A VULNERABLE teenager in State aftercare was found dead in a Nama-controlled building after consuming a large amount of methadone, an inquest has heard.
The body of 19-year-old Jonathan Doyle was found in McConnell House, a derelict office building on Charlemont Place, Dublin, on June 20th, 2010.
The inquest heard the building, next to the Hilton Hotel, was being used by homeless people when they couldn’t get a bed in a hostel. “Anywhere between two and 20 people stay in the building on any given night,” homeless man Andrew Doyle said.
Jonathan’s girlfriend of the time, Aideen Griffin, told the inquest how the two of them had stayed at the building along with Andrew Doyle on the night of June 19th. She awoke the next morning to discover Jonathan “blue”.
The inquest heard how Mr Doyle had been in State care as a child and the HSE was aware he was using drugs. The HSE said the State had no legal obligation to provide aftercare services once someone turned 18.
“The aftercare service is optional. If they’re willing to go into it, then we have a duty. Jonathan chose to enter aftercare but did not engage with all the aftercare services,” HSE’s Kelly Marie Kennedy said.
A postmortem carried out by State Pathologist Prof Marie Cassidy found Mr Doyle had died of methadone toxicity.
Prof Cassidy found no evidence of chronic intravenous drug usage.
The jury questioned where Mr Doyle could have obtained the methadone after Dublin city coroner Dr Brian Farrell said there was no evidence Mr Doyle was on a methadone programme.
Sgt Eoin Boyle of Pearse Street Garda station said methadone was freely available on the streets.
The jury of six men returned a verdict of death by misadventure.