Six doctors are to take legal action in a bid to reopen the inquest in to weapons inspector Dr David Kelly.
The scientist, 59, was found dead in woods near his Oxfordshire home in July 2003, after being named as the source that claimed the Government had “sexed up” a dossier on Iraq’s weapons of mass destruction.
An inquiry by Lord Hutton concluded Dr Kelly, a Ministry of Defence advisor, had died from cuts to his wrist and an overdose of powerful painkillers.
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But a group of six doctors want the case re-examined, claiming there is insufficient evidence to prove he committed suicide.
Trauma surgeon David Halpin, epidemiologist Andrew Rouse, surgeon Martin Birnstingl, radiologist Stephen Frost, Chris Burns-Cox, who specialises in internal general medicine, and Michael Powers QC, a former assistant coroner, have instructed solicitors and aim to approach the Attorney General Baroness Scotland to get the case before the High Court.
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Dr Powers QC, said the wounds to Dr Kelly’s left wrist, which cut an ulnar artery, would not have caused him to bleed to death and there was only a normal dose of co-proxamol present in his body.
He said a coroner had to be sure “beyond reasonable doubt” that a person intended to kill themselves before reaching a verdict of suicide.
Dr Powers, an expert in coroners’ law, said: “Suicide cannot be presumed it has to be proven. From the evidence that we have as to the circumstances of his death, in particular the aspect of haemorrhage, we do not believe that there was sufficient evidence to prove beyond reasonable doubt that he killed himself.”
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He said that there was not enough information to determine whether Dr Kelly was murdered or killed himself.
He also criticised the decision to allow Lord Hutton, who is not a coroner, to oversee the inquiry.
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“There are many times in political life that the country needs to have an answer and the desire to have an answer overwhelms the desire to get the right answer. There is that pressure to find a conclusion,” said Dr Powers.
“I have no doubt that many of us when we read about this thought that he had killed himself. But you cannot be certain.
“Everyone’s death is significant. This death had a significance which was greater and I feel that the process of the investigation of death ought to have been a thorough one. That was not provided for him.”
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Dr Kelly was identified as the source for a report by Andrew Gilligan on the Today programme in May 2003, in which it was claimed the Government wanted the weapons dossier “sexed up”. Dr Kelly denied the claims and on July 15 2003, three days before he was found dead, he appeared before the Foreign Affairs Committee.
Dr Kelly had some signs of heart disease which was not bad enough to have killed him, and it was never made public how much blood he had actually lost, Dr Powers said.
“Any doctor, any medical student will tell you that if you want to kill yourself by haemorrhage that is not the way to do it. Kelly was not silly,” he added.