Inquiry into Dalian death delayed by ‘quality failure’ at forensic tests firm
THE police watchdog’s inquiry into the death of exfootballer Dalian Atkinson has been delayed by a “quality failure” at a forensic testing firm, an inquest has heard.
Shropshire Coroner’s Court was told toxicology samples taken after the former Aston Villa star’s death were being retested after a significant number of cases were “potentially compromised” by a private company.
Coroner John Ellery, who adjourned a pre-inquest review into Mr Atkinson’s death until January, heard that “urgent” retesting of the samples was now being conducted by Avon and Somerset Police.
Mr Atkinson, who also played for Ipswich and Sheffield Wednesday, died in August last year after police used a Taser during an incident in the Trench area of Telford.
In a statement read to a preinquest hearing in Shrewsbury, Independent Police Complaints Commission (IPCC) operations team leader Paul Marriott said a testing firm instructed by the watchdog had allocated toxicology analysis to Randox Testing Services.
Mr Marriott’s statement added: “This analysis was completed. However, a quality failure within Randox Testing Services was subsequently identified, which potentially compromised a significant number of cases across the criminal justice system nationally.
“Due to the number of cases impacted by this issue, Avon and Somerset Police were tasked to coordinate the retesting nationally and they categorised the cases in order of priority.”
Mr Marriott, the case supervisor for the inquiry, said the IPCC had been unable to obtain any timeframe in relation to the testing, despite regular inquiries by its senior management.
The pre-inquest review was told that Mr Ellery then “raised queries” about the retesting timeframe with the IPCC on September 14.
The court heard the retesting process started on September 18 and was expected to be completed next week.
A toxicology report will then be sent to the pathologist, enabling him to complete a final post-mortem report.
Mr Marriott said: “Once the IPCC receives the final post-mortem report, we will then complete our final investigation report.
“This report will go through internal IPCC quality assurance processes and the IPCC commissioner will then determine whether a referral to the Crown Prosecution Service will be made.
“Due to the number of individual parties involved in the process, we feel unable to provide a definitive timeframe.
“However, in our opinion it would be reasonable to re-list the pre-inquest review for three months from now, during which time we hope to conclude our investigation.”
The National Police Chiefs’ Council said in May that a criminal probe was under way into allegations of “data manipulation” linked to Randox Testing Services.
The council said the allegations related to data that supported samples and there was no evidence of manipulation of actual samples.
The IPCC said last month that its investigation into Mr Atkinson’s death was nearing completion.
The watchdog said three West Mercia Police officers had been interviewed under criminal caution, while around 15 other officers had been spoken to as witnesses.