Mystery over why young council worker hanged himself (From Daily Echo)

Suicide of young council worker a mystery

5:20pm Thursday 31st May 2012 in News

MYSTERY surrounds the reason why a young Southampton council worker killed himself.

Ross Welch was found hanged in his bedroom. Southampton Coroner’s Court heard that friend Keith Blake tried to get into the 22-year-old’s room at the house they shared with three other men, when he couldn’t raise him for work early on March 16.

Paramedics pronounced Mr Welch dead shortly after police arrived.

An inquest heard that the former Ford factory worker had previously tried to hang himself, as well as threatening to throw himself from the Itchen Bridge.

However, his friends told police that he had been in good spirits the night before he died, laughing and joking before going to bed.

Mr Welch was said to have split up with a new girlfriend on March 15, but had got back together with her later that day.

Deputy coroner Gordon Denson said there was no doubt that Mr Welch had knowingly taken his own life, but the reasons are not fully clear.