Family desperate for answers over father's Dominican Republic holiday death

These are the heartbroken words of a Rugeley woman who's older brother – a fit and healthy rugby player – died while on holiday in the Dominican Republic.

Roy Fawcett, aged 58, had been snorkelling off coral beach Paradise Island two days before he and wife Sue were due to return from their dream holiday.

But he was found face down in the ocean.

The father of one, who also became a grandfather for the first time just months after his death, grew up in Rugeley after his family moved to Staffordshire when he was six years old.

He attended the former Fair Oak School, which is now The Hart after merging with other local school Hagley Park, and was a keen player at Rugeley Rugby Club before moving to Newcastle for university.

His family want answers over his death in October last year, and hope an inquest to be held tomorrow in Cannock will shed some light.

Disbelief

His younger sister Jo-Anne Townsend, age 53, is still in disbelief at the death of her brother.

"I don't really know how I feel," she said. "I'm completely numb about it. I want to scream and shout but I know it won't do any good. I want to know why he died. He shouldn't have died.

"The worst thing was we couldn't even be with him. The thought that he was over there and we couldn't do anything about it.

"I just want to know what happened. There are so many questions that need answering. Why was there no first aid? Why did no-one know what to do?

"If it wasn't so tragic it would be a comedy. You couldn't even write what happened. They dragged him out of the water by his feet."

Roy came back to Rugeley in the early 1990s with wife Sue. The pair stayed for a few years, with son Nathan, but started moving around the country a few years later for Roy's work as a project manager.

Sue, his wife of 27 years, now lives in Swindon, which is where they resided at the time of Roy's death.

The 56-year-old support worker said she could remember Roy being dragged from the water, his face a horrible purple-blue colour.

She said the last year had been hell without him and that the whole family still struggled to come to terms with what happened the day he died.

“We know that the inquest is going to be an emotional time and bring back painful memories but we just hope our family gets the answers we deserve about the events of what happened on that day," she said.

Family man

She described Roy as a gentle and kind family man. Six months after he died, Roy and Sue’s first granddaughter was born, followed three months later by another two granddaughters.

The couple first met in Staffordshire when they were teenagers but went on to marry other people. But after both marriages broke down they bumped into each other on a night out in Rugeley.

The couple, who had three children between them, flew to the Dominican Republic on September 30 last year with holiday company Thomson.

“We’d always wanted to go,” said Sue. “We just decided last year to go. We went for two weeks and we’d been out there for 12 days when Roy died.”

Roy was on a snorkelling excursion when he was found face down in the water. He was pulled to the beach and efforts were made to resuscitate him. He was pronounced dead at the local hospital a short time later.

He apparently showed no apparent signs of being unwell in the days leading up to his death and had been playing beach volleyball hours before his death.