Documentary material may be relevant to showjumper’s inquest, coroner told

By David Young, PA

Material broadcast in a new documentary series on the death of showjumper Katie Simpson may be relevant to her inquest, a coroner has been told.

Coroner Joe McCrisken heard that his legal team would take steps to obtain footage from the Sky Originals series to establish if it contained information that may assist the inquest.

Ms Simpson, 21, who was from Tynan, Co Armagh, died in Altnagelvin Hospital in Derry almost a week after an incident in Gortnessy Meadows, Lettershandoney, Co Derry on August 3rd 2020.

Police originally thought she had taken her own life.

It was not until the following year that Jonathan Creswell, the partner of Ms Simpson’s sister, was arrested on suspicion of murder.

A number of personalities who are relevant to your investigation were interviewed during the course of that and those interviews were broadcast as we understand it

The trial of Creswell, 36, for the murder of Ms Simpson ended in April last year following his sudden death.

Ms Simpson’s death is due to be examined at an inquest by Mr McCrisken.

The three-part Death Of A Showjumper documentary TV series was aired by Sky in the summer.

The contents of the programmes were discussed at a pre-inquest review hearing before Mr McCrisken in Belfast Coroner’s Court on Thursday afternoon.

A barrister for Ms Simpson’s family raised the issue with the coroner.

“A number of personalities who are relevant to your investigation were interviewed during the course of that and those interviews were broadcast as we understand it,” he said.

“I have yet to view it myself but it may be that there will be material there that will be of relevance to your investigation.”

It's likely the contents of those interviews are likely to be potentially relevant

Mr McCrisken told the court that he would not watch the documentary series until he secured permission from all legal parties in the proceedings.

“I’ll make it clear now I haven’t watched the documentary, and I don’t intend to until I’m told by agreement of all the interested persons here that it’s OK that I should, because we haven’t made decisions on whether there should be a jury or not (in the substantive inquest),” he said.

Philip Henry KC, who is legal counsel to the coroner, said the series would be examined to see if it contained relevant material.

“It’s publicly available, but we will obtain copies of it, because I think it needs to be assessed for potential relevance,” he said.

“It’s likely the contents of those interviews are likely to be potentially relevant.”

The next pre-inquest review hearing was scheduled for the first week of December.