The death of a retired Powys policeman who died after his head was trapped between bed rails and his hospital mattress was an avoidable accident, a coroner has concluded.

Maxwell Thomas Dingle, who lived in Kerry, suffered a cardiac arrest and was not resuscitated because data was not updated properly or was incorrect, an inquest heard.

The 83-year-old died 15 minutes after he was found trapped in his hospital bed at the Royal Shrewsbury Hospital.

An inquest held at Shirehall, Shrewsbury on Tuesday (May 31) heard that Mr Dingle, of The Warren, Kerry, near Newtown, was admitted to hospital with shortness of breath on April 27, 2020 and was waiting for treatment. He died six days later on May 3.

Earlier this year, Shropshire and Telford Hospitals NHS Trust pleaded guilty in court to failings in Mr Dingle’s care and was fined £533,334 over a charge brought by the Care Quality Commission (CQC).

The inquest heard that Mr Dingle’s son Philip, who watched the proceedings via video-link from his home in Australia, contacted Professor Johan Duflou, of the Central Clinical School at the University of Sydney, to review the findings of a postmortem which was carried out in the United Kingdom.

Forensic pathologist Dr Angus McGregor concluded that Mr Dingle died because of heart disease and did not consider that the 83-year-old getting his head trapped was the cause or contributed to his death.

But Professor Duflou came to a different conclusion, believing which was that Mr Dingle died by entrapment with positional asphyxia and obesity.

Senior coroner John P Ellery said the differing conclusions in medical opinions were the difference between a natural and unnatural death. Dr McGregor and Professor Duflou later jointly concluded that combined effects of entrapment, positional asphyxia with high potential heart disease and obesity did play a “significant” part in his death.

The inquest into Mr Dingle’s death was adjourned while criminal proceedings were taking place against the Shropshire and Telford Hospitals NHS Trust (SaTH).

An investigation carried out by the CQC concluded that the circumstances surrounding Mr Dingle getting his head trapped between a railing and a hospital mattress had breached health and safety regulations and that a criminal prosecution should be brought.

On May 18, 2022, at Telford Magistrates’ Court, SaTH pleaded guilty to failings in Mr Dingle’s care and an unrelated fatality.

Maxwell Thomas Dingle, a retired police officer who lived in Kerry, near Newtown, was born in Surrey on March 8, 1937, and died on May 3, 2020 at the Royal Shrewsbury Hospital.

The inquest concluded that Mr Dingle died as a result of an avoidable accident.