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Star pupil's fatal fall after losing wallet
A FORMER Rishworth School student fell 150ft to his death after drinking to celebrate the end of his A-levels.
Andrew Curwell, a star pupil and promising rugby player, was in Newquay with 11 schoolmates when he plunged from cliffs while searching for his lost wallet, an inquest heard.
The tragedy happened at the end of a pub crawl on their third night in the Cornish resort last June.
Andrew, 18, realised he had lost his wallet, containing
100, when he tried to get into a club and left his friends to search for it.
He was found dead on the beach the next morning.
A post-mortem found that he was almost twice over the drink drive limit.
Police, who traced his movements with CCTV footage, believe he jumped over a low wall not realising there was a sheer drop on the other side.
His friends told the inquest at Truro that the group had paid 5 for the guided pub crawl and had drunk cider, alcopops and shots.
Robin Kitchen, 19, said: "We got back to the bed and breakfast at around 12.30 am and he rang me about an hour later. He sounded drunk, but not really drunk. He could speak properly and was not slurring.
"He had been fairly drunk earlier but sobered up while he was looking for his wallet. He was upset about losing it.
"He was not staggering. He was a big lad so he could take more than most of us."
The coroner heard that Andrew, from Saddleworth, rarely got drunk because he was so dedicated to his rugby training.
His mum Janet said: "Andrew was not a big drinker. He was a rugby player and was always training. He did drink sometimes but it was unusual."
He joined the Leeds Rhinos academy as a second row in 2007 and had made five appearances for the Super League club's under-18 side.
He was a star pupil at Rishworth School and had been selected to meet Princess Anne on a Royal visit to the school.
He had hoped to go to Leeds Metropolitan University to study sports science.
Barrie Van den Berg, Cornwall's deputy coroner, recorded a verdict of accidental death and said that drink and disorientation were factors in the tragedy.
His death, and that of Patrick Higgins, 16, who fell 100ft from nearby cliffs just a week later, triggered a clampdown on drinking in the town.
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Thursday 09 February 2012
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