Retrial acquits hotel owner of gas killing

A hotelier has been acquitted of killing a guest who died of carbon monoxide poisoning.

Bryan Male, 61, was cleared of manslaughter on the third day of a retrial at Stafford Crown Court, when Mr Justice Sachs ordered the jury to return a not-guilty verdict following legal submissions.

Male, who was alleged to have carried out "botched" DIY repairs to a faulty gas boiler at the White Horse hotel in Pershore, Worcestershire, had pleaded not guilty to the charge.

Robert Drabble, 20, of Chapel-en-le-Frith, Derbyshire, died after being overcome by poisonous fumes in a shower cubicle at the hotel on 28 January 1998.

Male claimed he had inherited a problematic boiler when he took over the hotel in April 1997. At a previous trial at Worcester Crown Court earlier this year, at which a jury failed to reach a verdict, Male's defence barrister said the hotelier had thought he knew the answer to the problems and how to rectify them.

It was wrong to suggest that his client, a "responsible citizen", had been grossly negligent.