SADNESS OVER HEROIN GIRL'S NEEDLESS DEATH

The sister and mother of a 16-year-old girl, who both watched TV
instead of calling an ambulance as the teenager died of a heroin
overdose, are now both facing jail.

While Carly Townsend was dying in a bedroom at their family home in
Pwll, Llanelli, last May, her 46-year-old mother Andrea Townsend and
26-year-old sister Gemma Evans watched Emmerdale downstairs.

Even though Carly's lips turned blue before she died, Townsend's only
defence was to say: "I had seen her 10 times worse on drugs... I
thought she would sleep it off."

On Thursday, a jury at Swansea Crown Court found mother-of-four
Townsend guilty of manslaughter due to gross neglect.

And yesterday, after deliberating for more than 10 hours, they
convicted Evans of the same charge.

Paul Thomas, prosecuting, said Evans was a "go-between" in obtaining
heroin for Carly from a local dealer.

Both mother and daughter were granted bail until a sentencing hearing
next month but trial judge Mr Justice Lloyd-Jones warned them jail was
"a real possibility".

The lead officer in the case, Detective Sergeant Sharon Griffiths,
made it clear yesterday Carly had little chance to escape the grip of
hard drugs.

She said the 16-year-old's mother, a former amphetamine addict, and
her sister, who nearly died two years ago from a heroin overdose,
provided a platform "for encouragement and support" for Carly to take
drugs.

Astonishingly, the jury heard that by the time she was 15 Carly, had a
?50-a-day heroin habit.

And her mother Andrea Townsend stunned the court by revealing that 20
of her own friends had died from heroin overdoses.

Also, her late husband Stephen Townsend, Carly's father, died some
years ago after a drugs overdose.

Alan Andrews, director of Choose Life Cymru, a Llanelli-based drugs
charity, said the town had a problem with heroin.

But he added: "It's not just Llanelli - it's the same wherever you go
in Wales.

"No valley, no small town, no village is immune."

He added of the lifestyle of Townsend and Evans: "If you have not lived in
that world it's very hard to understand it.

"It's another world altogether."

Carly was placed under a council care order when she was just seven
and was fostered.

But at 15 she got a flat in Llanelli's Station Road where there have
been numerous drugs raids in recent years.

On two occasions she was hospitalised after taking
drugs.

On one occasion, her mother arrived at the hospital and "discharged"
her without consulting any doctors.

Carly was sentenced to six months in the Hillside Secure Unit for
young offenders at the start of 2007 due to drugs-related offences.

After a multi-agency conference it was decided to release her with an
electronic tag into the care of her mother.

Carly told social workers she was determined to give up
drugs.

She wanted to become a youth worker because she had been through "such
a lot" herself.

But a day after her release she broke her electronic tag curfew after
taking heroin.

A week-and-a-half later she was dead.

On May 2 last year, her mother was mowing the lawn at their home in
Bassett Terrace, Pwll, when Carly excitedly boasted she had three "?10
bags" (tiny foil wraps of heroin) for a cut price ?20.

She injected the drug and after being seen by a Carmarthenshire County
Council drugs worker who noted she was "sleepy," she later collapsed.

Evans and Townsend picked her up and placed her on the bed and
"listened" to her from downstairs where they watched soaps.

Because Carly had not taken drugs in her three months at Hillside, her
tolerance to the drug was hugely reduced meaning she was extremely
vulnerable to an overdose.

She told her mother she had a "hot head", a known sign of heroin
poisoning.

The court heard Townsend would have been well aware of the symptom
because her co-defendant daughter had the same symptom when she
overdosed on the drug in 2005.

Then, Evans was saved by the heroin antidote Naloxone administered by
paramedics.

But there was no Naloxone for Carly.

Evans and Townsend slept in a single bed next to the bed Carly was
lying on.

When they awoke, they found the teenager dead, curled up in a foetal
position.

Det Sgt Griffiths, of Dyfed- Powys Police, said yesterday: "There is
no pleasure in this verdict today, there is only sadness, sadness for
Carly Townsend.

"Just 16 years of age...gone...dead.

"A needless death as a result of the abuse of heroin."

She said drugs still caused tragedies in many families who did all
they could to prevent their loved ones taking drugs.

But she said this case was different.

She said: "Her mother and sister provided a platform of encouragement
and support for her to take drugs."