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Islington Tribune - by CHARLOTTE CHAMBERS
Published: 18 April 2008

Coroner rejects ‘sudden death’

A GALLERY assistant found dead in a Barnsbury street had walked out of an emergency hospital ward 24 hours earlier, an inquest heard yesterday (Thursday).
Robert Nwaka was admitted to the acute admissions unit at University College Hospital, in Bloomsbury, on his 37th birthday in November last year. He was in an “acute confusional state”, according to medics giving evidence at a St Pancras inquest.
Two days later, the married father-of-one, from Kilburn, left hospital and made his way to Half Moon Crescent, off Caledonian Road.
Dressed in jeans and a t-shirt, Mr Nwaka’s lifeless body was found by a resident who earlier that evening had heard a moaning noise outside his window.
Mr Nwaka’s widow, Suzanna, 37, grilled a stream of medics who gave evidence.
She wanted to know why staff treated her husband for alcohol-related health problems when his two-year history of seizures was well known to the hospital.
Coroner Dr Andrew Reid said he did not accept the post-mortem results provided by a home office pathologist.
He adjourned the inquest to hear more evidence.
Dr Reid said: “The circumstances I’ve heard persuade me that this is not sudden death. I do not accept the cause of death given in autopsy is tenable.”

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