A teenage boy was found dead from drugs at a residential unit three weeks after his mother signed him into HSE care, an inquest heard.
The 16-year-old, who cannot be named for legal reasons, was found dead at a Focus Ireland residential unit in Dublin on February 19th, last year.
Dublin Coroner’s Court heard he was not a known drug user but spent the day before taking tablets at his mother’s house.
He had been living at the unit for the previous three weeks. A representative for child and family agency Tusla, speaking from the body of the court, said he was accepted into their care in December 2012, having presented to emergency services.
He was placed in an emergency hostel but then returned to his mother’s home. “He was continuously returning home to care for his mother because he felt that she was under threat,” he told the court.
This happened several times until his mother voluntarily signed him into the care of the HSE in February 2013.
A social worker had been assigned to him since 2007. There was never a court order involved. The boy wanted to be taken into care, the court heard, because he could “no longer tolerate” the situation at home.
He was described as “one of the nicest young people” Tusla workers engaged with. His stepfather’s family said he had been living with them and doing well, but his mother had called social services to take him back to her home.
He was placed in the residential unit on February 4th. Speaking from the body of the court, Focus Ireland services manager Neil Forsyth said he was a “sweet boy” and they “thought he would do quite well”.
There are conflicting accounts of February 18th, the day before his death. The depositions of two other residents of the unit were read into the record in their absence. One told gardaí they were drinking and smoking cannabis in the boy’s mother’s house, but she was not involved, spending most of the time in the bedroom.
However, the other boy told gardaíthey were taking sleeping tablets in the house which they bought from the mother’s partner, with the deceased also buying some sedatives. He also claimed that the boy’s mother took some of the tablets with them.
Garda Killian Murphy told the inquest that on taking a statement from the mother, who was not present in court, she reacted “extremely aggressively” when asked about drug use and refused to continue. The partner was also questioned and denied selling the drugs to the boys.
There was no prosecution arising from the Garda investigation into supply issues.
When the deceased and his friends returned to the residential unit, they were arguing. Relief worker Shane Browne was not present to give evidence, but in his deposition, read into the record, he said when they arrived back their “eyes were pinned like dots” and the deceased seemed “very affected”.
After the deceased went to bed at about 7.30pm he was checked on every 30 minutes but he was asleep and workers did not enter the room.
Mr Browne told gardaí he was sleeping in the next room and heard him snoring until 3am.
He found him dead the following morning when he went to wake him for breakfast at 8.30am.
The cause of death was multi-drug toxicity with methadone, sleeping tablets and sedatives found in his system.
The court earlier heard he was not a known drug user and Tusla had no concerns in this regard.
Coroner Dr Brian Farrell said that as a naive user with no tolerance of methadone, it would disproportionately effect him.
The jury returned a verdict of death by misadventure and recommended the residential unit carry out regular, documented, visual checks where a minor is perceived to be under the influence of alcohol or drugs.