Simon Dodds

Simon Dodds died after going into the River Kent, near Levens, Cumbria.

His wife was arrested on suspicion of murder but the case was later dropped.

He had injuries but it was not known whether they were caused before or after he went in and his inquest stated that it was not known how he came to be in the water.

His post mortem found that he died from drowning, with a blunt force head injury.

He had been with his estranged wife at the time who said that he had jumped in after her after she had fallen in, but that she had managed to get back out after holding onto a tree for several hours.

However, it was heard that his estranged wife gave inconsistent accounts of what had happened, and that a suicide video that she had recorded was made 30 minutes after they had been in the water. The video detailed her plans to jump in the river.

It was also heard that Simon Dodds had something like a shoe print on his head and that the injury to his head was caused immediately before he died. His body was found about a mile downstream.

She was later arrested for his murder but later released with no further action.

The Coroner said that her account was, 'difficult, if not impossible to reconcile or explain'.

His post mortem found that he had received a severe head injury immediately before his death. However, it could not be determined whether he had been hit on the head by a third party or whether the injuries were caused by the swollen river.

His mother said that Simon Dodds was a non-swimmer and had been scared of the water and that she thought that he would have gone for help first, rather than jumping in.

Simon Dodds had run Fell View newsagents in Ambleside and they had three daughters, aged 7, 10 and 12 but he had been their sole carer as his wife was in a mental health hospital.

Simon Dodds and his wife were estranged and Simon Dodds had asked his wife several times for a divorce as he had met someone else whilst she was in hospital.

His wife was bipolar and had been a long term patient at The Priory, in Darlington, but was allowed fortnightly visits to see their children. However, on 10 August 2019 she had gone to stay with Simon Dodds while their children had been on holiday in Skegness with relatives.

She had been due back at The Priory by 11pm and at 7.59pm they were seen in CCTV getting into a red Vauxhall estate outside the newsagents.

The car was spotted the following morning, 11 August 2019, at 6.20am in a lay-by at Brettargh Holt by a woman, with a smashed windscreen. She saw Simon Dodds's wife, who was wet and shivering, standing in front of the car in the rain and she stopped to help.

Simon Dodds's wife then told the woman that she had slipped into the river whilst she was going to the toilet the previous night at 9pm, and that Simon Dodds had then gone in after her.

She said that they were then swept along the river and went down a waterfall but that she managed to grab hold of a branch which she held onto throughout the night and that she managed to pull herself out the following morning at day-break around 5.30am.

She said that Simon Dodds had also grabbed onto a branch on the opposite bank and that they were screaming at each other until about 11pm when she thought that he had lost his grip and was carried away by the current.

However, the woman that found Simon Dodds's wife said that she knew the stretch of river and that there were no trees there. She noted that the River Kent was fast flowing and strewn with loose boulders and was the worst she had ever seen it.

She said that she then asked Simon Dodds's wife why she didn't go for help at some of the nearby houses, and said that she told her that she hadn't seen the houses.

The woman further noted that she overheard Simon Dodds's wife tell the paramedics when they arrived that she had blacked out at 11pm and also heard her changing other times.

At the inquest, the woman said, 'I found her behaviour peculiar. If I had lost my partner I would have been screaming and hysterical'.

She said that she noticed blood on the car's damaged windscreen, but saw no bruising on Simon Dodds's wife and said 'I felt really uneasy about what she told me'. She added that the river was the worst she had ever seen it and said, 'I cannot comprehend how anybody could have got out of that river'.

Simon Dodds's wife was then taken to Lancaster Royal Infirmary.

When the police arrived they broke into the car and took Simon Dodds's wife's phone and when they examined it they found a video message that had been recorded at 9.26pm on 10 August 2019 in which she said that voices were telling her to do as they said else they would kill her girls. In the recording she said, 'I’m going to say I’m desperate to use the toilet and then jump in the river'. They also found a written suicide note in the car about her jumping into the river inside a pink notebook.

However, when she was later questioned at the hospital she denied that she had had any suicidal thoughts and said that she had merely slipped into the river and that Simon Dodds had then gone in after her.

However, she later told doctors at the hospital that she had jumped in on purpose to kill herself but that she had immediately regretted it.

Simon Dodds was later found in the river in a log jam on 13 August 2019 at 2pm just below the A6 bridge.

A man that monitored the River Kent said that it had been 1.5m above its normal level and its velocity was very high and added that mobile rocks and boulders on the river bed made it dangerous for anybody in the water.

A pathologist that examined Simon Dodds's body said that he found a large laceration on his scalp and a lesser cut on his forehead that was caused by a patterned object, such as footwear.

It was further stated that the injury, which could have led to unconsciousness, had been caused when he was still alive and immediately before he drowned.

Simon Dodds's mother detailed how Simon Dodds and his wife had met, and said that after some time Simon Dodds's wife's mental health deteriorated and she couldn't cope with the children and was admitted to The Priory, after which Simon Dodds met a woman from the Philippines in January 2019 and then asked his wife for a divorce.

She added that in July 2019 that his wife snuck into Simon Dodds's newsagents and attacked him in front of one of their daughters. She noted also that a week before Simon Dodds died that he had a grazed right cheek which he refused to explain.

She also added that Simon Dodds was afraid of water and would only ever paddle ankle deep or stay in the shallow end of a swimming pool and that she would not have expected him to have jumped into the river. She said, 'He would not have got himself within inches of a river. If his wife had gone in he would have called 999, but he would never have gone in. I cannot get my head around why Lisa was there and the children were away'.

After the case was dropped against Simon Dodds's wife, the police said, 'A criminal investigation took place to establish the circumstances around the death of a 43-year-old man whose body was found in the area of the River Kent near Levens Lanes on the 13August 2019. As part of this investigation a woman was arrested on suspicion of murder and released under investigation. Following a thorough investigation a decision was taken to take no further action and a file was passed to the coroner’s office'.