Daniela Espirito Santo reported partner to police seven times before death

Daniela Espirito Santo reported her boyfriend seven times in less than a year before her death in 2020

No standards were breached by police when a woman died while on hold reporting a domestic assault, a watchdog has said.

Daniela Espirito Santo, 23, from Grantham, reported partner Julio Jesus for attacking her while on bail for another assault the same day.

He was charged with manslaughter but that was dropped over lack of evidence linking the attack and her death.

He was instead charged with assault and jailed for 10 months.

A report by the Independent Office for Police Conduct (IOPC), which was leaked to the New York Times, detailed seven calls from Ms Espirito Santo about her partner between May 2019 and April 2020.

During her final 999 call on 8 April 2020, she reported being attacked hours after Jesus was released on police bail for an assault earlier that day in which he pinned her down and pushed his arm against her throat.

The 999 call handler deemed the call non-urgent as Jesus had left the home and told Ms Espirito Santo to ring back on the non-emergency 101 number.

Eight minutes later, when the non-emergency call handler answered, all she could hear were the distraught cries of a baby.

When police forced entry to Ms Espirito Santo's flat, they found her slumped on the sofa cradling her six-month-old son.

Daniela Espirito Santo died while on hold to report a second attack by her partner in one day

'No evidential link'

Following her death, Julio Jesus was arrested on suspicion of manslaughter.

A post-mortem examination found Ms Espirito Santo had died from a pre-existing heart condition and that there was a possible link between the stress of the assault and her heart failing.

However, after further reviewing medical evidence, the Crown Prosecution Service (CPS) said it did not believe it could sufficiently prove "an evidential link" between the assault and her death and dropped the manslaughter charge.

A spokeswoman for the CPS said: "Julio Jesus was originally charged with the manslaughter of Daniela Espirito Santo on the basis that his actions that day triggered a fatal complication from a pre-existing heart condition.

"As the case neared trial, and following review of further expert medical reports, it became apparent we could not prove an evidential link between Ms Santo's tragic heart failure and what occurred that day between her and Mr Jesus.

"We contacted Ms Santo's family to explain the way the evidence in this case led to this conclusion. Our thoughts and sympathies are with her loved ones at this difficult time," the spokeswoman added.

Instead, Jesus was convicted for two assaults and jailed.

Charly Price-Wallace, a friend of Ms Espirito Santo's, has called for greater protection for victims of domestic abuse who are scared to press charges against their partners.

"They had record of seven incidents which contained 10 attacks that Dani had disclosed and yet didn't see a pattern or do anything about it.

"We need to make sure her name means something - that she didn't die in vain."

Charly Price-Wallace says she wants more to be done to protect vulnerable domestic abuse victims scared to press charges

Copies of police reports in the IOPC investigation show how the abuse escalated over the course of a year from threats to kill, to controlling and coercive behaviour and strangulation.

The IOPC also found that Lincolnshire Police had not failed in any of their standards during multiple contacts with Ms Espirito Santo.

However, the IOPC said there was a "learning recommendation" in relation to the need for a force-wide written policy on when to transfer calls directly to the non-emergency 101 service rather than asking people to call back themselves, and any actions to be taken by 999 operators when taking that action.

A spokeswoman for Lincolnshire Police said it would not be possible to comment until the conclusion of an inquest into Ms Espirito Santo's death.

A Domestic Homicide Review, which is a multi-agency review of the circumstances in which a person's death has, or appears to have, resulted from violence, abuse or neglect by a person to whom they were in an intimate personal relationship, is under way.