Tragic teen Gaia Pope 'received terrifying messages' before mysterious death
Teenager Gaia Pope-Sutherland was found dead at Dancing Ledge in Dorset on November 7, 2017, after suffering a mental health breakdown.
The 19-year-old had gone missing from her home in Swanage 11 days earlier and according to her twin sister Maya, she was convinced that a man who had allegedly raped her was 'after her'.
Gaia allegedly received 'terrifying' text messages in the days leading to her tragic death, which contained threats to kill her family.
She became petrified of being seen walking around the coastal town and now a new BBC Three series - Gaia: A Death On Dancing Ledge - aims to uncover what the vulnerable woman was running from.
Gaia's naked body was found in the undergrowth surrounding the Dorset cliff edge, with her clothing scattered across a field. An inquest later found she had died from hypothermia within 18 hours of first running away.
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Marienna (cousin) Maya (twin) and Gaia (DAILY MIRROR)It is believed that her body might have been tricked into thinking it was too warm, so she removed her clothing as she walked. At her inquest last year, Maya Pope-Sutherland told the hearing her sister lived in fear.
She said: "I just know she was absolutely terrified to go out in Swanage, and she had shown me messages from the perpetrator saying he knew people in Swanage threatening to kill the family and she just became so terrified to leave the house.
"She was crying and saying she was very scared, and she thought the perpetrator was after her. At other times she was mentioning pregnancy."
In one clip during the documentary, a text message is shown reading: "Just wanna say you look amazing x" while people who knew the teen said about the man, "There was one boy, he had messaged her."
College student Gaia was diagnosed with post-traumatic stress disorder after she was allegedly raped by a man in 2014 when she was 16 and he was in his early 20s. He was arrested but not prosecuted.
It is believed Gaia feared his imminent release from prison, and that she was being sent indecent images by another man. Gaia's family have argued that her mental health and epilepsy worsened from this point.
"Over the two-year period between 2015 and 2017 Gaia's seizures began to get worse and worse," Maya continued at the 2022 inquest. "She would hallucinate, start fitting and turn blue and all of her muscles would contract. We often had to call ambulances to the house.
CCTV dated 7/11/2017 of Gaia Pope that was taken less than an hour before she disappeared (PA)
She had struggled with her mental health from 2014 (DAILY MIRROR)"She told me she was starting to feel really scared, terrified. She was struggling to manage the seizures and she was really depressed. She was struggling with her attendance at college and was finding it harder and harder to get out of the house. She often says she did not feel safe."
When Gaia was reported missing, a large search operation was launched which included police, HM Coastguard, National Police Air Service, Dorset Search and Rescue and members of the public. However her family have subsequently criticised the police handling of their daughter's reported rape and disappearance.
The inquest heard police had accepted there were several failings in the hunt for Gaia, such as delays in logging her as missing and grading her as 'medium risk of harm' rather than high. The college student had spent several weeks in hospital in February and March 2017 having been sectioned under the Mental Health Act.
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She was further assessed in Poole Hospital in the October after her mental health worsened, but was later discharged and sent home without any community support. Dorset Police said it had sought to 'identify and deliver' improvements in its organisation following her death.
Her cousin, Marienna Pope-Weidemann, said at the end of the inquest: "For two years, they did nothing but fail Gaia. They failed to treat her with respect.
"They failed, as did Dorset Healthcare, to take safeguarding action or offer support with continuing harassment from the known child sex offender she had reported for rape and threats to kill. Gaia's story epitomises all that is wrong with British policing and cuts to the heart of why public confidence has never been so low."
The new documentary, released today, is hosted by former Love Island star Zara McDermott. The 26-year-old said the film gives Miss Pope-Sutherland the "voice that she never quite got to have" and hopes her family take comfort from it "as hard as it probably has been for them to watch it back".
Gaia: A Death On Dancing Ledge airs on BBC Three today.
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