Death leap after affair exposed

A MAN who was caught having a secret affair killed himself by jumping 84ft from the Spindles shopping centre multi-storey car park.

An Oldham inquest heard how Mr Paul Hughes (37) was caught having an affair when his civil partner John Pennington came across text messages in their fostered child’s phone, which had been missing.

Mr Pennington, called Mr Hughes to discuss the messages but he said he wasn’t aware of them.

The inquiry heard how Mr Hughes, a sheltered housing scheme manager, who was described as bubbly and caring, had been exchanging messages with another man he met on chat line.

Mr Pennington, a social worker, said he also noticed there was no money in his account and later found that Mr Hughes had accumulated thousands of pounds worth of debt on his credit card.

He added: “The last conversation we had was about the phone which had been missing since May and belonged to our fostered child.

“Paul said he found it that morning and put it on charge. He was going into Oldham, and when he left I noticed the phone battery wasn’t fitted correctly so I pushed it in and noticed a text message for Paul.

“I called the sender and found the pair had been exchanging text messages so I phoned Paul and he denied it. He then hung up.”

Mr Pennington failed to get hold of Mr Hughes, and was later informed by police he had jumped off the Spindles car park.

Det Insp David Massey said he examined CCTV footage which confirmed Mr Hughes was in a indecisive mood as he was in and out of a door that led to the car park.

He added: “The wall around the car park was around 5ft 6inches high which means you can just about see over it.

“Mr Hughes climbed up a lamp post and jumped from it. There was no third party involved.”

A post-mortem examination revealed Mr Hughes, of Joseph Jennings Court, Ashton, died from multiple injuries in the plunge on September 13.

Coroner Simon Nelson recorded a verdict that the Mr Hughes took his own life.