The aunt of an ITV journalist found dead at her flat three years ago has said she hopes an upcoming inquest will “get to the truth” about how her niece died.
A recent court case heard that Teresa McMahon, 43, had reported domestic abuse to police a fortnight before she was found dead in Salford in August 2021.
Former ITV presenter Lucy Meacock described the on-off relationship Ms McMahon was in as “volatile”.
Aunt Lorna McMahon said she believed failings by Greater Manchester Police (GMP) may have contributed to her niece’s death.
A letter from Meacock, read out at a pre-inquest hearing, detailed how Ms McMahon would describe her former partner Robert Chambers as her “soulmate”, but their relationship was “volatile”.
Ms Meacock, who presented regional news programme Granada Reports for 36 years, said Ms McMahon had “confided” in her, and she advised her to leave Mr Chalmers.
“They would often drink heavily, then get into fights when he would get aggressive towards her,” she wrote.
“They sounded like very heated fights,” she added.
Lorna McMahon has been advocating for her niece since her mother died earlier this year.
She has made a series of complaints about GMP to the police watchdog, then took the watchdog to the High Court in March.
“She was extremely intelligent, very bubbly and very witty,” she said.
Ms McMahon had worked for ITV’s Granada Reports as a producer and reporter since 2016.
“She turned her life around and worked for ITV for the last six years of her life and she did amazingly well,” her aunt said.
She was found dead after a period off work with Covid. Police concluded she had taken her own life.
‘Very bubbly’
Her aunt said it was “vital” that Thursday’s inquest probes the allegations of domestic abuse “so we can get to the truth”.
The March court case means many of the circumstances in the weeks and months before her death can be reported, but the case did not seek to establish the truth of her allegations.
The judgement from the case says Ms McMahon had been in an on-off relationship with Mr Chalmers in the year before she died and had “told friends and family that he had assaulted her on several occasions”.
The court heard she called GMP in July 2021 and told the call handler “he’s also broke my fingers, broke my ribs, generally just battered me and attacked me loads”.
She had called to find out whether Mr Chalmers had a history of domestic abuse, submitting a request under the domestic violence disclosure scheme known as Clare’s Law.
Police ‘error’
An investigation by the Independent Office for Police Conduct (IOPC), summarised in the High Court judgement, found that Ms McMahon was wrongly told by a junior officer that her Clare’s Law request would not be successful because she and Mr Chalmers were no longer together.
The IOPC found that answer was given in “error” because of a “myth” within GMP that former partners could not use Clare’s Law.
The investigation also found it took nine days for an officer to see Ms McMahon after she had reported her allegations, a delay which a senior officer later acknowledged “would have done nothing to inspire her with confidence that her concerns were being taken seriously”.
“She probably felt that the police aren’t interested in her allegations,” her aunt said, adding “it made her more vulnerable”.
“The very fact that Teresa was told that she’s not entitled to disclosure I think also put her in quite a vulnerable position, because you’re inclined to believe what the police tell you,” she said.
A final decision on whether the Clare’s Law application would be approved had not been made by the time she died.
The High Court case heard Ms McMahon later retracted her complaints against Mr Chalmers.
The court was told a neighbour had “confirmed to police that some weeks previously she had intervened in a row” after which she had asked Mr Chalmers to leave the house.
The court was told an investigation after Ms McMahon’s death found “the only evidence” of domestic abuse would have amounted to an allegation of common assault “for which the six-month statute limit of prosecution had expired” meaning Mr Chalmers could not be prosecuted.
The court was also told the posthumous investigation had concluded there was “not enough evidence to corroborate” concerns that she had been subjected to coercive control.
Judicial review
The IOPC’s review concluded police were “not in possession of information” to know that Ms McMahon “may have been experiencing suicidal thoughts” and that “appropriate safeguarding information was provided”.
Unhappy with the IOPC’s performance, her aunt took the watchdog to a judicial review at the High Court, where she urged them to require GMP to re-open their investigation into the death, and look at whether there was third party involvement.
The court heard the police concluded there was “no evidence of criminality or third-party involvement”.
A police officer who said they had seen the post-mortem report said “there is nothing to suggest Teresa was the victim of any serious domestic violence in the report”, the court was told.
They also cited a report from her GP which said she had “a long history of mental health problems and had received support”.
Ms Meacock wrote that she did not recall ever seeing McMahon with physical injuries, and said she had never met Mr Chalmers.
Reading her letter aloud in the pre-inquest hearing in October, coroner Mary Hassel emphasised “I have absolutely no information as to the truth of any of these statements”.
The inquest was moved from Greater Manchester to St Pancras Coroner’s Court after Lorna McMahon appealed to the most senior coroner in England and Wales.
In a decision letter, chief coroner Alexia Durran she said the move was granted “to avoid any perception of conflict given the jurisdiction of GMP and the concerns the applicant has raised”.
The full inquest hearing is due to last one day, which Ms McMahon said “is not long enough in my opinion”.
“In order to get to the truth you need all the relevant evidence to be considered and you need all the relevant witnesses,” she said.
Mr Chalmers did not respond to requests for a comment but he has previously denied all allegations of wrongdoing.
A GMP statement read: “Our thoughts continue to be with Ms McMahon’s family.
“We remain fully engaged with getting Teresa’s loved ones the answers they deserve through an independent, full and fearless inquiry into her death.”
