A coroner in the United Kingdom has ruled that three sisters of Nigerian descent who drowned in the sea off Brighton took their own lives, 16 years after their mother died by drowning.
The sisters were identified as Jane Adetoro, 36, Christina Walters, 32, and Rebecca Walters, 31. Their bodies were recovered from the sea off Brighton beach in the early hours of May 13.
An inquest at Woodvale Coroner’s Court in Brighton heard on Thursday that the women lived together in Greenford, west London and had lived very secluded and private lives following the death of their mother, Janice Adetoro, who drowned in 2010.
The inquest heard that on May 11, two days before their deaths, the sisters made a night-time trip to Birmingham to visit the former home of their mother. They travelled by taxi and were dropped off at Linton Walk at 11.36 p.m. The address is close to Brookvale Park Lake, where their mother died. They were picked up to return to London at 1.28 a.m. on May 12.
DCI Mark Cullimore of Sussex Police told the hearing there was no CCTV to show what the women did while they were in Birmingham. The family said the sisters also visited their mother’s grave and the lake during that trip.
On the evening of May 12, they took a pre-booked taxi to Brighton and arrived near the seafront at 10.21 p.m. The taxi driver noted they hardly spoke during the journey. CCTV captured them walking along the beach in darkness and they were last seen alive at 2.42 a.m. on May 13.
The bodies of Jane Adetoro and Christina Walters were located by an RNLI lifeboat crew while Rebecca Walters’ body was recovered from the shoreline on Brighton beach.
Senior Coroner Penelope Schofield for West Sussex, Brighton and Hove said the medical cause of death for all three was drowning. A post-mortem found no evidence of drugs or alcohol and no evidence of violence.
“In hours of darkness, they entered the sea at Brighton, they could not swim and sea conditions were adverse,” Schofield said.
She concluded that the sisters collectively decided to end their own lives and that they died by suicide.
“These three sisters lived very secluded lives; they were incredibly private. We don’t know why they took this course of action or indeed why they chose to do it in Brighton. It is not for the court to speculate and sadly these reasons may never be known,” the coroner said.
Their father, Joseph Jacobsen, followed the proceedings via video link. In an emotional statement read on his behalf, he said he had watched his daughters grow from little girls into beautiful and intelligent women.
“There are no words that can adequately express the pain of losing a child. To lose all three of my precious daughters is heartbreaking,” Jacobsen said.
He added, “To lose all three of my precious daughters, Jane, Christina and Rebecca, is a heartbreak beyond anything I could ever have imagined. May your beautiful souls rest in perfect peace.”
He said he could not understand why his daughters’ lives ended so suddenly and hoped they were reunited with their mother in God’s eternal care.
The inquest was told that Christina Walters had suffered from anxiety and depression since her mother’s passing, while Rebecca had no recorded mental health history and Jane was not registered with a doctor.
