The family of tragic schoolgirl Toni Connell accused Ockendon Academy of a ‘cover-up’ at the inquest into her death yesterday, after police said they found no evidence of Toni being bullied.

Coroner Beasley-Murray returned an open verdict into the schoolgirl’s death, aged 15, saying she could not find sufficient evidence to support a conclusion of ‘suicide’ or ‘accident’.

The Ockendon Academy pupil tragically passed away in February this year at Great Ormond Street Hospital after being found at her home in South Ockendon.

Toni’s mother Amanda Connell raised questions during Detective Sergeant James Holmes’ testimony, as he said police found ‘no evidence of suspicious circumstances or bullying’ regarding Toni’s death.

The Det Sarg said: “I looked into Toni’s mobile phones and on examining those, there were no concerns that I could find that would suggest that she was being bullied. There were no messages and nothing to suggest that.”

Mrs Connell asked how that was possible, when a teacher from the Academy had sent her and her partner Paul an email expressing concerns about her being bullied a few weeks before her death.

Mrs Connell said: “You said there’s no evidence at the school regarding the bullying. Did you check with the counsellor because I know for a fact that Toni was having counselling at the school for bullying.”

She added: “When the counsellor was at the review meeting, nothing was said about bullying at all. They covered that and other evidence up. If you have not spoken to the counsellor, it’s a cover-up.”

Ofsted released a report two weeks ago into Ockendon Academy’s safeguarding of pupils, following the death of two students at the school, giving the school the ‘all clear’.

The education watchdog carried out the inspection on The Ockendon Academy because it was “concerned about the effectiveness of leadership and management in respect to the welfare and safeguarding of students at the academy.”

Toni’s mother spoke to the Gazette earlier this year to express her disappointment with the school, and how she felt school ‘stress’ contributed to her daughter’s early death.

In giving her verdict, Coroner Caroline Beasley-Murray said yesterday she needed to prove 'beyond reasonable doubt' that Toni's death had either been caused by an accident or by suicide.

Not being convinced by either, this only left the possibility of an open verdict.

Mrs Beasley-Murray said: “Whenever there’s been a death, there are all sorts of emotions and feelings and very often, most of those are outside the scope of an inquest.”

“An inquest answers the questions of who has died, where they died, when they died and how they came by their death. Of all four questions, the fourth is often more difficult. You might find there’s no answer of the question why?”

“An inquest is a fact-finding enquiry, it’s not a fault-finding mission.”

“We will never quite know what was going through Toni’s mind just prior to her death. She clearly was much loved and I’m again going to express sympathies to you all and hope that you will be able to look back at all the happy memories you have of her.

“If you have concerns that haven’t been answered those are matters you can take up with the school.”