The Puttick Family

A five-year-old boy whose body was found in a rucksack at Beachy Head with those of his mother
Kazumi Puttick and Neil Puttick had died from meningitis at his home four days earlier, police have
now revealed.

Sam Puttick was discharged from hospital on Friday and had died later. His mother Kazumi Puttick,
44, and her husband, Neil, 34, wanted Sam to die at home in Westbury, Wiltshire.

Det Insp Ian Williams, of Sussex Police, said: "I am satisfied that Samuel's grieving parents Neil
and Kazumi appear to have taken their own lives.

Sam Puttick had been paralysed from the neck down following a car crash in July 2005 and was a
quadriplegic and needed equipment to help him breathe.

A statement posted on the 'stuff4sam' website today reads "It is with great sadness we have to share
the terrible news about Neil, Kazumi and Sam. Sam died from meningitis on Friday and it seems that
Neil and Kazumi took their own lives shortly after that."

"We are all very shocked at this terrible news and thinking of everyone who cared for Sam or were
close to Neil and Kazumi who are dealing with this tragic situation. We are all better for knowing
them and Sam could not have wished for better parents."

A spokesman for Bath and North East Somerset NHS said: "When it became clear that Sam had no hope of
recovery from his severe infection, he was discharged to his family home at his parents' request."
He was certified dead at the family home by a doctor at about 2000 BST.

The NHS said the discharge to home of seriously ill children was an accepted part of the palliative
withdrawal of treatment to support the families of dying children.

Rescuers found a second rucksack, full of toys, near the bodies.

Tributes have been paid on Memorial on the GoneTooSoon memorial site to the Puttick family, found
dead on a beach in the south of England.