Corkman heard calling for his mother hours before suicide in prison

 Andrew Gearns took his own life in Cork Prison.

A man who was suffering distressing delusions about being stabbed and had some six risk factors for suicide was seen by medical staff for less than five minutes on the day of his fatal attempt on his own life in Cork Prison, an inquest has heard.

Andrew Gearns, 29, a former engineer and father of two from Model Farm Road in Cork, was heard calling for his mother in the hours before his death.

Mr Gearns had developed a drug addiction after being prescribed benzodiazepines to cope with pain following a car crash in 2016. He entered Cork Prison “at a low ebb” on September 22, 2020, and was found unresponsive in his cell on September 28, 2020, after a fatal attempt on his own life.

 Since September 27, 2020, he had suffered delusions of being “stabbed and slashed” and thought some 50 people were outside his cell trying to attack him.

Following a phone call from Mr Gearns’ mother who was extremely concerned about his mental state on September 28, 2020, Mr Gearns was checked on some 13 times by prison staff between approximately 12.30pm and the time he was found unresponsive in his cell after 4pm.

However, Elizabeth O’Connell, senior counsel for the family, said that one of these checks amounted to just a one-second look through a window in his cell door and two similar checks lasted just two seconds each.

CCTV analysis showed that 12 of the 13 checks were by prison officers who were not aware of Mr Gearns' previous suicide attempt or his recent diagnosis of psychosis since entering the prison.

Doctor's visit

Although a doctor came to his door once on the day of his death, Mr Gearns said he did not want to see him, and the doctor left without seeing the patient. The doctor was present outside the cell with a nurse for 34 seconds, according to CCTV analysis.

Nurse Caroline Murphy said that they had no choice but to leave when Mr Gearns, who was lying on the bed, refused to engage with the doctor.

Ms O’Connell questioned whether one three-minute visit from a nurse and another one-minute and 55-second visit from a nurse were sufficient for a patient as complex as Mr Gearns who had five to six recognised risk factors for suicide and who was suffering very distressing delusional thoughts.

Mr Gearns told the Irish Prison Service in 2018 that he tried to kill himself while in garda custody and he was put on special observation at that time. But he was not put on special observation when entering Cork Prison again in 2020 as he claimed that he did not have mental health issues and he twice said that he had no intention to hurt himself.

Nurse Consultant Enda Kelly agreed that Mr Gearns’ smoking heroin and taking the medications Anxicalm and Halcion before coming into prison may have affected his clinical presentation when giving his committal interview to a nurse on September 22, 2020.

It was also noted that in 2019, it had been requested at the Coroner's Court that the prison committal interview process be kept under review.

Pandemic

Mr Gearns was a new committal to Cork Prison in September 2020 at the height of the Covid pandemic and was displaying some Covid symptoms so he was placed in quarantine, which meant that he was left alone in a two-person cell for six to seven days.

He started suffering delusional thoughts on September 27 when he said that he had gone for a walk and had been attacked on Watercourse Road in Blackpool where he was stabbed and slashed in the face and chest.

State Pathologist Dr Margot Bolster gave the cause of death as hypoxic-ischemic encephalopathy due to cardiac arrest. She said he would have lost consciousness very quickly and would not have suffered for long.

But he would have suffered catastrophic brain damage in the process.

Some 14 family and friends of Mr Gearns sat for the hearing at Cork Coroner’s Court.

The inquest, in front of Coroner Philip Comyn and a jury of four men and two women, continues.