Escaped UK convict found hanged in Polish cell

Photo: sxc.hu

Ian McLean, who had been serving a life sentence after stabbing his former partner, fled a mental health unit in Oxford on 8 July.

The 44-year-old was detained in Kolobrzeg, a seaside resort on the Baltic, on 15 July, and he was then moved to Koszalin.

McLean, whose extradition hearing was slated for 13 August, apparently hanged himself.

His mother, Moira Henderson, who revealed news of the death this week, said that her son had been rushed to hospital, but that he died on 14 August.

She said that prior to her son's escape to Poland, he had been agitated about being moved from the mental health unit in Oxford back to prison.

“In his letter he told me a psychiatrist [at Littlemore, Oxford] had told him he was good enough to go back to prison,” she told the Oxford Times.

“He needed help – he was not fit enough to go back to prison,” she said.

Mrs Henderson told the paper that her son had chosen Poland as he had struck up a friendship with a Polish cleaner while at the Oxford mental health unit.

McLean was able to flee the UK because allegedly, a doctor at the Oxford unit had helped him obtain a passport in his birth name of Ian Mitchell.

“The remit of our investigation may need to be revised to take into account this latest sad development,” commented Oxford Health spokesperson Carrie-Ann Wade Williams, following news of McLean's death. (nh)