A “defective” bean bag bed caused the death of a woman after falling and trapping her, a coroner’s report said.
Helen Davey, 39, was bent over bed storage when the gas-elevated section fell.
Her daughter found her
According to the coroner’s report, her neck became trapped in the base of the bed and she was unable to free herself, and suffocated to death at her home in Seaham, County Durham. The beautician was reportedly found lying on her back with her head under the bed by her daughter Elizabeth, who tried to free her, according to the Northern Echo newspaper.
Jeremy Chipperfield, coroner for Durham and Darlington, ruled at an inquest earlier this month at Crook Coroners’ Court that Mrs. Davey’s death was an accident. To help prevent future deaths, coroners can produce reports that prompt other authorities to consider taking action. In a report to Business Minister Jonathan Reynolds and the Office of Product Safety and Standards, Chipperfield said one of the two gas pistons used to raise Davey’s bed was “defective”.
“The decedent was hunched over the storage area of an ottoman-style ‘gas lift bed’ when the mattress platform unexpectedly lowered, trapping her neck on the top surface of the side panel of the bed base,” the coroner wrote.
“Unable to free himself, he died from positional asphyxiation. One of the two gas lift pistons was defective.
Source: Sky News