THE pressures of running a business may have led a Merseyside family man to take his own life by driving his car head-on into a fuel tanker, an inquest heard yesterday.

Trevor Wright, who was 51, died of multiple injuries sustained after colliding with an HGV on the A565 Moor Lane, near Ince Woods, in June.

Coroner Christopher Sumner recorded an open verdict, saying that, although suicide was possible, it could not be ruled out that the sudden onset of some health condition had caused Mr Wright to lose control of his car.

Widow Christine Wright, 50, said her husband was incapable of committing suicide.

She told the Daily Post: “My husband would never have committed suicide. Absolutely not.

“The open verdict doesn’t mean anything to me. It doesn’t change the fact that we’ll never know what happened. That will always be a mystery.”

Tanker driver William Gayter told the inquest he believed Mr Wright, who had been driving a silver Honda CR-V, had purposefully crashed into him.

Mr Gayter had been travelling towards Liverpool and Mr Wright towards Formby.

He said: “The silver car seemed to accelerate and veer across towards my lane. I started to break and he accelerated again and moved into my lane.

“I looked through the windscreen and saw his eyes, wide open, shocked looking, fixed on me. He was staring into my eyes until his car disappeared over the top of my unit.

“My immediate reaction was he had committed suicide.”

Mr Wright, who lived in Holmwood Drive, Formby, with his wife, son Nick, 22, and daughter Lizzie, 21, was described as becoming increasingly stressed and anxious in the months leading up to his death.

The keen golfer had been considering selling his business The Kitchen Rooms of Formby, which he had bought in 2007.

Dr Martin Shaw, consultant pathologist at Southport Hospital, who conducted the post-mortem, said Mr Wright had no heart or brain problems but alluded to a “slight starvation” factor – perhaps due to the appetite-suppressing effect of tablets he was taking to stop smoking.

At the inquest, held at North Sefton Magistrates’ Court, coroner Sumner concluded: “To record a verdict that somebody has committed suicide, I have to be sure as to their intent.

“There’s evidence that Mr Wright had suffered from one dizzy spell. I cannot rule out that Mr Wright had some sort of medical event.”

Mrs Wright paid tribute to her late husband, saying: “He was a devoted family man, nothing came before his family.

“He enjoyed playing golf at Hurlston Hall and had a good sense of humour and an easy way with people.”

paulaowens