18 DEATHS ‘LINKED TO GAS COOKERS’
Legal firm claims Beko range may be involved in carbon monoxide tragedies
GAS cookers made by the country’s top large home-appliance brand Beko may be linked to 18 fatalities in the UK and Ireland.
This week a coroner will probe five deaths from suspected carbon monoxide poisoning that are believed to have involved a faulty range of Beko cookers.
The cookers are now known to have emitted the deadly gas when the grill was incorrectly used with the door shut.
Kevin Branton, 32, and his pal Richard Smith, 30, were found dead in their house in Saltash, Cornwall, in November 2010.
Audrey Cook, 86, husband Alfred, 90, and their daughter Maureen, 47, died at their static caravan in Camborne, Cornwall, in February 2013.
Richard’s dad, Brian, said the families want to know the truth about why the two young men had died 10 years ago.
Leigh Day, the legal firm acting for the families of the five victims, believes that the cookers are linked to 13 more deaths, including three in Ireland, from 2008 to 2015.
A recall of the ovens was launched in early 2009, but Beko failed to notify trading standards of all of the affected models. It was fined £76,659 in November 2014 for breaching safety regulations because of the notification failures.
A spokesman for Beko, which has sold more than 30 million appliances in the UK, said: “We deeply regret any incident linked to one of our products. We are cooperating fully with the coroner’s investigation and will do so throughout the inquest.”