A teenager from Bridgend was found hanging from a stranger’s washing line after drinking heavily with friends the night before, an inquest was told yesterday.

Zachary Barnes, 17, had twice the drink-drive limit of alcohol in his blood when his body was found.

The teenager is one of 17 young people from the South Wales town suspected of killing themselves in the past year. But Philip Walters, the Bridgend Coroner, said at yesterday’s inquest that Zachary had drunk so much alcohol that he could not return a simple suicide verdict.

Ricky Tovey, a friend of the teenager, told the hearing that on the night before his death they had been drinking and, though he did not seem different that night, he remembered seeing Zachary with a T-shirt around his neck on a wall.

Mr Tovey told the inquest that they had bought 24 cans of Carlsberg lager between them on August 10 last year. He said they had gone with four other friends to a recreation centre at about 6.45pm and stayed there drinking until 12.40am. They then walked to the Brackla area, he said, where they stole a pint from a pub and were chased up the street. After that they went on to a fried chicken takeaway place but ran off again when the police turned up, he said.

Mr Tovey told the inquest that he had been quite drunk and didn’t remember anything else that night.

A police officer told the inquest that the force had received a call from a resident to say they had found a person on his knees hanging from their washing line by a T-shirt. PC Donna Mason said that she identified the body as that of Zachary from photos given to her by his family.

Alan Martin Rees, who carried out the post-mortem examination, said that Zachary died of asphyxia. Dr Rees said that the teenager had twice the drink-drive limit of alcohol in his blood and three times the limit in his urine, which suggested that he had drunk a lot more.

Responding to a question from Zachary’s family as to whether he would have suffered, Dr Rees said it was likely that he had lost consciousness very rapidly. The coroner said that he could not return a verdict of simple suicide. “To find a verdict of suicide I have to find clear evidence of intention for someone to take their own life. In the ones I have done over the years involving this level of alcohol I have never been convinced that is the case. Alcohol affects your judgment.”

Recording his verdict, the coroner said: “Zachary Barnes killed himself while under the influence of alcohol.”

The funeral of Nathaniel Pritchard, another young person suspected of taking his own life in the town, will be held today at Coychurch Crematorium, Bridgend. An inquest was told last week that Nathaniel, 15, from Cefn Glas, Bridgend, was found hanging after telling his former girlfriend that he was going to kill himself. His cousin, Kelly Stephenson, 20, was found hanging within hours of his death.

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