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One blow too many... What drove loving parents to Beachy Head.

Article Excerpt
Byline: Sam Greenhill, Julie Moult and Luke Salkeld

SMILING from ear to ear, fiveyear-old Samuel Puttick was the 'happiest boy in the world', spreading joy throughout his short life.

But behind his infectious grin lay a desperate story of heartache and ill luck which was to culminate in his death from meningitis last Friday and trigger the suicide of his parents Neil and Kazumi Puttick at Beachy Head.

The youngster was just 18 months old when he was the victim of a car crash which left him paralysed from the neck down and confined to a wheelchair. Mr and Mrs Puttick gave up their careers to devote themselves to the care of their fragile little boy.

But last week Sam lost a brief battle against pneumococcal meningitis, contracting the disease on Tuesday and dying peacefully at home on Friday evening, with his devastated father, 34, and Japanese-born mother, 44, at his bedside.

They simply could not face life without him and, last Sunday, left an 'extremely emotional' typewritten note and drove 150 miles to the East Sussex cliffs and flung themselves to their death.

Sam's little body was found in a zippedup rucksack alongside his parents' bodies. A second rucksack nearby was filled with his toys.

Yesterday, as police said the couple had committed suicide consumed with grief, horrified friends told the unbearably sad story of how the family's once-perfect life was torn apart.

After meeting at...

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