A FATHER tormented by years of having no contact with his daughter hanged himself, a court heard.

An inquest in Bolton was told how Craig Gavin had wanted to play a role in his daughter’s life but was frustrated as he was unable to find out where her mother lived in order to serve legal papers and had seen the child only once in eight years.

Mr Gavin’s mother, Catherine Hutton, told the hearing that the 31-year-old, a forklift truck driver, was badly affected by the inability to have a relationship with his child.

Once he sent his mother a message saying "I can’t do this any more" and she found him in a distressed state.

Mrs Hutton told area coroner Alan Walsh: “He was just sat with his daughter’s photographs around him. I calmed him down and he went to work the next day. He seemed fine.”

Mr Walsh heard how Mr Gavin, of Halliwell Road, Bolton, worked for Valley Plastics for 12 years and enjoyed socialising at weekends, drinking and sometimes taking drugs.

But the court heard he mostly kept his feelings private and at the time of his death, on September 30 this year, he was to be best man for his pal Gareth Naylor and had arranged the stag party in Magaluf. Mr Gavin was last seen alive on September 29 heading to work on a bus. But then he turned around and headed back home.

Mr Naylor said that when he got a message from one of Mr Gavin’s colleagues saying he had not turned up for work, he and friend George Burtak went to Mr Gavin's first-floor flat.

They found Mr Gavin dead. He had left a note. A police investigation found there were no suspicious circumstances.

Recording a conclusion that Mr Gavin’s death was suicide, Mr Walsh said Mr Gavin was a hardworking man with many friends who enjoyed life but the missing element was contact with his daughter, which deeply affected him.

Mr Walsh said: “I am satisfied that he was tormented in his mind but because he was a very private person he would not have wanted anyone to know what he was going through."