It is “hard to fathom” that a model tenant could have died and remained quiet in her flat for more than two-and-a-half years despite failing to pay rent and neighbors raising the alarm, an inquest has heard on the death of Sheila Seleoane.
Coroner Julian Morris said it was “clear something went wrong” when Mr Seleoane’s repeated failure to engage with his landlord, gas engineers or the police did not arouse suspicion.
The body of Seleoane, 61, a medical secretary who appeared to have no close friends or family, was found in February after a member of the public alerted police to damage to the balcony door of her flat in Peckham, south london and officers forced entry.
“Any death is sad. To lie undetected is hard to understand,” Morris said as he concluded the inquest.
The case attracted publicity because of the unusual length of time Seleoane’s body lay in state at Lord’s Court. This was despite neighbors repeatedly complaining about the smell to its owner, the Peabody Trust, and asking him to carry out a welfare check.
An independent report into the case commissioned by Peabody published on Friday was scathing that the housing association failed to detect that its tenant had died or live up to its corporate ambition to be a “humane and kind” landlord.
The report, by consultants Altair, found there were several missed opportunities to discover her body, as well as 89 attempts to contact Seleoane between August 2019 and February 2022 that were not followed up.
These included reports of maggots and flies in her apartment just weeks after rent payments stopped in August 2019. A report to the Peabody Customer Center from a neighbor in October 2020 mentioned that the smell it was like “a corpse”.
“What could have been designed as a customer-focused service didn’t work. Instead, the focus became the processes themselves and it seems Peabody didn’t see the triggers, didn’t listen to Mrs Seleoane’s neighbors nor joined the dots,” he said.
Peabody officials did not ensure any “meaningful contact” with Seleoane, according to the report, preferring a “transactional” approach that treated the sending of an email, text, letter or phone message as evidence that the work
Peabody ward administrators had unusually large “patches” by industry standards, being responsible for up to 1,200 units each, meaning they could not easily track individual cases.
The culture of the organization had to change, he added. “There is no doubt that Peabody’s reputation has been damaged, with stakeholders, the industry and, most importantly, with its tenants. There is work to be done to restore its reputation,” the report concludes.
Peabody Trust trustees who gave evidence to the inquiry admitted they had “failed to connect the dots”. Ashling Fox, the trust’s deputy chief executive, said: “We could have raised the alarm sooner.”
Asked about the case’s effect on Peabody’s staff, a visibly upset Fox said: “You could tell everyone was devastated. I don’t think anyone goes to work to do a bad job.”
In a statement, Peabody chief executive Ian McDermott said: “We are devastated by what has happened. We deeply regret our part in this and apologize to Sheila, her family and everyone who lives at Lord’s Court. When we took action in this case, we didn’t ask the most fundamental question: Is Sheila OK?
Police who found Seleoane’s badly decomposed body told the inquest that dates on shopping receipts and food cartons found in her flat suggested her likely date of death was August 2019.
The inquest heard that a local Peabody manager had asked police to carry out a welfare check in October 2021. However, a police error meant they mistakenly informed the manager that officers had “spoke to the resident [Seleoane]that it was fine and safe” and the case was closed.
Morris said medical files showed Seleoane had suffered from inflammatory bowel disease in the past and had contacted his GP about a chest complaint in August 2019. But there was no evidence of ‘a cause of death and issued an open conclusion.
Even if her owner had responded more quickly, it would not have saved Seleoane’s life, the coroner said. “She was already dead,” he said.