AN 82-year-old woman's family left her to die in a tiny attic covered in faeces and blood, an inquest was told yesterday.

Valerie O'Connor deserved to "die in comfort and with dignity" in the home she shared with her daughter Lynette O'Connor and grandchildren Sean and Shane.

Instead she suffered what a coroner described as the worst case of cruelty to a senior citizen she had ever seen.

Glebe Coroner's Court, in Sydney, was told that Mrs O'Connor was bed-ridden and suffering from an undiagnosed stomach cancer.

On January 14, 2008, she was found by her sister, Shirley Barber, in a tin-roof attic on a 44C day, lying in sheets that hadn't been washed for months. She weighed just 35kg.

In papers tendered to the court, police and medical experts detailed Mrs O'Connor's living conditions.

The tiny attic bedroom was covered in faeces and blood. Mrs O'Connor was given a bucket to use as a toilet but was incapable of getting off her bed to use it.

She was fed a diet that included Milo, pizza and mudcake, the court was told.

Mrs Barber likened the appearance of her sister to a "concentration camp victim".

The inquest was told that Mrs O'Connor died three days after being admitted to Royal Prince Alfred Hospital from sepsis and a perforated bowel - side effects from the undiagnosed cancer.

Coroner Mary Jerram said: "Thiis one of the worst matters of which I have heard in this court or any other as

to an elderly person being uncared for.

"It's hard to imagine how any caring person could allow her to get into the state she was in without seeking help, medical or community services.

"All people are entitled to die in comfort and with dignity, she did not. She was sadly neglected."

Mrs O'Connor's daughter Lynette rejected an invitation from Ms Jerram to take the stand and put forward her version of events.

Ms Jerram said she could not pursue legal action against Lynette O'Connor or her partner Michael Gray because it was cancer that had killed Mrs O'Connor.

"I must find that Valerie O'Connor died on January 17 at RPA cause of death being sepsis, perforated bowel, stomach cancer," she said.

"That is the cause of her death. But I do regard those who were supposed to be caring for her as contributing to the terrible manner of her death."

Outside court, Mrs O'Connor's niece Carrol Barber remembered her as a "caring person".

"She didn't deserve to go like this. No person should have to live their last days in that sort of agony," she said.