Drugs killed our party girl
Rugby club chairman’s teenage daughter dies after taking ‘Pink Teddy’ ecstasy at rave
HER parents had told their party-loving daughter to stay well away from drugs.
But when Lauren Atkinson left with friends for a weekend rave, she didn’t follow their advice.
The 19-year- old beautician collapsed and died in a hotel room after taking a cocktail of drugs including ecstasy, an inquest was told.
Miss Atkinson took two ‘ Pink Teddy’ MDMA tablets, as well as cocaine and ‘hippy crack’ at the allnight party run by The Warehouse Project in Manchester, an event which has been associated with a string of deaths.
When she got back to her hotel, she became paranoid, fearing there was an intruder lurking on a balcony, before having a fit and collapsing on the bathroom floor.
Friends put her to bed before calling an ambulance but Miss Atkinson died at the scene. One admitted they ought to have dialled 999 immediately but had ‘thought she was OK’. As a coroner described Miss Atkin- son’s death as ‘every parent’s worst nightmare’ it emerged that her family had done their best to warn her of the dangers of drugs.
Her father Nigel, 50, who runs Ulverston Rugby League Club in the Lake District, told the inquest: ‘Lauren lived life to the full and loved to party at weekends. We had always advised her against taking drugs, but could only ever advise her, and she never gave any indication she had taken drugs.’ But he insisted: ‘I am not naive about what she did but I don’t believe she took drugs on a regular basis, it was more a recreational thing.’
The tragedy occurred in December 2016 after Miss Atkinson, from Ulverston, travelled to the £35-a-head party run by The Warehouse Project at a car park under Piccadilly railway station. Just 24 hours earlier she posted a message online saying: ‘So excited – roll on tomorrow.’
Her friend Sophie Jackson told the inquest in Manchester that Miss Atkinson had taken a variety of drugs as well as drinking vodka but she had ‘seemed fine’ until they left at about 4.30am. She said her friend seemed ‘a bit paranoid’ as they waited for a taxi.
Later at the hotel Miss Atkinson suffered a fit. ‘We tried to get her into bed and she just stopped breathing at that point,’ she said.
The friends called an ambulance and were told to try CPR on Miss Atkinson. Paramedics arrived soon after but she died at the scene.
Coroner Fiona Borrill recorded a conclusion of drug-related death.
‘Her mother and father spoke to Lauren about the risks of drug taking,’ she said. ‘These risks can occur even when drugs are taken recreationally and it is clear Lauren and her friends have underestimated the risks and toxic effects.’
‘She just stopped breathing’