Court in south London hears trio would not have known which track the train was on

This article is more than 1 year old

This article is more than 1 year old

Three graffiti artists were trying to avoid detection when they were killed by a train last year, an inquest has heard.

Alberto Fresneda Carrasco, 19, and Jack Gilbert and Harrison Scott-Hood, who were both 23, were hit in the early hours of 18 June on tracks in Brixton, south London.

The friends, who all lived in north London, had met the evening before to practise, Southwark coroner’s court heard on Thursday.

DS Simon Rees, who led the investigation into their deaths, said it was “completely pitch black” on the largely moonless night, but that they would have seen the train’s lights coming towards them.

“My view is it’s impossible to know what rail it was on and I believe their first instinct was to conceal themselves because they wanted to go on to create artwork,” he told the court.

Facebook Twitter Pinterest Jack Gilbert, 23, and Alberto Fresneda Carrasco, 19. Photograph: British Transport Police/PA

“It is likely in terms of where they were they dropped down behind a wall so they are not seen. Unfortunately they had already put themselves in harm’s way.”

Rees said the three men were believed to have scaled a (1.8 metre) 6ft fence to trespass on the elevated track near Loughborough Junction station.

The driver said his shift was “uneventful” and did not realise there had been an impact, which occurred between Denmark Hill and Brixton.

Fresneda, a New York-born student who lived in Hampstead, had written up a list of his aspirations shortly before the incident.

In a statement read to court, his mother, Isabel Carrasco, said: “He wrote a to-do list just a few hours before the accident and we just wish he could’ve fulfilled his dreams.”

Harrison Scott-Hood, 23. Photograph: British Transport Police/PA

Gilbert’s mother, Maxine, said she knew her son, an events inspector from Enfield, painted but was surprised he was on the train tracks, having believed he was using legal spray walls.

The last thing he told her was: “I’m going out painting, love you lots.”

In a statement, she said the “gorgeous, bright, cheeky, inquisitive boy brought everyone joy” and that he had been supporting his sister and two nieces after the death of his brother-in-law in January 2018.

“Painting grounded him and in those last few months, in our family’s darkest days, it was his release, his therapy,” she said.

In a statement, Scott-Hood’s mother, Susie Hood, said her son, a chef who lived in Muswell Hill, was a “creative, free-spirited young man”, and criticised the “stigma” surrounding the “amazing art form” of graffiti.

All three men died from multiple injuries as a result of being struck by a train, postmortems found.

The inquest continues.