A headteacher who was shot by her husband before he turned the gun on himself told her sister that her husband had hit her in the hours before her death, an inquest has heard.
Epsom College headteacher Emma Pattison and seven-year-old daughter Lettie were found dead at their home within the grounds of the private boarding school in Surrey in February last year, alongside George Pattison, their husband and father respectively.
An inquest was previously told Mrs Pattison, 45, died of shotgun wounds to the chest and abdomen on February 5 2023, while Lettie was shot in the head.
Senior coroner Richard Travers concluded at Surrey Coroner’s Court on Tuesday that George Pattison shot his wife, Emma Pattison, and their daughter, Lettie, without lawful reason at Epsom College at an unknown time between February 4 and 5 2023.
He also concluded that Pattison died by suicide, after he shot himself with the same gun.
Evidence from Deborah Kirk, the sister of Mrs Pattison, was read to the inquest at Surrey Coroner’s Court in Woking on Tuesday.
She said she received a phone call from her sister just before 11pm on February 4, telling her that her husband had hit her and their dog, Bella.
She said her sister told her: “I need someone to come over.”
Her sister’s tone of voice was one of “concern, but not of terror”.
“It was more like she had assessed the situation and did not feel safe,” she said.
She said she and her husband, Mark Miller, got an Uber to her sister’s home just after 11pm.
“I kept trying to call Emma but there was still no answer,” she said.
She added: “By the time we had arrived at Emma’s house I was getting really worried that she was not answering her phone.”
When they arrived at the house, all of the lights were on and the cars were in the driveway.
Her husband entered the house ahead of her, and then stopped her from coming in any further once she entered.
“He said don’t go in there, don’t go in there, we are going outside,” she said.
Her husband called an ambulance, and paramedics arrived on the scene shortly afterwards.
Ms Kirk also read out a tribute to her sister and niece at the inquest.
“Emma was lightness itself,” she said.
She said her sister was “smart” and kind in a way that “fills a room” and “drives change”.
She described her niece, Lettie, as “razor smart, curious, and disarmingly cute.”
She said she would comfort her niece whenever she was sad.
“I would hold her in my arms and say, yes it is hard to be seven, isn’t it monkey?” she said.
Ms Kirk said she was still trying to forgive Mr Pattison.
“I can only speak for myself when I say that I am trying to forgive you,” she said.
She added: “I can only imagine that you were in an extraordinary hell of your own.”
The inquest heard that Mrs Pattison watched rugby with her friends in the hours before she died.
The last friend left at 7pm, and Mrs Pattison then received a Chinese takeaway at 9.36pm.
In evidence read out to the court by the coroner, the delivery driver said: “She had a smiley face and seemed okay.”
The inquest heard that a post-mortem report found that Mr Pattison’s cause of death was a shotgun wound.
It also found that Mrs Pattison and Lettie’s causes of death were shotgun wounds.
A toxicology report found that George had 243 milligrams of alcohol per 100 millilitres of blood, a quantity that is associated with a “high to extreme” level of intoxication.
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