GREECE: Tourists say there was nothing unusual about the British family involved in the Corfu hotel tragedy

British tourists staying in a hotel where two children died and their parents were found in a coma reacted with shock on Thursday (October 26) after having met the family a day earlier. Tourists described the family as very loving and popular with the other guests, and did not notice anything out of the ordinary in their behaviour. The children, they said seemed happy and were playing with the other children in the hotel compound. 'I had seen the family they arrived early in the week and they seemed very very nice. Two lovely children, mother very popular. I can't understand it. It's sad but nobody knows what's going on and no one is telling anyone anything too much speculation going on at the present moment," said British tourist Roy Charles. 'There was nothing out of the ordinary they were just a loving couple it was said how beautiful the woman was she was just a gorgeous lady. The kids were playing in the pool with all of the kids there, this is my nephew and I have got my daughter here so it was just in and out" said another tourist staying at the hotel. The two British children, a boy and a girl aged five and seven, were found dead in the hotel room with their parents unconscious on Thursday morning when a maid arrived to clean the room at the Louis Corcyra Beach Hotel in Gouvia Bay. The two children, ages five and seven, had been dead for an estimated eight to ten hours, Corfu hospital pathologist Stephanos Gasteratos said, and the parents were in critical condition in the Corfu General Hospital, hooked up to life support machines. The cause of death is under investigation, but Gasteratos said first indications show poison was involved. He said final toxicological tests were underway but had not yet been completed. "The results of the toxicological tests will confirm if this is the case. The investigation is continuing and will shed more light on the situation of which information is still not clear," Gasteratos added. The acting coroner said first indications showed the family may have taken a strong poison. Local police have launched an investigation into the strange circumstances and were awaiting the results of autopsies and toxicological tests to determine the cause of death. Officials said they had not ruled out the possibility that the family had consumed poisonous mushrooms. A Foreign Office source in London named the two dead children as Robert and Christianne and their parents as Neil Shepherd and Ruth Beatson from West Yorkshire. The receptionist at the hotel said the family had checked in on October 23 and had not caused any problems during their stay.

ITN Source | October 27, 2006

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