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Friends from schooldays Andy Benade, Andrew Small, Michael Bourke and Stephen O’Connor. |
Friends remember a ‘gentle giant’
FRIENDS from schooldays who carried Dean Bennett’s coffin from St Martin’s Church in Gospel Oak on Thursday later lined up at his wake to toast the man they knew as a “gentle giant”.
Mr Bennett, 34, died last month after falling from a West Hampstead tower block.
At the wake in the Golden Lion pub in Royal College Street, Camden Town, his friends remembered how as youngsters they played together at a park in Quex Road.
One of them, Michael Bourke, said: “Those days of your youth when you’re always in each other’s pockets. You only have a few people like that – it was like that for us.
“They were really, really happy days – I don’t think a lot of people get that.”
Another friend, Stephen O’Connor, remembered Mr Bennett’s playfulness. “He was a bit of a comic,” he said. “The sort of lad who would pull his trousers down to make the girls laugh. He was annoyingly better than anyone at everything, and especially sports.
“He was one of those people who’d walk into a room and everyone would look at him.”
During the service Mr Bennett’s father Ray, a retired postman, sang the slave song Michael Row The Boat Ashore, a favourite with Mr Bennett Snr and his friends – who joined in from the pews – after they came up with a rude version while on holiday 20 years ago. “Dean loved it – both versions,” said his father.
At the funeral, the Reverend John Hayward questioned Mr Bennett’s care in the days before his death.
He offered support to Mr Bennett’s parents, who hope to sue Camden and Islington Mental Health and Social Care Trust over the death.
They say their son should not have been allowed to visit his home unsupervised just four days after he was “sectioned” by his mother and admitted to Grove Centre, at the Royal Free Hospital in Hampstead.
Mr Hayward told the mourners: “The voices he heard and the serious depression, coupled with erratic medication and a seemingly premature release from hospital, led to a final leap which brings us all to his funeral today.
“I pay tribute to Dean. His tragic death brought to a tragic end the love of life; music, dance and racing of go-karts and horses.
“He was a bright child and an affectionate man.” |
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