Brain-damaged boxer dies after 2 days in coma

Bradley Stone, the boxer brain- damaged in a fight for the new British

super-bantamweight title on Tuesday, died last night. His fiancee, mother, brother and more than a dozen other relatives and friends were at his bedside in the Royal London Hospital in Whitechapel, east London.

John Sutcliffe, the consultant neurosurgeon who operated on the 23-year-old fighter on Wednesday, pronounced him dead at 8.15pm. He said: 'Having talked to the family, myself and consultant anaesthetist Dr Mhaire Healy tested brain stem function and found he fulfilled two sets of brain stem death criteria; he showed no activity at all.'

Mr Sutcliffe said Stone's ventilator was not switched off until his family were allowed the chance to say goodbye.

The East Londoner collapsed at his fiancee's flat hours after being stopped in the 10th round. A two-hour operation removed a blood clot from the left side of his brain, but he stayed in a coma.

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