Father 'couldn't comprehend' fatal Rotherham crash ID error
A coroner has ruled that an 18-year-old man was unlawfully killed in a car crash in Rotherham. The victim's family was mistakenly told he had survived, leading them to spend weeks at the bedside of another injured teenager before discovering the error.
Why it matters
The case highlights a severe failure in police identification procedures and the profound psychological trauma inflicted on grieving families by administrative errors.
Image source, South Yorkshire Police Image caption, Joshua Johnson's family were mistakenly told that their son, who had died in a car crash, had survived
A father who was mistakenly told his son had survived a car crash has told an inquest it felt like his family had been through "two deaths".
Joshua Johnson, 18, and Summer Louise Scott, 17, died when a Toyota Corolla left the road near Rotherham, South Yorkshire, and hit a tree on 13 December.
Police initially misidentified the front seat passenger Trevor Wynn, then 17, as the male who had died in the crash, with the mistake becoming clear when Trevor came out of sedation three weeks later.
The hearing at Doncaster Coroner's Court was told the Johnson family had sat at the bedside of seriously injured Trevor, not realising their son was dead.
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