Teenage violin prodigy died in self-harm misadventure
A TEENAGE violin prodigy who died at her family’s Kensington home had been self-harming but did not mean to kill herself, an inquest has ruled.
Ekaterina Tsukanova, the daughter of Russian banker Igor Tsukanov, was found dead at the £9.5 million property on June 18, just eight days after she performed at the Royal Opera House.
She returned home at 3:30am after a night out with friends and was let in by her father, but a few hours later her body was discovered in the bathroom.
Police found compression marks around her neck, and a post mortem examination found they matched a ligature found by her body – concluding she had died from “fatal compression to the neck”. Officers also found a knife in the room and cuts to her forearms.
Dr Shirley Radcliff, the Westminster Coroner, ruled that she had died by “misadventure”, and had not intended to kill herself.
Earlier this year, her father reported that she had died of a drugs overdose from a cocktail of cocaine and ketamine known as a “Calvin Klein”, but a toxicology report showed that there were no drugs present in her system.
The inquest was told that on June 5 2018, she told a psychologist she had been self-harming and drinking to cope with GCSE exam stress.
Tanya Lecchi, her therapist, told the inquest that Ekaterina, 17, a student at £12,600-a-term Wycombe Abbey girls’ boarding school in Buckinghamshire, went through “dark periods.”
Dr Radcliff said: “There was no suicide note, there had been no previous attempt, there was no significant history of psychological significance.
“She was intoxicated, and that has led me to consider if she had a clear thought to harm herself or if this was an impulsive act. I conclude that this was a case of misadventure – she deliberately undertook an act that had unexpected consequences.”