Metropolitan Police officers were sent to Porters Avenue, Dagenham, to conduct a welfare check after concerns were raised that Dawn O’Shea “had not been seen for a significant period of time”.
“The 65-year-old Mrs O’Shea was found in her home address,” senior coroner Graeme Irvine told East London Coroner’s Court on Friday, July 5.
“She had been dead for some time.”
Police identified her “on the balance of probabilities”, said the coroner, “based upon a number of different factors”.
They included that the body was found inside Mrs O’Shea’s home and that it resembled photographs of Mrs O’Shea found by police.
After the discovery on May 8, police referred the death to the coroner for investigation.
He ordered a post-mortem, but it did not take place until more than a month after her death, on June 10.
“Regrettably, it has not been possible to determine a clear cause of death,” Mr Irvine told the court. “The death has been determined as unascertained.
“Given those circumstances, I will open an inquest… It seems to me that as there is no clear cause of death, I must hold an inquest to look into the wider circumstances.”
Coroners must hold inquests into unnatural or unexplained deaths and whether future similar deaths might be avoided.
He asked that Mrs O’Shea’s next of kin be contacted and asked to provide a statement which included when she was last seen and “any concerns that they have” about her death.
He also ordered that her GP records be obtained and asked coroner’s officers to find out whether Mrs O’Shea had been known to Barking and Dagenham Council’s adult social care department.
He asked them to contact the local mental health trust as well and find out whether Mrs O’Shea had been known to them.
“It may shed some light,” he said.
The final inquest was provisionally scheduled for January.
