The distressed mother of a 'fit and healthy' 26-year-old man has said that she is ‘disappointed’ at the lack of investigation following her son’s unexpected death.

Matthew James Ling, of Belmont Park Road in Maidenhead was found unresponsive at work on May 12 around 6:30 pm and despite life-saving measures, he was declared dead at the scene.

The inquest was conducted at Reading Town Hall on Friday, July 12 and overseen by assistant coroner Mr Simpson.

Attendees, including the deceased Mum and friends, heard evidence from a variety of parties. These witness statements included the Air Ambulance, Police, a toxicology specialist, a GP, the cleaner who found Mr Ling in his office, and a co-worker.

Coroner Simpson began the hearing by apologising to Mathew’s mother for the shortage of evidence that had been gathered over the course of their investigations.

Choking back the tears, Mrs Susan Ling described her son as ‘an amazing man, fantastic friend and son who loved designing and making things’.

She said: “Matt was incredibly creative and successful in his career where he was a design engineer concentrating on 3D printing.

“He loved gaming with his friends and had a great social life. The weekend following his death, he had planned to take a fun trip with his friends and was really excited about it.”

Matthew's mother expressed her concern to the coroner throughout the inquest about the lack of investigations done into the unexplained death of a ‘healthy and fit’ 26-year-old who was generally fit and well.

Despite obtaining a wrist injury from a football match the previous day, he was described as being in very good spirits when in contact with his friends and girlfriend that day.

Matthew was discovered on the floor of his office – alongside his inhaler - by the cleaner at around 6:15pm, having been the final person working in the building at the end of the day. It was thought after evaluating evidence statements that he died suddenly between 4:30pm and 4:45pm.

In conclusion, the assistant coroner stated that Matthew James Ling’s cause of death was of natural causes after an unwitnessed collapse due to a medical condition - asthma.

Despite being relatively healthy at the time, reports of a decline in fitness during a football match and an increasing persistent cough were said to have been factors leading to his death.

To conclude the inquest, Matt’s mother – Susan Ling – spoke about her outrage that it took 11 days for an autopsy to take place.

She queried: “Is it common that a post mortem on a young, healthy man with an unknown cause of death to take 11 days? I just think that if an autopsy was done in a more timely manner, they may have found more evidence of what exactly he died of.”

“I owe it to my son to ask why HSE did not get involved in this investigation and why it took so long to come to a deliberation”

Mr Simpson explained: “Unfortunately, due to a well recognised shortage in pathologists I am not surprised that it took 11 days. The service provision does allow delay especially when the level of deaths has gone up.

“I understand that 14 months is a long time to wait as a grieving mother to find out the question that has been hanging over your head. I hope now you will be able to go on and heal for this tragedy.”