A DESPERATE girlfriend struggled to resuscitate her boyfriend after she found him hanging from a tree in an Ipswich garden, an inquest has heard.Michael Nicholas, 24, of Spring Road, was found hanging from the tree in the back garden of the house he shared with his partner of four-and-a-half years on August 22.

A DESPERATE girlfriend struggled to resuscitate her boyfriend after she found him hanging from a tree in an Ipswich garden, an inquest has heard.

Michael Nicholas, 24, of Spring Road, was found hanging from the tree in the back garden of the house he shared with his partner of four-and-a-half years on August 22.

His girlfriend looked out the back window of the house on August 22 and saw the former salesman suspended from the tree by a plastic skipping rope.

She rushed to his aid and fought to free him but had to call for the assistance of a friend, who helped to remove the rope from around his neck.

During the inquest at Ipswich Crown Court, Greater Suffolk coroner Dr Peter Dean said Mr Nicholas was planning to undertake an electrician's course beginning in September and had secured a job as a bartender in the meantime.

He said desperate efforts to resuscitate Mr Nicholas succeeded in bringing him back to life but tests showed that he was brain dead and he died in intensive care at Ipswich Hospital on August 23.

Police found no suspicious circumstances surrounding his death and ruled that no one else was involved.

The court heard that Mr Nicholas' relationship with his girlfriend had been through difficult patches in the past and the pair were experiencing difficulties in their relationship in the period before his death.

Toxicology tests conducted after his death revealed that Portsmouth-born Mr Nicholas was not under the influence of drugs or alcohol at the time of his death.

Dr Dean said: “It appears from toxicology tests there was nothing to affect Michael's ability to understand what he was doing.

“I must therefore record that he took his own life.”