Roll on Friday
The death of a Pinsent Masons partner has ignited a debate on stress and work/life balance in private practice.
Vanessa Ford, known professionally as Vanessa Heap, had been working 18-hour days and through her holidays to complete the sale of Everton FC to a private equity firm.
On 23 September 2023, just over a week after the deal completed, she “consumed a significant amount of alcohol while undergoing an acute mental health crisis”, concluded coroner Ian Potter, before going onto the tracks by Dalston Lane road bridge where she was struck by a train.
The inquest heard that the Pinsents equity partner had attended a celebratory lunch in Manchester the day before her death to mark the completion of the transaction, and spent the night at the home of her friend, Katie Charles, Everton’s legal services director, before catching an early train back to London on the 23rd.
Ford returned home that morning while her husband and children were out and left a note before leaving with a bottle of gin.
The coroner said there was “no doubt” that Ford had taken her own life, but said there was “insufficient evidence” to conclude that she fully intended to do so.
A toxicology report showed that Ford’s blood alcohol level at the time of her death was “incredibly high”, and she also contacted a private health care provider in the hour before her death to seek help for alcohol consumption.
Read their in depth report here
