Amy Winehouse’s former brother-in-law Freddy Civil killed by heroin overdose aged 27

22 November 2022

Amy Winehouse’s former brother-in-law Freddy Civil died of a heroin overdose aged 27.

Amy Winehouse’s former brother-in-law Freddy Civil died of a heroin overdose aged 27

The cause of death was revealed on Tuesday (22.11.22) during an inquest at Wakefield Coroner’s Court in West Yorkshire, attended by Freddy’s 40-year-old brother Blake Fielder-Civil.

He was married to Amy, who also died aged 27, from 2007 to 2009.

Pathologist Lisa Barker told jurors Freddy had been found face-down in his underwear on April 26, 2021, at a hotel in Leeds, where he was staying with his friend Dennis Lennon.

The Daily Mail reported she told the hearing Freddy had “fatal levels” of morphine in his body from injecting heroin, while an internal examination found he choked on his vomit.

Ms Barker said in court: “It was indicated as the lower end of the fatal range. It might be survived by someone who regularly took heroin, because they build up a tolerance, but it might even have overdosed a chronic user.

“It was in the fatal range, even for somebody with a history of taking heroin.”

The inquest also heard Freddy was staying at the £40-a-night Bed and Breakfast where he died after fleeing a mental health hospital, about which his mum said he had complained.

Jurors were told Freddy escaped on foot from Newton Lodge, a mental health unit on the grounds of Fieldhead Hospital, Wakefield.

A judge had sentenced him to the psychiatric unit in the autumn of 2018 following an unspecified crime.

Doctors initially diagnosed Freddy with paranoid schizophrenia, but the condition was later decided to have been drug-induced.

Freddy’s mum Georgette Civil told the court her son’s hospitalisation was due to finish in June 2021 and said he had raised a “complaint of staff abuse”.

She added he was often “moved around from ward to ward” with only an hour’s worth of exercise and activity per day.

Blake, who struggled with addiction throughout his marriage to Amy, admitted to introducing the ‘Back to Black’ singer to heroin.

She is thought to have quit hard drugs after they separated but was killed by alcohol poisoning on July 23, 2011, at her home in Camden, north London.