IT IS "impossible" to tell what a Dartford boxer intended before he drowned while swimming in a lake, a coroner has ruled.

Mark Katnoria, of Barham Road, drowned after getting into difficulty while swimming in Cotton Lake, Crossways Business Park, on February 27.

Coroner Roger Hatch said the conclusion of how the 34-year-old had died was "impossible to reach".

Mr Katnoria, had worked for John Lewis in Bluewater for six years and was a voluntary patient at Little Brook Hospital, in Dartford, which provides mental health services.

The post mortem carried out at Darent Valley Hospital on February 28 and the verdict was hypoxic brain injury caused by drowning.

 

News Shopper: Emergency services at The Wharf pub in Galleon Boulevard

Oliver Parkar-Grater, who was fishing the lake after pitching a tent the night before, told a Gravesend Town Hall inquest last week: "I noticed someone who appeared to be swimming in the lake.

"The visibility wasn’t good, I couldn’t see him very clearly.

"He was making a noise like he was in distress, like groaning noises.

Mr Parkar-Grater grew concerned when Mr Katnoria suddenly disappeared from view.

He said: "The man stopped swimming in the middle of the lake. He was bobbing about and then went under the water for a few seconds.

"I was starting to worry. He went under the water again, I thought he was going to come back up but he didn’t."

A boat was sent to rescue him from the freezing water before he was taken back to shore and paramedics attempted to resuscitate him in the car park of The Wharf pub.

Mr Katnoria’s clothes were later found folded neatly of the side of the lake. He was later declared dead at the facility in Denmark Hill.

Coroner Roger Hatch, who recorded an open verdict, said: "It is an impossible conclusion to reach as to what he wanted."

News Shopper: Pat Katnoria says she has "got to carry on somehow".

His mother Pat, who lived with her son, told News Shopper after the inquest: "He was a lovely man and his mum misses him terribly.

"But I wouldn’t want him back if he was feeling like he was when he did that."

Mr Katnoria, a keen lightweight boxer, served in the army for three years in Germany and had donated a kidney to King’s College Hospital.