By IANS,
London : The death of a successful Indian-origin banker who leapt in front of a train here on the day he was due to have dinner with his wife has baffled his family, colleagues and a coroner.
Carl Perreira, 36, an acquisitions manager at Allied Irish Bank, leapt in front of a speeding express train in London April 3 after inexplicably going on an alcohol drinking binge.
Born in Mumbai and brought up in Melbourne, he was described by colleagues as an intelligent, hard-working and well-liked professional.
An inquest into his death earlier this month was told Perreira was coping well at work and had been acting normally, the Daily Mail reported.
Perreira was not known as a heavy drinker but consumed five times above the drink-driving limit.
Perreira had arranged to dine out with his wife, nursery nurse Gemma Campbell, shortly before his death at Wimbledon Station in south-west London.
Eyewitnesses saw him put a plastic bag containing two cans of beer on the platform before leaping into the path of the train.
He rang his office April 2 to say he was suffering from a headache and would not be coming in and decided not to work the following day too, but appeared to be relaxed and normal.
Three hours before committing suicide he rang his wife at work to tell her he was going for a walk because the weather was good.
David Lock, the head of UK acquisitions and finance at Allied Irish, said: “The news of his death took me by complete surprise. Nothing leading up to the time indicated that there was anything untoward. He spoke positively of his personal circumstances and the future.”
Coroner Shirley Radcliffe recorded an open verdict.
She said: “It’s a little bit of a puzzle as to where he had been, what he was doing and how he had come to consume so much alcohol. There was no planning, he had no psychiatric history, he was obviously an intelligent, hard-working, professional, well-liked person.
“We are aware that working in certain areas of banking can be very stressful, but he seems to have managed for a number of years, coping with the stress.
“So it’s a slight mystery, I’m afraid, and there is no sufficient evidence for me to be sure that he intended to end his own life.
“To be perfectly honest, with an alcohol content of that level, people do think they can do all sorts of things, such as fly or jump across the track.”