A prisoner at HMP Durham died on his cell floor from a heart attack after throwing up green vomit, but a report by the prison ombudsman has found that his care was of the quality expected. 

Vincent Smith was remanded to HMP Durham for harassment, assault, indecent exposure and sexual assault on June 26, 2021. He died two months later. 

He died aged 46 on August 27, 2021. He was the 13th prisoner to die at HMP Durham since August 2019. Of the previous deaths, five were self-inflicted, six were from natural causes and one was drug-related.

Read more: Chester-le-Street man jailed for sexualised online chats with 'girls​'

At around 5.40 am on August 21, an officer was conducting the night roll checks, when he noticed that Smith was lying on his cell floor.  

Though Smith appeared to be sleeping on the floor, which some prisoners do, his snoring stood out to the officer as concerning.

When a nurse arrived to give a medical opinion, she noted that his breathing could be obstructed due to the noises he was making. She called in additional staff before entering the cell, as it was not known whether the situation was an emergency. 

When the team moved Smith, they found that he was unresponsive, and had thrown up green-coloured vomit.

An ambulance arrived 40 minutes later, and the prisoner was taken to University Hospital of North Durham. 

Read next: 

A CT scan at the hospital revealed that Smith had a bleed on his brain. H was quickly transferred to Royal Victoria Infirmary Newcastle, where he had surgery to ease the pressure on his brain.

But despite the quick treatment, Smith died in the hospital a week later. A pathologist gave Smith’s cause of death as cardiorespiratory arrest (heart attack) caused by a bleed on the brain.

An inquest concluded that Smith died from natural causes, and the Prison and Probation Ombudsman's recent report found that the care offered to Smith at HMP Durham was of the required standard and equivalent to that which he could have expected to receive in the community.