'Accident waiting to happen' says coroner after four-year-old dies in designer shop

A four-year-old boy who was crushed to death after a 19-stone mirror fell on him in a designer shop died in "an accident that was waiting to happen," a coroner has stated.

Senior Oxfordshire Coroner Darren Salter's comments came after an inquest jury returned a narrative verdict in to the death of Austen Harrison.

The youngster had been playing with a heavy steel-framed fitting-room mirror while his father tried on a suit at a Hugo Boss shop when it toppled on to him, causing "devastating" head injuries, Oxford Coroner's Court heard.

The jury found: "The mirror came to fall on Austen after he moved the wings, causing the unfixed mirror to become unstable.

"The jury believes that the mirror should have been fixed to the wall and that the wall should have been reinforced. We do not believe the mirror was fixed to the wall."

Austen of Crawley, West Sussex, was with his parents Simon and Irina Harrison when he was injured at the Bicester outlet village in Oxfordshire on June 4 2013 at around 8.30pm.

He underwent an emergency operation to relieve pressure on his brain but died four days later in hospital after life-support was switched off.