Three sisters found dead off Brighton beach, inquest opens Friday

The inquest into the deaths of three sisters recovered from the sea off Brighton was set to open at 10am on Friday at the coroner’s court at Woodvale, Lewes Road, Brighton, where West Sussex, Brighton and Hove senior coroner Penelope Schofield will begin examining how Jane Adetoro, Christina Walters and Rebecca Walters died.

The sisters, aged 36, 32 and 31, were formally identified by Sussex Police after their bodies were recovered from the water near Madeira Drive and the Black Rock car park in the early hours of 13 May 2026. Emergency services were called at about 5.45am after reports that someone was in the water near Black Rock, off the seafront. Police said they were not searching for anyone else, and early indications suggested there was no evidence of third-party involvement, although the circumstances of the deaths remained unexplained.

That uncertainty is what the inquest is designed to test. The hearing is expected to establish the sequence of events before the sisters were found, the circumstances in which they entered the sea, and whether the official response needs closer scrutiny. In cases such as this, the coroner’s court also provides a formal public record of what is known, what remains unknown and whether any wider lessons emerge for safety along the coast.

The sisters were from the Uxbridge area of west London and had been living together in a flat there. Family tributes described them as church-going and teetotal. Their father, Joseph, said the loss was unbearable and that no words could capture the pain of losing all three daughters in the prime of their lives.

The deaths have also reopened attention on a family history marked by another drowning. Their mother, Janice Adetoro, died in 2010, with her body recovered from a Birmingham lake. Brighton and Hove has seen other fatal sea incidents too, including the death in January of a 51-year-old man who got into difficulty west of Brighton Palace Pier. The latest inquest will now probe not only a family tragedy, but the public questions that follow when the sea turns deadly so close to a busy city beach.