A HAMPSHIRE dad found hanging two days after he went missing took his own life because he felt there was “no way out” of his money worries, an inquest heard.

Edmund Jeske was discovered in the New Forest by a dog walker 24 hours after a major police search operation was launched to find him after he failed to return home from renovating a house.

On top of his financial problems, the 65-year-old was also trying to cope with the suicide of his sister who took her own life just a year before.

Southampton Coroner’s Court heard how Mr Jeske – who was known as “Eddie” to his friends – was last seen by his wife Patricia on December 28, as he left to carry out some work on a property in Rosebery Avenue that he was renovating.

He told his wife as he left their home in Main Road, Hythe, that he “wouldn’t be long” but when he failed to return his family quickly became worried.

The next morning his daughter Portia Back reported her father’s disappearance to the police, having gone to the house in Rosebery Avenue to find his van parked on the driveway but he was nowhere to be seen.

They were particularly worried because they told police that over the last few months he had been feeling depressed with financial and work issues and had at one point told them that “there was no way out”.

A major search operation was launched involving more than 70 officers and specialist search teams, on land, by air and at sea, were deployed but sadly his body was discovered in Butts Ash Wood.

Detective Sergeant Frank Nelson, who found a note by the body, told the inquest: “It appears to be a very difficult situation where things had got on top of him, compounded by the fact his sister took her own life the previous year.”

Coroner Keith Wiseman ruled that Mr Jeske took his own life.