Ian Tomlinson coroner asks for judge to preside over inquest

The coroner presiding over the inquest into the death of Ian Tomlinson has officially requested that a senior judicial figure take over the case, on the eve of formal proceedings. The City of London coroner Paul Matthews will tomorrow begin a pre-inquest review – a proceeding that will set out the scope of the judicial investigation into Tomlinson's death. However the Guardian understands that Matthews, who controversially appointed the pathologist Dr Freddy Patel to conduct the first postmortem into the newspaper vendor's death, has written to ministers raising doubts about his own lack of expertise in criminal cases. The justice secretary, Ken Clarke, is considering the request, which has the support of Tomlinson's family. Tomlinson died at last year's G20 protests after being struck by PC Simon Harwood, a member of the Metropolitan police's territorial support group. Patel said Tomlinson died of a heart attack. A second and third examination contradicted that finding, suggesting instead that the he had died from internal bleeding. In July Keir Starmer QC, the director of public prosecutions, announced that no charges would be brought against Harwood, citing complications surrounding Patel's evidence. Matthews has yet to explain why he selected Patel, whose professional conduct had repeatedly been brought into question prior to his appointment. Last week the General Medical Council in effect banned Patel from carrying out postmortem examinations in suspicious death cases and suspended him for three months after being found guilty of misconduct or "deficient professional performance" in three earlier autopsy cases. However Matthews is not thought to have referred to the Patel case when listing the reasons why a "retired or serving judge" should preside over the inquest in his place. His letter to the Ministry of Justice is understood to have focused instead on his own lack of expertise in criminal cases, as well as the wider implications of the inquest for "police and police behaviour". Writing that the case would be long and complex, Matthews said that the matter was of national rather than local importance. He described himself as a part-time coroner with other professional obligations. The inquest into the death of Blair Peach, who was killed by police in 1979, was marred after Conservative ministers refused to replace the coroner with a senior judge. Dr John Burton was accused by supporters of Peach of prejudicing the jury at the inquest, which returned a verdict of "death by misadventure". Confidential documents released last year at the National Archives revealed senior civil servants became alarmed after discovering Burton had penned an "unpublished story" about the Peach death, which he believed was being blamed on police as part of a political "fabrication" by leftwing subversives.