THE man cleared of killing notorious North-East hardman Lee Duffy smashed his house up in despair after discovering his partner had hung herself, an inquest heard yesterday.

Scaffolder David Allison found the body of 31-year-old mother-of-three Beverley Reynolds hanging by wire from a loft hatch.

Extra police were called in to comfort Mr Allison, who stabbed 24-year-old Duffy to death outside the Afro West Indian Club in Marton Road, Middlesbrough, on August 25, 1991.

He claimed he used the knife in self defence during a vicious fight with the former boxer, who owned a .38 Smith and Wesson gun. Mr Allison was cleared of murder at Teesside Crown Court in February 1993.

Yesterday, the 33-year-old left the Middlesbrough inquest soon after giving evidence about the "ups and downs" of his 11-year relationship with Miss Reynolds.

PC Timothy Lowe was the first officer at the house, in The Crescent, Ormesby, in the early hours of Sunday, January 30 last year.

While he and another officer gave mouth-to-mouth resuscitation, he asked next-door neighbour Ian Willoughby to take Mr Allison away from the body, on the first-floor landing.

PC Lowe said: "I could hear David Allison downstairs. He seemed very distressed.

"He became more and more agitated, passing from anger to violence. He went into the kitchen and smashed a chair and threw a radio cassette into the sink.

"He kept throwing himself about the kitchen.

"He was saying: "Who will tell the kids? What am I going to do?'

"He caused damage to numerous items in the house. He was finally persuaded to attend Middlesbrough police office and he left with other officers."

Sergeant Steven Gillson said that there was overturned furniture and scattered clothing throughout the large detached house.

Miss Reynolds, whose children were sleeping overnight at the home of relatives, did not have a house key and she had cut her hand smashing in through a patio door.

The pair had argued earlier, during a night out in Middlesbrough, and Miss Reynolds took a taxi home alone.

Dr Jeremiah Murphy, her GP at the Middlesbrough Health Centre who was treating her for depression due to domestic stress, said that she had twice taken overdoses of paracetamol.

Michael Sheffield, the coroner for Central Teesside, recorded a verdict that she killed herself