Dartmoor prison death was due to 'natural causes'

CULT LEADER WAS SERVING 23-YEAR SENTENCE

- ANITA MERRITT

THE sudden death at HMP Dartmoor of a Maoist cult leader and rapist who enslaved and imprisoned women – including his daughter – for 30 years has been confirmed as having been due to natural causes.

Aravindan Balakrishnan – who was known as Comrade Bala to his followers and prisoners – was six years into his 23-year prison sentence when he was found lifeless in bed in his prison cell on the morning of April 8, 2022.

An inquest into the 81-year-old’s death began on August 1 at Exeter Coroner’s Court, with no family members present. Balakrishnan was described as having been a “frail and elderly man” who had been diagnosed with dementia, and also suffered from poor eyesight, hearing loss and diabetess.

Following his arrival at the prison in Princetown in December 2021, the inquest heard he was put in a single cell and was on a wing for prisoners who were vulnerable or had health needs.

A fellow prisoner, who had been appointed Balakrishnan’s ‘buddy to assist him’, described how, the day before his death, he had gone into his cell as usual in the morning to give him a drink and helped him to ring his wife, before nurses showered him as he was unable to do it himself.