A PRISONER died of an overdose while being detained at Winchester Prison.

Jason Payne died due to misadventure following a series of failings during his detention in August 2015.

Winchester Coroners Court heard how during the 40-year-old’s detention at the prison he was enrolled into a programme for drug and possible alcohol dependency and had been prescribed methadone and diazapam.

As part of the programme Mr Payne needed be clinically observed by healthcare staff twice a day for five days.

On August 15 and 16 clinical observations were taken only once each day by healthcare staff and his medication was administered late on August 16.

The jury, after a two-week inquest, concluded that neither of these failings contributed or caused his death.

The jury found that at 9.22pm on August 16, the Farnborough man showed signs of methadone toxicity when visited by a prison officer and nurse in his cell as he was snoring and they were unable to rouse him and believed that further steps should have been taken to rouse him.

They also found that clinical observations should have been made at the time and as such a more informed decision could have been made when administering medication.

At the end of the two-week inquest the jury concluded that Mr Payne’s death had been caused by misadventure.

There are longstanding concerns about the number of such deaths at the jail.

The Hampshire Chronicle approached the Ministry of Justice for comment but none had been received at time of going press.