The Coroner’s Court inquest into the death of 40-year-old Croydon man Gareth Evans has found that a gambling disorder contributed to his death by suicide.
Coroner’s verdict: Gareth Evans was 40 when he died in 2021
Gareth Evans was found dead in his flat in Addiscombe on November 3, 2021. He had left a note to his family reflecting that he had taken his own life due to gambling.
In the six months leading up to his death, Evans’s bank statements show cash withdrawals of more than £35,000, many of which were made from a cash machine at a fried chicken shop next door to William Hill’s Cherry Orchard Road betting shop, a short walk from his home on Morland Road.
Concluding the inquest at Croydon Coroner’s Court, HM Assistant Coroner Adela Williams found that gambling disorder was part of the medical cause of Evans’s death and that a lack of intervention in Evans’s gambling by the bookmakers and betting shop operators William Hill contributed to his death.
The inquest heard that Evans had longstanding problems with gambling, and that he joined Gamblers Anonymous and referred himself to the National Problem Gambling Clinic to seek help.
In November 2020, after extensive online gambling in the previous months, predominantly with William Hill, Evans self-excluded from online gambling via the GAMSTOP scheme.
In January 2021, he made a complaint to William Hill, explaining that his gambling and losses over many years had greatly impacted his mental health.
The complaint was rejected.
Around April 2021. Evans is understood to have resumed gambling in William Hill betting shops. Many of the large cash withdrawals shown on his bank statements were funded in part by a series of HSBC bank loans, which his family was unaware of until after his death.
Betting shop: Gareth Evans used the William Hill branch on Cherry Orchard Road
Two weeks before he died, Evans contacted a firm of solicitors to enquire about a claim against William Hill.
He described that he had regularly been going to a William Hill betting shop “five times a day, often spending up to £800 in cash on the sports betting terminals”.
William Hill staff never attempted to speak to him about his gambling.
The inquest heard evidence over two days including from Evans’s family, the betting company William Hill and the Gambling Commission.
This included:
Evidence from his mother, Rosalie Evans, that Gareth was a happy and healthy young man who was very sociable, had many strong friendships and a very close relationship with his family. His family never regarded him as having any kind of mental health difficulties until they came to understand the devastating impact which gambling had on him.
Mrs Evans told the court that the family firmly believe that Gareth’s gambling was the root cause of the harm to his mental health and, ultimately, his death.
Evidence from William Hill showed that Evans’s online gambling activity in August 2020 triggered a telephone interaction from the company’s safer gambling team, at a time when he had lost around £18,000 with the operator in the previous three weeks. A short time after this interaction, Evans requested to close his online William Hill account. William Hill told the court that it had no records of Evans’s gambling in William Hill betting shops in 2021.
Tim Miller, executive director at the Gambling Commission, gave evidence thaat his organisation had considered the circumstances of Evans’s case and had identified that they were consistent with failings which the Commission had identified in William Hill’s policies and procedures in a separate review conducted after his death.
Although Evans’s case did not form part of that review, in March 2023, the review resulted in the largest ever financial penalty issued by the Commission – a £19.2million fine.
In Evans’s case, the Commission found a number of areas where William Hill could have identified a risk of harm and stepped in.
The Coroner found that, based on the evidence of Evans’s gambling in William Hill betting shops in 2021, insufficient steps were taken by the operator to intervene. Despite hearing evidence from William Hill about changes made since Gareth Evans’s death, the Coroner indicated that she still had concerns about training provided to staff in betting shops and about a lack of standardisation across the industry of measures to control customers’ gambling in the retail sector.
The Coroner indicated that she intends to issue a Prevention of Future Deaths report to the Gambling Commission and the Department for Culture, Media and Sport.
Evans’s family were represented at the inquest by Merry Varney and Dan Webster, with Helena Hart-Watson at law firm Leigh Day and counsel Jesse Nicholls of Matrix Chambers. They have also been supported since Gareth’s death by the charity Gambling with Lives.
Following the conclusion, speaking on behalf of the family, Gareth’s father, Tony Evans, said:
“Four and a half years since Gareth took his own life, the coronial process has confirmed what we as a family always knew: that his death was directly caused by the gambling industry and its dangerously addictive products, and that William Hill failed in their duties to protect him. We are also pleased that the Coroner will issue a Prevention of Future Death report.
“Gambling had a catastrophic impact on Gareth’s mental health. Gareth was a normal, happy and healthy person who was loved by us all. He had a good job and lots of friends. He loved football and pub quizzes, and travel. Although nothing can change what happened to our wonderful Gaz, we hope this inquest can help people understand that gambling kills – and that by telling his story we can open the conversation around gambling addiction, reduce the shame and stigma associated with it, and encourage other individuals currently experiencing gambling harm to seek treatment. Please know you are not alone.
Sociable: Gareth Evans was described at the inquest as happy and healthy young man
“There are currently around 700,000 people registered with the gambling blocking site, GAMSTOP– that’s around 1.3% of the adult population. The gambling industry deliberately designs their online games and other products to create addiction, and then tells us all that the addicted are to blame. Everyone, including the government, needs to understand where the blame really lies and take action to prevent future harms and deaths.”
The inquest into the death of Gareth Evans is the seventh since 2022 at which gambling has been recognised as contributing to a self-inflicted death. It is the fourth such inquest in 2026 alone.
The family’s solicitor, Dan Webster from Leigh Day, said, “Gareth’s inquest has highlighted that, even where people self-exclude from online gambling via GAMSTOP in an effort to protect themselves from harm, there are inadequate systems in place to prevent them from gambling by other means.
“It is vital that better systems are put in place to protect people in Gareth’s position and to identify signs of gambling harm in betting shops as well as online.”
And drawing attention to the serious failings identified by the Gambling Commission, Webster said, “William Hill’s evidence at the inquest provided no reassurance that lessons have been learned from Gareth’s case. Gareth’s family are not satisfied that the changes made since Gareth’s death will prevent similar events from re-occurring.
“The family urge the government and the Gambling Commission to take urgent action to prevent further deaths.”
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Once again businesses making money outweighs the health and wellbeing of the public.
Don’t they and the government realise gambling is an illness.
So what do they do allow advertising on tv sports events everywhere.
I am sick and tired of the bingo ad’s on tv, particularly during the day, they are targeting a particular audience.
Ban all forms of gambling promotion
This is a shocking indictment of the gambling industry, which purports to care about its customers but in reality does nothing of the sort. But there’s another side to this issue.
As well as taking advantage of people addicted to gambling, these betting shops and sites also allow criminals – from local drug dealers to terrorists – to launder money. It’s not just here in the UK – it’s a global problem.
Two years ago the Grauniad reported that “of the 12 most recent political donations by the industry and its executives, all have gone to Labour – a total of just under £400,000 stretching back to March 2020 – according to Electoral Commission records.”
Starmer promised to do something in his 2024 manifesto, saying the party was “committed to reducing gambling-related harm”. As we know, he’s mainly done sod all but dither (and take the money)
Gamblers Anonymous holds weekly meetings at West Croydon Baptist Church, Whitehorse Road, Croydon, CR0 2JH, corner of St James Road, on Thursdays 20:00pm – 21:30pm.
The meeting is in Meeting Room 1. Press the buzzer and someone will open the door.