An inquest has heard details of the final moments before the death of a bus driver who tragically died after his car collided with another vehicle and then hit a tree in Long Eaton.
Ashley Entwistle had been travelling along Wilsthorpe Road, in Long Eaton, on Monday December 13, 2021, when his car veered into the opposite carriageway.
The 45-year-old had potentially fatal amounts of heroin in his system before suffering serious injuries in the crash, the inquest heard. He had been living at an address Barkley Avenue, in Long Eaton, at the time of the fatal incident and had been trying to deal with his addiction, Derbyshire Live reports.
The inquest heard that Mr Entwistle's Skoda Octavia brushed against an oncoming Mercedes before hitting a tree. He was not wearing a seatbelt at the time and is likely to have lost consciousness before impact.
The driver of the Mercedes immediately began CPR on Mr Entwistle until emergency services arrived on the scene. Mr Entwistle was rushed to Queen's Medical Centre in Nottingham where he passed away.
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CCTV footage of Mr Entwistle driving seconds before the incident showed him negotiating a roundabout with "perfect" motor skills. A police investigation showed that there was no evidence of Mr Entwistle breaking before the impact, leading Deputy Coroner Louise Pinder to conclude that he had "lost consciousness shortly before the collision".
A witness statement from the driver of the Mercedes stated that Mr Entwistle was not wearing a seatbelt at the time of the crash. This was supported by the type of injuries he sustained.
A post mortem toxicology report found that Mr Entwistle had heroin, cocaine and methadone in his system, and that the levels of heroin were in a "range recorded in fatalities". The report concluded that Mr Entwistle's medical cause of death was both heroin toxicity and multiple injuries sustained in a road traffic collision.
Ms Pinder added: "Without the collision he may have died due to the heroin, and without the heroin he may have died from the serious injuries. Hence why in this unusual situation both are listed as the primary cause of death".
Mr Entwistle was described by his family as someone who "really wanted to try" to get better. This was supported by a statement from Joanne Moore, a substance misuse practitioner, who said Mr Entwistle had been in the process of looking into rehabilitation facilities.
The conclusion of Mr Entwistle's inquest was that his death was that of a road traffic collision. Ashley Entwistle's inquest was held at Derby Coroner's Court on Friday August 19, 2022.
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