AN animal rights activist died after falling 40 feet from a window at a house in York, an inquest heard.

Lara Saunders, 35, of Lindsey Avenue, Acomb, was found dead in an alleyway in Bootham on May 21 last year, after falling from the fourth floor bathroom window.

Coroner Donald Coverdale recorded an open verdict at an inquest yesterday, saying he could not be certain that she had intended to kill herself.

North Yorkshire Police scenes of crime manager Michael Hudson said in a report that Miss Saunders had squeezed through a narrow bathroom window in the Bootham house.

As she was falling to the ground, she hit a telephone line, snapping it and bringing it down with her.

A member of York's alternative community, she was staying in the Bootham house after squatting at the White Swan Hotel in Piccadilly. A biochemist's report said Miss Saunders had some alcohol in her blood when she died - but only the equivalent of two pints of beer.

She was reported to have been "in an emotional crisis" after her boyfriend died of a heart attack brought on by alcohol abuse last March.

A committed animal rights activist, Miss Saunders staged a vigil outside York Hospital during the treatment there of convicted arsonist and anti-vivisection campaigner Barry Horne.

The inquest was told she had alcohol problems stretching back up to 20 years, and she had told doctors at Bootham Park Hospital - where she admitted herself last March - that she had been known to drink three litres of wine a day, as well as sherry and vodka. She stayed in hospital for nearly three weeks, and was said to be making positive plans for the future when she was discharged.

After she left hospital, she started drinking again, and asked doctors to readmit her in May last year. But Dr Jackie Holland, consultant psychiatrist at Bootham Park, told the inquest this had not seemed "appropriate".

Mr Coverdale said: "Miss Saunders had been going through a very difficult time in her life. She had suffered a comparatively recent bereavement, and she had for quite some time a problem with alcohol.

"What prevents me from recording a death of suicide is that nothing was said about specifically taking her life - and nobody saw what happened."

Updated: 10:55 Wednesday, May 12, 2004