Friends find body of Burnley drug addict (42)

Craig Brown (42), of Brownhill Avenue, was found dead at his flat on April 13th, Burnley Coroner’s Court heard on Tuesday.

Dr Muhammad Aslam, consultant histopatholgist for East Lancashire conducted the post-mortem of Mr Brown and concluded he died of cardio-respiratory failure because of combined drug toxicity.

Mr Brown was found with 519mg/ltr of morphine his system as well as lower levels of methadone and diazepam.

Dr Aslam said the drugs would have multiplied each other’s toxic effects.

On April 13th friends became worried when Mr Brown was not answering his phone.

They broke into his flat where they found him in a collapsed state and burnt bits of tin-foil littering the ground.

An ambulance was called and paramedics confirmed he had passed away.

Mr Brown had been a keen footballer in his youth, before a knee injury at the age of 13 ended his playing career, the court was told.

Shortly afterwards he began sniffing glue and experimenting with cannabis and heroin.

Mr Brown suffered from chronic obstructive pulmonary disease - namely emphysema - and needed to take oxygen for 16 hours every day as his lungs only worked at 23% capacity.

Richard Taylor, senior coroner for East Lancashire District was told Mr Brown was taking heroin more often after being diagnosed with emphysema.

“Maybe he was upset by what he had found out and was taking more than he had done before, and his body could not take it,” he said.

Mr Taylor ruled that Mr Brown’s was a drug-related death.