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You are here: BAILII >> Databases >> England and Wales High Court (Administrative Court) Decisions >> Shipsey & Anor v HM Senior Coroner for Worcestershire [2025] EWHC 605 (Admin) (14 March 2025) URL: http://www.bailii.org/ew/cases/EWHC/Admin/2025/605.html Cite as: [2025] EWHC 605 (Admin) |
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KING'S BENCH DIVISION
ADMINISTRATIVE COURT
DIVISIONAL COURT
Strand, London, WC2A 2LL |
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B e f o r e :
MRS JUSTICE HILL
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DOUGLAS AND CAROLE SHIPSEY |
Claimant |
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- and - |
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HM SENIOR CORONER FOR WORCESTERSHIRE |
Defendant |
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- and - |
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WORCESTERSHIRE ACUTE HOSPITALS NHS TRUST |
First Interested Party |
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HEREFORDSHIRE AND WORCESTERSHIRE HEALTH AND CARE NHS TRUST |
Second Interested Party |
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Briony Ballard (instructed by Worcestershire County Council) for the Defendant
Bridget Dolan KC (instructed by Herefordshire and Worcestershire NHS combined Legal Services) for the Interested Parties
Hearing date: 5 March 2025
Further written submissions: 6, 7 and 13 March 2025
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Crown Copyright ©
Mrs Justice Hill:
Introduction
"Bethany Shipsey was a young woman with significant mental health difficulties who, on 15 February 2017, died as the result of suicide having deliberately ingested a quantity of tablets containing the drug Dinitrophenol which she had purchased over the Internet.
She did so intending to take her own life and was admitted into the Worcestershire Royal Hospital at approximately 5:30 PM on that day.
The clinicians having care of her recognised the extreme toxicity of the drug, the lack of antidote, the risk of rapid deterioration and the need for close monitoring of her condition with a view to providing supportive treatment.
Notwithstanding this the clinicians failed to take sufficient or adequate steps to monitor her leaving them unprepared to deal with the rapid deterioration which ensued.
There were significant failings in the care given to her which amounted to a lost opportunity to provide supportive treatment which although probably would not have saved or prolonged her life may nevertheless have done so".
"(b)….whether by reason of fraud, rejection of evidence, irregularity of proceedings, insufficiency of inquiry, the discovery of new facts or evidence or otherwise…it is necessary or desirable in the interests of justice that an investigation (or as the case may be, another investigation) should be held".
The factual background
The events leading to Beth's death
The coronial proceedings
(i): The investigation
(ii): The inquest
(iii): The Coroner's ruling
The judicial review proceedings
The 'fiat' process
The procedural history of the section 13 application
The section 13 application as advanced in 2024
The Claimants' two February 2025 applications
Our assessment of the procedural issues
Applications (1) and (2)
Applications (3) and (4)
Applications (5) and (6)
Conclusion on the procedural issues
The merits of the Claimants' section 13 application, as advanced in 2024
The legal framework
"The single question is whether the interests of justice make a further inquest either necessary or desirable. The interests of justice, as they arise in the coronial process, are undefined, but, dealing with it broadly, it seems to us elementary that the emergence of fresh evidence which may reasonably lead to the conclusion that the substantial truth about how an individual met his death was not revealed at the first inquest, will normally make it both desirable and necessary in the interests of justice for a fresh inquest to be ordered. The decision is not based on problems with process, unless the process adopted at the original inquest has caused justice to be diverted or for the inquiry to be insufficient. What is more, it is not a pre-condition to an order for a further inquest that this court should anticipate that a different verdict to the one already reached will be returned. If a different verdict is likely, then the interests of justice will make it necessary for a fresh inquest to be ordered, but even when significant fresh evidence may serve to confirm the correctness of the earlier verdict, it may sometimes nevertheless be desirable for the full extent of the evidence which tends to confirm the correctness of the verdict to be publicly revealed" [emphasis added].
Application of the legal framework to this case
(i): New evidence from Beth's family including evidence of her social media use
(ii): New evidence from Dr Cosmo Hallström, Consultant Psychiatrist
"41. It is entirely consistent with her diagnoses...that Beth was relatively happy around lunchtime on the 15th of February 2017, but then quite suddenly was overwhelmed by emotions as she herself suggests and acted impulsively in some way in response to this.
42. I am not in a position to give a definitive answer as to her intention at the time of taking the tablets, but at the time of my original report, I quite clearly thought that it was not her intention to kill herself when she took the tablets but the sort of impulsive act that people with her sort of EUPD engage in…
43. On the balance of probabilities I do not think that it was her intention to kill herself, but more an impulsive act of deliberate self-harm possibly to reduce tension or at worst an episode of "Russian Roulette". She certainly did not know that she would inevitably die as a consequence of taking the overdose, as she would for example have known if she had placed a ligature around her neck and suspended herself in a place where she would avoid detection.
44. There was a lot of ambivalence expressed in her contemporary Facebook messages, and very little to suggest [that] she wanted to die. That was in contrast to what she told the A&E doctor and the Ambulance staff".
(iii): New toxicology evidence
Conclusion on the section 13(1)(b) test
Relief
The legal framework
"(a) order an investigation under Part 1 of the Coroners and Justice Act 2009 to be held into the death either—
(i) by the coroner concerned; or
(ii) by a senior coroner, area coroner or assistant coroner in the same coroner area;
(b) order the coroner concerned to pay such costs of and incidental to the application as to the court may appear just; and
(c) where an inquest has been held, quash any inquisition on, or determination or finding made at that inquest".
The issues relating to relief in this case
(i): Whether it is permissible to amend the Record of Inquest by quashing parts of it
(ii): Whether it was necessary to order a fresh coronial investigation
Costs
Conclusion
"Bethany Shipsey was a young woman with significant mental health difficulties who, on 15 February 2017, died having deliberately ingested a quantity of tablets containing the drug Dinitrophenol which she had purchased over the Internet.
She was admitted into the Worcestershire Royal Hospital at approximately 5:30 PM on that day.
The clinician having care of her recognised the extreme toxicity of the drug, the lack of antidote, the risk of rapid deterioration and the need for close monitoring of her condition with a view to providing supportive treatment.
Notwithstanding this the clinicians failed to take sufficient or adequate steps to monitor her leaving them unprepared to deal with the rapid deterioration which ensued.
There were significant failings in the care given to her which amounted to a lost opportunity to provide supportive treatment which although probably would not have saved or prolonged her life may nevertheless have done so".
Lady Justice Macur: