A majority open verdict has been delivered by a jury at the Birmingham inquest of former Ledbury man, Bert Loveday.

Mr Loveday was found hanged while an inmate at Winson Green Prison in 1998.

The coroner and jury heard that Mr Loveday, aged 29, formerly of Lawnside Road, was the father of Joshua, an eighteen-month-old baby who died in 1995, during unsuccessful surgery at the Bristol Royal Infirmary's cardiac unit.

Laurence Vick, of Michaelmores Solicitors of Exeter, representing the family, said following investigations into the unit's procedures, Mr Loveday had "found it hard to cope with the knowledge that the death of his baby son might have been avoidable".

In August 1998, Mr Loveday was sentenced at Birmingham Crown Court to three years' imprisonment. His first offence was to be a lookout for an armed robbery.

Before he was sentenced, Mr Loveday suffered a mental breakdown and was sectioned under the mental health act.

The inquest heard that the system for assessing and monitoring new inmates with known psychiatric illnesses at the prison had improved since Mr Loveday's admission.

Mr Vick said the open verdict meant that the jury could not be satisfied that Mr Loveday had meant to take his own life.