A MOTHER who was left for dead in her garden after an attack took her own life because she could no longer bear the terrible injuries inflicted on her face.

Caroline Thornton told her family and friends that she had been given a "life sentence of fear" following the brutal beating by a former neighbour.

After the attack doctors had to reconstruct her face - removing her teeth, cheek and jaw bones.

Despite the surgery Mrs Thornton's face was partially paralysed and she suffered brain damage that affected her memory.

She suffered a further setback when the Court of Appeal cut her attacker's jail sentence from three years to just two.

And, although the beating took place in 1995, friends say the trauma took an increasing toll on her health.

An inquest heard yesterday how she eventually snapped and swallowed a fatal dose of tablets.

Consultant psychiatrist Sikander Kamlana told the hearing in Middlesbrough how the 55-year-old mother of two suffered post traumatic stress disorder as a result of the assault.

And she said: "Mrs Thornton appeared to be traumatised over the effect of her appearance following the attack.''

The strain wrecked her previously happy marriage to her husband Vince, increasing her feelings of low esteem and "unattractiveness'', while the later deaths of both her parents deepened her depression, the psychiatrist said.

She was diagnosed as suffering from post traumatic disorder in 1997 as a result of the attack in April 1995 which also left her the subject of epilepsy type seizures.

Mr Kamlana said Mrs Thornton would also suffer flash-backs.

After her attacker won a reduction in his sentence Mrs Thornton wrote to Stockton North Labour MP Frank Cook calling for victims to have a say in the sentencing process. She also took her case to then Home Secretary Michael Howard.

Her neighbour Paul McGough of Brendon Crescent, Billingham, was jailed at Teesside Crown Court in July 1996 after pleading guilty to causing grievous bodily harm with intent.

But appeal court Judges Rhys Davies, Lord Justice Evans and Mrs Justice Ebsworth, reduced his sentence saying there had been considerable tension between McGough and his former next-door neighbour, Mrs Thornton.

The appeal court heard the assault followed a four year feud between the former neighbours.

Michael Bosomworth, defending McGough, had said at the original trial: "His then neighbour appears to have been a lady who cannot keep her nose out of other people's business.''

Her son Phillip told the inquest he had found his mother lying dead on the bedroom landing of her Lincoln Crescent, Billingham, home just a day after his 21st birthday, last November.

She had left suicide notes on her bed and taken a fatal mixture of 30 tablets.

Questioned by Teesside Coroner Michael Sheffield, the unemployed engineer of Beech Close, Port Clarence, confirmed his mother had made previous suicide attempts which included taking an overdose when her father died.

He said she had appeared "emotional'' at his 21st birthday party, held on November 23, last year. He made the heart breaking discovery of his mother's body, on letting himself into her house on November 25. She had been dead for some time.

Mr Sheffield said: "It's clear she had attended her son's 21st, and sometime afterwards, when she had gone home, had consumed a number of tablets which resulted in her death.

"The notes she left, indicated it was her intention to end her life.''

He recorded a verdict that Mrs Thornton killed herself.