After returning home after a night out, a man accidentally hanged himself while “joking”. He tried to scare off his fiancee.
Philip Burns died at his home on Thomson Street in Carlisle on February 28, aged 36. Cockermouth’s Coroner’s Court says Burns worked in Glasgow during the week and returned to Carlisle at the weekends to be with his fiancee Michelle Delahunty-Evans.
On February 26th he arrived in Carlisle in the afternoon and he and his fiancee went to a pub for a quiz. She said that Burns had used some cocaine, but that he didn’t do it often. On Sunday evening, February 27, they went out in Carlisle, had “quite a few drinks” and “had a good time”. She said they went home afterwards and were “joking around” and “being silly.”
Delahunty-Evans said when she turned while watching TV and singing along, she saw Burns standing with his back to the door. She said Burns tried to scare her while they were watching American Horror Story that weekend. Upon further investigation, it turned out that Burns had been “playing around” to get his fiancee’s attention. Just after 3:30 a.m., emergency services received a call about a 36-year-old man who was not breathing.
Delahunty-Evans couldn’t find her phone to call 999, so she ran outside and asked for help. A police officer who went to the scene said when he got there he saw a man on the ground who wasn’t breathing and someone resuscitating him. He said that Burns’ partner was “drunk” and “surprised” by what was going on. Burns was already on the ground when a police sergeant arrived, and the door frame was broken.
Delahunty-Evans couldn’t find her phone so she couldn’t call 999 so she went outside and asked for help. (Facebook/Philip Burns)
A toxicological analysis of his blood revealed that he had used cocaine and had a lot of alcohol in his system. The coroner, Dr. Nicholas Shaw said Burns had shown no signs of wanting to kill himself in recent months. He told the Daily Mail: “When you find someone hanging from a rope, your first thought is that they have killed themselves. Philip has never had a history of mental illness or harming himself. He went out for the night and looks like he’s having a good time.”
“Most people don’t kill themselves when other people are in the room at the same time. I have a hard time believing that he killed himself. I rather think he did something wrong because they messed around and it went wrong. Nobody will find out. Philip can’t tell us about the other side. I think it’s very likely that he was messing around when something went wrong,” he said. He said Burns was probably hanging on the door to scare his fiancee when the rope tightened, killing him. dr Shaw ruled that Burns died by accident and the cause of death was listed as hanging.