The December 2025 Times investigation recounts the death of Edward Cornes, a 19-year-old gay student who was found dead in a King’s Cross hotel less than 48 hours after starting at University College London, and the four-year struggle by his family to establish whether his death was properly investigated.
Edward died after consuming alcohol, GHB and methamphetamine while in the company of two men in their fifties, Matthew Butler and Ian Casimir. A post-mortem concluded the cause of death was “the acute toxic effects of alcohol, GHB and methamphetamine”, and a coroner later ruled the death was drug-related. No criminal charges were brought.
The family argue that the Metropolitan Police prematurely fixed on a narrative that Cornes was a promiscuous young man involved in chemsex and failed to pursue alternative lines of enquiry. Their solicitor said police “looked to prove a narrative around Ed being young, gay and promiscuous” while minimising contradictory evidence.
The investigation identifies multiple alleged failures: key witnesses were not interviewed; CCTV footage and blood samples were lost; forensic analysis was delayed for years and some searches were cursory or never carried out. Officers also failed to test whether Edward was too intoxicated to consent, or how he came to have a “massive amount of GHB in his system”. An ITV report (see below) said an internal review later found 27 failings.
Edward’s parents say they were subjected to homophobic assumptions. An officer suggested their son might be a “rent boy” and another claimed “all gay men take trays of drugs”. At the inquest, police introduced phone evidence implying drug dealing, despite no evidence of commercial transactions and messages showing Edward disliked chemsex.
The case has been compared to the Stephen Port scandal [Barking Murders], raising concerns about institutional homophobia and a lack of investigative “curiosity” in cases involving gay victims. Edward’s mother says she is still seeking the truth: “If he wasn’t gay, the whole context of that investigation would have been very different.”
Family Fight for Truth Over Son’s ‘Date-Rape’ Drug Death | Times News | 15 Dec 2025 | 35m 52s
Met Police accused of botching probe into gay student’s drug death | ITV News | 27 Jan 2026 | 8m 37s
They focused on him being gay’: Family accuse police of failures after student found dead in hotel | ITV News | 27 Jan 2026 Barking Murders | MEN R US
Inquests into the deaths of Anthony Walgate, Gabriel Kovari, Daniel Whitworth and Jack Taylor | MEN R US
