The grieving family of a British man found dead in his home on the Caribbean island of Grenada have accused UK authorities of failing to support their fight for justice.
The family of Andrew Frederick, 47, whose body was discovered on 4 January, are calling for an urgent review of the policies governing UK assistance to the loved ones of Britons killed abroad.
A spokesperson for the family said they had been forced to launch their own public appeals for information, and commission an independent forensic pathologist and a private investigator, after they grew concerned about the direction of the police investigation in Grenada.
The pathologist, approved by the Royal Grenada police force (RGPF), found that Frederick had been tortured and concluded that his death was a homicide, the family spokesperson said, adding that family members then referred the case to the UK Foreign, Commonwealth and Development Office.
Despite being provided with a postmortem report establishing that Frederick had been tortured and killed, the FCDO refused to refer the case to its murder and manslaughter team, a specialist unit that supports families of British nationals who are victims of homicide abroad, the spokesperson said.
The family said in a statement: “Acting on pure discretion and with no guidance to underpin its position, the FCDO chose to defer to the local police force’s classification of Andrew’s death as suspicious but not a homicide over the determination of the only medical professional who examined Andrew.”
After the family referred their case to the Ealing Central and Acton MP, Dr Rupa Huq, she tabled a question in parliament in April, asking “on what legal basis” did the FCDO defer “to a foreign police force’s classification of the death of a British national abroad over the determination of an officially appointed pathologist and an official death certificate in circumstances where those findings would constitute grounds for a homicide investigation in England and Wales?”
The FCDO undersecretary, Hamish Falconer, responded that he was aware of the family’s case and added that there was no “guidance on the specific circumstances”.
The family said the delays and continuing gaps in support from UK authorities had taken an “immeasurable toll” on them, adding that they had received no information or any updates from the RGPF since mid January.
They said: “We have been unable to grieve properly for Andrew because grief requires a degree of resolution or at least the belief that those with the power to act are acting. Instead, nearly five months have been spent driving a campaign for justice while carrying the weight of what was done to him.
“This includes examining horrific pictures and the knowledge that the organisations that exist precisely to help families in these circumstances have, at every turn, forced us to fight for the most basic engagement. This is not what grief should look like. It is what institutional failure looks like.”
Eve Henderson, who co-founded the Murdered Abroad charity in 2001, which is helping Frederick’s family, said she was baffled by the UK’s reluctance to offer the support of the murder and manslaughter team, despite the postmortem and death certificate categorising the case as a homicide.
Murdered Abroad, created after Henderson’s husband was killed in 1997 while on holiday in France, was instrumental in the campaign for the establishment of the FCDO’s murder and manslaughter team in 2015.
Henderson said: “On average, there are between 60 and 80 homicides of British nationals abroad every year, which, I believe, is about 10% of all homicides in England and Wales last year. When it happens to you … you just assume that you will be assisted by our police or the Foreign Office or the coroner.
But most of the people the charity helps find themselves facing a maze of complications and frustrations, Henderson said.
One of the challenges, she added, is that much of the support is discretionary and not backed up by law. “There’s no statutory right to whatever they’re offering in the guidance. So it falls down on, ‘we may be able to help’,” she said, adding that attempts to get the support written into law through parliament had failed.
Bernie Kinsella, a UK retired chief superintendent of police, who worked on the high-profile case of the British student Joanna Parrish, 20, who was murdered in France in 1990, echoed Henderson’s concerns.
Kinsella, who is an adviser to Murdered Abroad, said while he understood British police were limited because they had no jurisdiction in a foreign investigation, there had been a lack of meaningful progress in support for families since he first worked on an overseas homicide case 25 years ago.
An FCDO spokesperson said: “We are supporting the family of a British man who has died in Grenada and are in contact with the local authorities.”
The Metropolitan police said they did not publicly comment on investigations being led by other forces.
In Grenada, the director of public prosecution, Howard Pinnock, said Andrew Frederick’s file had been reviewed, adding: “My advice to the police was to refer the matter to the coroner for an inquest.”
The RGPF was approached for comment.
