Machine 'behind drug death wait'

A FAULTY piece of forensic equipment is being blamed for grieving families having to wait up to six months to learn what caused their loved ones' deaths.

The breakdown of a machine at an Edinburgh lab used to identify substances in toxicology samples has contributed to delays in producing reports.

On average results from the laboratory should be made available within two months but two mothers have told how nearly six months on from the heartbreak of losing their children they are still waiting to hear the truth about how they died.

Myrna McGowan, from Chesser, whose 19-year-old daughter Linzi died after taking a single dose of methadone last September, said the protracted wait had been devastating.

Mrs McGowan said: "It's awful that it's been this long. I can't say it would help me get on with my life as I don't think I ever will but it would be another step.

"It's been five months and other than an e-mail we received in December which said toxicology reports were not included, we haven't heard a thing. (Initially] we were told that it would be two or three months."

The mother of a student found dead in a flat in Prestonfield Avenue last September is consulting Scotland's top lawyer to establish what killed her son.

Jill Norman's son Harry Valentine, 17, had moved to the Capital from Gairloch to study a BSc in horticulture with plantmanship at the Scottish Agricultural College when he died. Although he had no known history of drug abuse, his mother believes he suffered an overdose.

In a letter via her MSP to Lord Advocate Elish Angiolini, she said: "I was initially told by the police that investigations awaited the result of reports from the toxicology department.

"Five months on, I am in tears as I write to you."

Mrs Norman said she had also discovered she may be "one of hundreds of people waiting for toxicology results".

But her belief that budgetary demands on the toxicology service had led to delays was denied by the Scottish Police Services Authority (SPSA), which runs the Howdenhall lab.

The defective instrument, used for gas chromatography-mass spectrometry, is one of two such machines in the lab and was out of action for four or five weeks.

Tom Nelson, director of SPSA forensic services said: "We understand that for families waiting for results it can be an agonising time.

"The SPSA toxicology unit received samples in connection with the death of Harry Valentine on November 19, 2010.

"The case was analysed by our forensic toxicologists and a report was sent to the procurator fiscal at the end of February. The processing in this case has taken three months - a few weeks longer than we would hope. That was not down to cuts of any kind but rather the complexity of the case and also due to the breakdown of an item of scientific equipment."