A PERTHSHIRE man who was found dead while in police custody was said to have taken a potentially lethal level of drugs, Perth Sheriff Court heard yesterday.

A fatal accident inquiry is being heard into the death of George Donald McLellan (37), Milnab Street, Crieff. He was found dead at Perth police headquarters in Barrack Street, on Christmas Eve.

The inquiry heard from Dr David William Sadler, senior lecturer at the department of forensic medicine at Dundee University, who said the cause of death was a mixture of methadone/dihydrocodine toxicity with a significant level of alcohol.

Dr Sadler told the court that there was a potentially lethal level of methadone found in Mr McLellan and he explained that both it and dihydrocodine are opiates and have what are described as a cocktail effect on each other.

“They depress the breathing and could have been taken in the afternoon prior to him being arrested,” he said.

Procurator fiscal Dr David Griffith had earlier read out an affidavit from Detective Sergeant John Petrie which stated that Mr McLellan was found dead in cell four at police headquarters at 5.05 am.

Mr Petrie had said Mr McLellan had a history of drug abuse stretching from 2002 to 2004, including an incident in August 2002 when he was taken Perth Royal Infirmary with a suspected overdose and in June 2004 when he collapsed in the street.

Dr Griffiths said Mr McLellan had been arrested on a warrant at 7.25 pm on December 23 in Crieff by PC Roderick Ritchie and taken to police headquarters and put in cell four at 9 pm. He had been handcuffed in the back of the police van.

The inquiry heard that police surgeon Dr Paul Guy saw Mr McLellan in the cell but his description of the drugs he had taken was vague. Dr Guy wanted him placed on 15 minute interval checks for a couple of hours and changed this to half hourly after that.

Dr Guy told the inquiry that there were signs that Mr McLellan had taken opiates in both his eyes and the fact that his speech was slurred and he was incoherent.

He said, “His pupils were three millimetres in diameter, which is a sign of opiate use. He was pronounced dead at 5.05 am and I noticed mucus and brown liquid on his mouth at that time.”

Sergeant Kenneth Copeland, told the inquiry that he was working on the charge bar when he carried out a vulnerability assessment on Mr McLellan.

He told the inquiry that he found four pill bottles which he had taken from Mr McLellan’s pocket, three of which were empty but one contained drugs.

Mr Copeland said he knew Mr McLellan had a history of drug and alcohol problems and placed him on half-hourly checks in the cell until he was seen by a doctor, and that he classed him as a highly vulnerable prisoner.

However, Sergeant Rodney Wigley, who was in charge of the custodies on December 23 admitted that he had wrongly entered Mr McLellan down as a “non-vulnerable” prisoner by mistake when he took over the shift from Mr Copeland at approximately 11 pm.

He said that the 30 minutes checks were sufficient but was not satisfied with entries made by custody assistant Alexander Innes.

“If you are checking someone on a half-hourly basis then they are still vulnerable. The normal procedure for checking on a vulnerable person is to get some verbal response, even if this is a guttural sound. To enter that someone is ‘asleep—no action’ is not good enough,” he said.

Cross-examined by Barry Murphy, solicitor for the deceased’s family, Mr Wigley added, “I went to the cell with Mr Innes but it was obvious that Mr McLellan was dead—there was no need for resuscitation. This was a worst case scenario and is a wake-up call.

“I can’t think of another job which carries such responsibility.”

Dr Griffiths established that there was a discrepancy in the timing of the CCTV tape used at the police station and the police clock and that there appeared to be a gap between 3.06 am and 3.58 am when it appeared that no check was made.

Earlier, the inquiry had heard from John Penman, custody assistant, who had previously worked in the Scottish Prison Service for 28 years. He said he had searched Mr McLellan when he was brought to the charge bar and he found two “blister” packs which contained pills and he also discovered four small bottles.

He said that one bottle found had 18 vitamin B ‘strong’ pills and another had 15 ibuprofen tablets.

“Mr McLellan was strip searched so there was no way he had any drugs on him whilst in the cell. But at 9 pm I took him to see the doctor as I became concerned as to his condition.”

The inquiry is expected to conclude today.