A distraught schoolgirl set herself on fire and died just days after being dumped by her boyfriend, an inquest heard.
Rebecca Berry, 15, was inconsolable after her partner of seven months split up with her, and in her despair made a shrine out of tea lights at the bottom of her garden, which would later kill her.
A hearing at Bournemouth Coroners’ Court heard she knelt in a circle of tea lights and then used a flammable liquid to set herself on fire. She died after inhaling toxic gases released by the liquid.
Rebecca, a pupil at Queen Elizabeth’s School in Wimborne, Dorset, told friends her life ‘wasn’t worth living’ after her boyfriend, who cannot be named for legal reasons, ended their relationship.
The coroner did not rule on whether her death was suicide, concluding that she couldn’t be ‘absolutely certain’ that Rebecca knew her actions would result in her death.
The inquest was told how her boyfriend broke up with Rebecca, who was adopted when she was less than a year old, on a Friday evening last winter, then blocked her from speaking to him on Facebook.
Rebecca, known as Rebe, then sent him increasingly worrying messages, in which she threatened suicide unless they got back together. She eventually went to his house in an attempt to salvage the relationship, which also ended in tears.
The worried boy started speaking to her again, but was not able to stop her from the apparent suicide.
Shortly before heading outside to light the candles, she sent him a final message saying: ‘I just want to say I love you for the last time, so bye.’
The first Rebecca’s adoptive mother knew of her death was when she saw candles flickering in the garden and went to investigate. Paramedics responded, but were unable to save her.
Joe Williams, a detective sergeant for Devon and Cornwall Police, told the inquest: ‘Rebe’s boyfriend had ended their relationship at school on the Friday, prior to her death on the Monday.
‘She was in denial about this and was in tears at school, having to be taken into a classroom by a member of staff.
‘On the Sunday before her death she had gone to the boy’s address and messaged him telling him to look out of his window. She had walked through a field to get to him.
‘Rebe was distressed and his mother had called her mum to come and collect her.’
A post mortem examination revealed Rebe had not been under any influence of drugs or alcohol at the time of her death and she had been killed by toxic gases as opposed to the burns inflicted onto her by the flames.
Rebe was described by her ex-boyfriend as a ‘sweet, nice girl who liked animals, was really funny and a bit weird but in a good way.’
The boy, who attended the inquest, broke down in tears as he spoke.
He said: ‘After we broke up she messaged me loads saying she was thinking about hurting herself. I blocked her quite a few times from Facebook but then she would say she was going to do something stupid so I unblocked her and tried to talk to her.
‘I didn’t seriously think she was going to do anything even though she had said all this stuff about killing herself before but hadn’t actually done anything.’
Rebecca’s family also told the inquest about her sometimes-fraught home life, in which she was left competing for attention with her brother Joe, who had also been adopted at a young age.
The inquest also heard that Gillian Scott-Taylor, Rebecca’s adoptive mother, had remarried not long before.
Mrs Scott-Taylor said: ‘Rebe was an incredibly funny, intelligent and determined individual. She had struggled throughout her adolescence with questions about her own identity and attachment disorder, as a result of being adopted.
‘Her father, stepfather and I did all we could to help her through these issues, but tragically it wasn’t enough.
‘It still seems completely surreal to us that day-to-day life goes on without our daughter in it. She will be forever missed.’
‘On the Monday she died she had seemed okay. I had made her scrambled eggs and salmon and a cup of tea and she had said to me not to worry and that she was okay.
‘When I called her because her favourite show was on TV, she didn’t answer and I looked throughout the house.
‘Then Scott said he saw candles in the garden and I went to find her.
‘Where she was had been a kind of shrine to her kitten Honey who had been run over. When I first saw her I couldn’t even recognise that it was her.
‘I knew instantly something was wrong. She had never hinted to me that she would do anything like this.’
Coroner Mr Payne recorded a narrative verdict saying: ‘She died as a result of self immolation but there is doubt as to whether she intended her actions to result in her death.
‘It is sad for anyone to die in this manner, let alone a young girl with so much ahead of her.
‘I really don’t think at the end of the day that she had thought this through.’
