Carphone Warehouse salesman dies in car boot

Xmas bash ends in suffocation tragedy

By Lester Haines • Get more from this author

Posted in Mobile, 15th August 2007 10:23 GMT

A Carphone Warehouse salesman's work Xmas bash revelries ended in tragedy after he suffocated in the boot of his car.

Dad-of-one Charles Courtier-Dutton, 34, went to the Thames Ditton pub session in his BMW 325, despite pregnant wife Lucy's pleas for him to take a cab. He apparently decided to sleep off the effects in the car, but was trapped when the keys "with the fob to spring the lock slipped out of reach in the boot", The Sun reports.

He died after desperate attempts to escape, in the process sustaining several injuries "where he had torn in a frenzy at the boot lining, wiring, and lock to get out". He'd also pushed "paper and pieces of broken toy through a rubber seal to attract attention or make a gap for air".

Police found his body in the "badly-parked" car 14 hours later. The vehicle had "all the windows open, golf clubs on the back seat, and a bulge in the boot lid made by [his] attempts to kick open the boot". The BMW's computer later revealed at what time he'd removed the keys from the ignition to get into the boot, coroner Michael Burgess said.

Burgess concluded he was convinced no one else was involved in the tragedy, and recorded a verdict of accidental death. ®

Bootnote

For the benefit of those of you who've been huffing and puffing that this is old news, the unfortunate incident was indeed last December, but the coroner's hearing has only just delivered its verdict.

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