BILL ACTOR'S WIDOW LOSES BATTLE OVER HIS DEATH (10/12/03)

The widow of a TV star has been left facing a huge legal bill after losing her battle to sue the rehabilitation clinic where he died.

Alcoholic Kevin Lloyd, who played Tosh Lines in the ITV drama The Bill, choked to death at the clinic after a drinking binge.

He died while recovering from alcoholism more than five years ago, just after he was sacked from his £130,000-a-year role for turning up drunk.

His wife, Lesley, brought a damages claim against the bosses of the drying-out clinic near Burton-on-Trent, seeking to prove the actor died through neglect. But today Mrs Lloyd was not present at Nottingham County Court to hear Judge David Brunning reject the compensation claim, thought to be in the region of £250,000.

Lloyd, a father-of-seven, was seen carrying a bottle of whisky into the Dove Clinic in Rolleston, Staffordshire, hours before his death in May 1998. The 49-year-old policeman's son was put to bed in the recovery position, but despite monitoring by nursing staff he later choked on his own vomit and paramedics were unable to save him.

A post mortem examination showed he was three times the drink-drive limit and had mixed alcohol with the drugs he was taking to curb his addiction. Mrs Lloyd had been estranged from her husband for two years, but as his next of kin was called to identity his body. She was seeking to prove he died through neglect.

During a week-long hearing in September, Richard Burns, on behalf of Mrs Lloyd, told the court that nurses stopped continuously checking him 30 minutes before his death. He said the clinic had a "cavalier attitude" to recording the checks made on Lloyd and had insufficient protocols about what to do in an emergency.

Speciality Care (Rehab) Ltd, which owned the clinic, denied negligence, claiming it did its best to look after Lloyd even though he had technically discharged himself earlier that day.

Judge Brunning, in a written statement of his judgment on the case, said: "This case has revealed what a desperately sad ending there was to the life of Kevin Lloyd. It was, however, I am satisfied, an accident for which no blame can be attached to the staff of the Dove Clinic."

Outside court Frank Cummins, director of Speciality Care, said: "As a representative of Dove Clinic I would once again like to pass on our sincere condolences to the family of Mr Lloyd. We always believed that our staff cared for Mr Lloyd professionally and with compassion and this has been reiterated in court today."