Love Island star hanged herself ‘after drink and drugs binge’
LOVE Island contestant Sophie Gradon took her own life after bingeing on cocaine and alcohol, an inquest heard yesterday.
The former Miss Great Britain, 32, texted a friend that she was struggling and ‘wanted to escape’.
Miss Gradon, who hanged herself last June, said she felt anxious after ‘selling her soul’ to appear on the controversial ITV2 dating show two years before. The model had been struggling in the three weeks since the drugs death of close friend Paul Burns.
Mr Burns, who died from an overdose of MDMA – ecstasy – had ‘previously stopped her taking her own life’ North Tyneside Coroner’s Court heard.
Privately- educated graduate Miss Gradon was found dead on June 20 by her boyfriend Aaron Armstrong, who killed himself in a similar fashion 20 days later. Hours before she died, Miss Gradon texted a friend, Sondeep Gill, saying: ‘If I could escape I would. I have been struggling with the world, no one knows why or how. I would never want to do that to my family but if I could escape I would... I cannot do this any more I struggle every day.’
Mr Gill, who also spoke to Miss Gradon on the phone until 2.40am, told police: ‘ Her speech was slurred, she was repeating herself a lot. I was worried she sounded down.’ When Mr Armstrong, 25, Miss Gradon’s boyfriend of eight weeks, tried to contact her the next morning she did not reply.
He and his brother visited Miss Gradon’s large detached family home in the village of Medburn, Northumberland, where they found her body.
Delivering a narrative verdict, coroner Eric Armstrong said cocaine and alcohol, which a post-mortem found in her system, may have prevented Miss Gradon thinking ‘rationally or logically’ and so he could not record a verdict of suicide.
Research showed that people who mixed drink and drugs
‘Her speech was slurred’
were 16 times more likely to kill themselves, he warned.
‘If Sophie’s death is to serve any purpose at all that message should go out far and wide. I must warn about imbibing alcohol and using cocaine,’ he said. The combination could ‘give rise to violent thoughts, and those thoughts can be directed against the self’.
Miss Gradon, who began modelling at 16, won Miss Newcastle in 2008 and was crowned Miss Great Britain the following year. Friends claim she fell victim to the perils of instant fame after appearing on Love Island in 2016. Miss Gradon said taking part had left her stressed.
She felt she had ‘sold her soul’ to reality TV, criticised the show’s makers for lack of psychological aftercare and said she had battled depression, exacerbated by online abuse.
Last night Miss Gradon’s parents, Deborah and Colin, disputed the findings of the inquest. They said the postmortem showed their daughter had an undiagnosed condition, arteriovenous malformation, that affected her brain and can cause irrational thoughts. She was also on medication, which could have led to the belief she had taken cocaine.
The inquest came five weeks after another former Love Island star, Mike Thalassitis, 26, was also found hanged – leading Health Secretary Matt Hancock to question how much emotional support reality TV contestants are offered.
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