Burns victim Jacqueline Kirk's scars 'like belt tied around chest'

Jacqueline Kirk was severely scarred from being set alight in 1998 and died in 2019

Scar tissue on a burns victim who was set alight by her ex-partner acted like a belt around her chest, a court hears.

Steven Craig, 58, set Jacqueline Kirk on fire in Weston-super-Mare in 1998.

Jurors have been asked to decide whether the injuries she received from the attack were "more than a minimal cause of her death" 21 years later.

Ms Kirk's consultant said the scarring restricted her chest wall and believes this was more than a minimal factor in her diaphragm rupturing in 2019.

Mr Craig denies murder but was previously found guilty of causing grievous bodily harm to Ms Kirk.

She suffered severe burns, scarring, and breathing difficulties following the attack in 1998 and died aged 61 in August 2019 when her diaphragm ruptured.

Professor Tim Cook, an intensive care consultant, treated Ms Kirk during the last few days of her life at the Royal United Hospital (RUH) in Bath.

He said scarring from the burns was "like having a belt tied around" her chest wall.

He told jurors: "Try to imagine three balloons, one is in the abdomen, and the other two are the lungs. And they're all inflated.

"If the balloon in the abdomen was massively inflated that pushed up the other two balloons. And when they were inflated they were squashed.

"In patients without scarring they could expand more."

Steven Craig attacked Ms Kirk in Dolphin Square, Weston-super-Mare

Mr Vijay Joshi, a thoracic surgeon, told the court the pre-existing injuries were not more than a minimal cause of Ms Kirk's death.

He said any mathematical calculation, about the degree to which the burns had played a part in her death, was likely to be "purely subjective".

'Grossly abnormal'

Mr Joshi pointed out she had already had a number of operations under general anaesthetic after 1998, and therefore did not accept she was too high risk to operate on because of her burns.

Later jurors heard evidence from forensic pathologist Dr Alison Armour who said Ms Kirk's diaphragm had ruptured due to "striking" and "severe" swelling of the gastrointestinal tract which she described as "grossly abnormal" and said "nobody knows the cause or reason" for.

She said: "In this case when the distention of the oesophagus, stomach, small and large bowel was so marked, the pressure inside the abdomen would have been so great that there is nowhere for the intestinal contents to go but to pressurise the diaphragm which then ruptures.

"So in consideration of the entirety of the case, the degree of abdominal scarring in my view would have been less than minimal in being responsible for the diaphragm rupturing, which ultimately led to the death of Jacqueline Kirk."

The trial at Bristol Crown Court continues.

Follow BBC West on Facebook, Twitter and Instagram. Send your story ideas to: [e-mail]