Payout denied for death answering call of nature

ST LUCIA is denying compensation to a British family who are grieving the death of a father after he was fatally electrocuted, on the basis that he was going to relieve himself at the time.

Martin Ellis, from west London, and his three teenage sons were trekking to a nature reserve on the Caribbean island in August 2019 when they were caught in a tropical rainstorm and took shelter under the eaves of a pumping station near the John Compton Dam. As the 68-year-old was heading to the rear of the building to relieve himself, he came into contact with a metal pipe with an unearthed electrical wire inside. He let out a cry of shock but died shortly after in front of one of his children.

As well as his sons, Mr Ellis left behind a wife with progressive multiple sclerosis who requires round-theclock care. Despite an official engineer finding that the electrical set-up breached regulations and recommended its immediate replacement, the St Lucian government-owned Water and Sewerage Company is refusing to pay out.

Part of its defence is that Mr Ellis should not have been intending to urinate in public, arguing that to do so would have been “illegal, unsanitary and likely to be injurious to public health”.

Amy Silverston, Mr Ellis’s widow, told The Sunday Telegraph: “For decency’s sake, Martin just wanted to get out of sight and have a pee where he couldn’t be seen. If you can’t be safe on government property, where can you be?”

In 2012, Hannah Defoe, 20, died when she was electrocuted in a St Lucia swimming pool. Mr Ellis’s family believe the authorities are desperate to avoid further negative headlines about safety standards on the island, which is heavily reliant on tourism.