A coroner has ruled that five people in Cornwall who were gassed to death by faulty cookers died as a result of an accident.

Coroner Geraint Williams said all five people died as a result of carbon monoxide poisoning at their homes in 2010 and 2013, writes Nick Irving.

He said the victims "died when a cooker at the property, which had an inherent defect, produced fatal amounts of carbon monoxide; while intending to cook food the oven grill was inadvertently turned on with the grill door closed and sealed and carbon monoxide was produced."

The coroner said Beko should have contacted distributors and end user customers earlier because the "inherently dangerous" cookers were in the homes of thousands of people in the UK.

He said "in excess of 30,000 potentially dangerous cookers had been sold."

Mr Williams said no consideration was given to that before December 2008, adding: "It must have been clearly apparent that a significant number of inherently dangerous cookers were in the homes of the public."

Friends and housemates Richard Smith, 30, and Kevin Branton, 34, died in Saltash, in November 2010.

In February 2013, John Cook, 90, his wife Audrey, 86, and their daughter Maureen, 47, were found dead in their static caravan in Camborne, along with their pet dog.

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The Truro inquest was in relation to the five deaths, but was told that 18 deaths in the UK and Ireland had been linked to gas cookers made by parent company Acrelik, but sold by different companies in the brand names of Beko and GlenDimplex.

The inquest heard that more than 60,000 "potentially dangerous" gas cookers were sold by Beko and other firms between 2003 and 2008.

Beko sold 30,000 of them and a further 30,000 were sold under the Glen Dimplex brand. And a further 2,400 cookers were also potentially dangerous when they were converted to run on LPG gas rather than natural gas.

The coroner said that the Turkish based company Arcelik made the cookers and two types of cooker had an "inherent defect from the outset".

The one used by the Cook family was perfectly safe when used with natural gas, but unsafe when converted to use LPG gas, using the conversion kits supplied only by Beko.

He said the defect on the grill doors meant a rubber seal prevented air getting into the grill and led to a build up of carbon monoxide.

The product director at Arcelik, Alp Karahasanogiu, said in a statement to the inquest: "No one foresaw that the grill might be used with the grill door shut on purpose or by accident."

But Mr Williams said this should have been "glaringly obvious and should have been recognised and dealt with."

He said this singular failure led to the deaths of all five victims.

Mr Branton's mother Denise said after the inquest: "He was my only child. I miss him every day of my life."

Brian Smith said his son Richard was a "loving son, brother and uncle who loved life."

He saved his brother's life in 2001 when he was a match donor when his brother had leukaemia and at the age of 23 Richard bought his first home, which made his family very proud.

The Cook's extended family did not want to make a statement afterwards.

Police investigated the two separate deaths with a view to a possible criminal prosecution for corporate manslaughter - but no charges were brought.

The coroner agreed with Det Sgt Jonathan Bray of Devon and Cornwall police that the victims had turned on the grill by error as uncooked sausages and a pie were found in the two oven compartments.

And he also agreed that the victims died from high levels of carbon monoxide from the faulty cookers.

A spokesperson for Beko said: “Our sympathies remain with the Branton, Smith and Cook families.

“Since these tragic incidents, we’ve continued to raise our safety standards and the testing processes our products go through have become even more robust and stringent.

"We also collaborated with the industry to get the UK and EU gas safety standards changed in 2009. The new standard helps prevent a similar tragic event from happening again.

“The cooker models involved in these incidents have been the subject of a recall for over ten years and are no longer manufactured or sold.

“Our main objective is to ensure that every Beko product is safe for our customers.”