COLIN Jones believes his daughter would still be alive if she had been kept in Barnsley Hospital on the night she fell from a bridge. One year later, he is furious because he has received no apology.
Caroline Leaver, of Cover Drive, Darfield, was 32 when she died after falling from the M1 junction 37 motorway bridge at Dodworth.
About four hours earlier she had discharged herself from the hospital where she had been taken after suffering “an acute psychotic episode”.
During her inquest last September, coroner Chris Dorries said Caroline, who had no history of mental illness, “may not have realised the nature and quality of her actions”.
Delivering a narrative verdict, he said: “There needs to be a system whereby there is at least some hope that people in this situation can be protected from their own illness.”
Colin said that after the inquest he expected a letter of apology from the hospital and an explanation of the action that had been taken to improve the system.
“It’s over 12 months since the inquest now and I’ve still had no letter from the hospital.
“I would’ve thought they’d have the courtesy to write, even if it’s just a note.
“If it only saves one other person’s life then some good’s come out of it. That’s why I’m persisting about it.”
Caroline’s family became extremely concerned in March last year when she began shouting that she had AIDS and cancer, and that she and everyone else in the house was going to die.
At 11.25pm she was seen by a doctor, who ordered an emergency psychiatric assessment, but she left the hospital before it could take place and returned to her parents’ home at Laceby Court, Kingstone. Later that night, Caroline said she wanted to go back to hospital, but as Colin was de-icing the car, she walked off and said he could pick her up on the way. That was the last time Colin saw her.
Witnesses saw Caroline running and crawling up Dodworth Road in freezing temperature with no shoes and inadequate clothing.
Colin said: “They should have sedated her and put her in a secure place, and she’d still have been here today, but they didn’t and she walked out.”
