Student drank himself to death by downing half-a-litre of vodka in just 20 minutes for a £40 bet



Drinking game: Jason Venezia

The mother of a student who drank himself to death in an end-of-term drinking game has attacked the 'heavy-drinking culture' she says is casting a shadow over university life.



Jason Venezia, 19, downed half a litre of vodka in just 20 minutes as he tried to win a bet with his friends.



The first-year psychology undergraduate had been promised £40 if he could drink the remaining three-quarters of the litre bottle - at a rate of one shot every 45 seconds.



But after drinking 15 shots and with a quarter of a litre still to go, Mr Venezia was left unable to stand or talk and his two friends put him to bed.



The friends - a man and a woman - checked on him every 15 minutes for two hours because they were worried he would choke on his own vomit.



But the Warwick University student was found dead the next afternoon of acute alcohol poisoning.



A post-mortem examination discovered he was over six times the legal drink-drive limit.



On Tuesday Mr Venezia's parents, Ennio, who runs an IT business and Joan, both 53, called for the legal drinking age to be raised from 18 to 21.



Mrs Venezia said: 'If it was illegal to drink alcohol (at his age), I don't think Jason would have done it.'



She added that while the couple and their surviving son did not blame anyone for Mr Venezia's death, they 'feel that there is an issue surrounding the heavy-drinking culture within university life which needs to be addressed'.



Level-headed: Jason Venezia with friends on a night out

The teacher, from Solihull, West Midlands, added: ' Students need to know that their drinking games can lead to sudden death.



'The death of our son is an utterly devastating loss that we are struggling to comprehend and come to terms with.



'Jason was a warm, kind and loving son who had a cautious approach to life.



We regarded him as very level-headed. Jason used to go out with his mates but he was not what I would consider a big drinker. I had never seen him incoherently drunk.'



It just shows that if this could happen to Jason, it could happen to anyone. People think that drinking only causes long-term damage - that's what I thought until this happened.

'But binge- drinking is a serious problem, not just amongst university students but young people in general.'



Asked how she felt towards her son's two friends who challenged him to drink the vodka, Mrs Venezia said: 'I don't blame them. It is just how young people are.'

Campus: The student was found dead in his room on the campus of Warwick University, above

The Coventry inquest heard how last May, Mr Venezia, whose father is Italian, had been drinking with the friends at their halls of residence.



The trio had consumed around a quarter of the bottle of vodka and then went out to a bar, where they had more shots of vodka, before returning home.



The two friends then agreed to pay him £20 each if he could drink the rest of the bottle.

Sean McGovern, the Coventry and Warwickshire coroner, said Jason had died from the misuse of alcohol and recorded a verdict of misadventure.



'I have dealt with many cases like this as a coroner and sadly this death comes as no surprise to me,' he said.



A spokesman for the University of Warwick expressed his sympathies with the Venezias and said the university urged students to drink responsibly.



He said: 'This problem is not a university problem but a country-wide problem. We can only hope that Jason's death serves as a lesson to all young adults everywhere.'





