Man's door kicked in after police fear he's dead (From Braintree and Witham Times)

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Man's door kicked in after police fear he's dead

11:25am Monday 30th June 2008

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A SALESMAN came home from a business trip to find police had kicked his door in - because they feared he was dead.

Officers were called to Tom Roy's flat in Cressing Road, Braintree, after a neighbour reported a bad smell.

But the 42-year-old had flown to Phoenix, Arizona, earlier that day and returned home at 5pm last Monday after more than 16 hours of travelling to find his front door boarded over and a note to contact Braintree Police Station.

Mr Roy, a diabetic, said he spent more than 30 minutes trying to contact the station before going there in person, to then be passed onto the control centre. He managed to get into his house two hours later using a screwdriver and police arranged for a contractor to secure the entrance.

It turned out the bad smell was from a large stain outside a nearby flat, which Mr Roy said came from a resident's rubbish bag.

The police have apologised following the incident on June 19 and the door was completely mended on Friday.

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Dave, Brantree says...
11:34am Wed 2 Jul 08

Surely an obvious stain on the ground outside a neighbouring flat should have been investigated first before breaking down the door and leaving it prone to burglary.
Or was this a case of extreme health and safety by not checking if indeed the stain was the cause.

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Steve, Braintree says...
2:44pm today Wed 2 Jul 08

Dave wrote:
Surely an obvious stain on the ground outside a neighbouring flat should have been investigated first before breaking down the door and leaving it prone to burglary. Or was this a case of extreme health and safety by not checking if indeed the stain was the cause.

Damned if they do, damned if they don't. I would imagine that trained police officers responding to a "i think my neighbour is dead" call are more likely to act on the information given first, then ask questions later. Imagine if they spent time investigating the stain, whilst someone was taking their last 2 breaths inside the flat.

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Dave, Braintree says...
10:10am Fri 4 Jul 08

Steve, you need to learn a bit of science. If there was a smell it would take a person with the slightest iota of intelligence to realise that the body would be deceased with little likelyhood of even taking 1 breath let alone 2. So it would not matter how long it took to investigate the stain.

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Steve, Braintree says...
12:10pm Sat 5 Jul 08

The last comment in my original post was rhetorical. Liken it to shoot or be shot - quick decisions have to be made then stood by. The police made theirs based on a report. My comment was based more on how this case would have been reported by the press if someone had died but the police decided to spend their time investigating something else (ie. a stain).

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Dave, Braintree says...
1:49pm Sat 5 Jul 08

You still don't understand that my comment was based upon the facts, as reported, not some hypothetical theory or rhetorical comment. It still remains fact that the man was not dead and that if society was more neighbourly a neighbour would have surely known that the man had gone on a trip. A classic case of neighbourhood watch. I talk to my neighbours and they in turn are aware if I am away from home and look out for anything untoward.

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Steve, Braintree says...
2:53pm Sat 5 Jul 08

Society and being neighbourly. Well there's a laugh in the 21st century ;o)

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