BRIGHTON: A UK coroner, Prof Penelope Schofield , has delivered a conclusion on the deaths of three British Nigerian sisters who drowned off Brighton beach on May 13, 2026.
The sisters were identified as Jane Adetoro, 36; Christina Walters, 32; and Rebecca Walters, 31. Schofield, the Senior Coroner for West Sussex, Brighton and Hove, reached the conclusion following an inquest into the incident.
According to a BBC report cited by PUNCH, the inquest heard that the sisters entered the sea during the early hours of May 13 but encountered adverse water conditions. The women could not swim.
Before the incident, the three sisters had been living together in Greenford, London. On May 11, they travelled to an area in Birmingham close to where their mother had drowned in 2010.
They later left their London residence together and travelled by taxi to Brighton, arriving at approximately 10:21 p.m. British Summer Time on May 12. They were last seen alive at 2:42 a.m. on May 13.
The sisters’ father, Joseph Jacobsen, followed the inquest proceedings remotely through a video link to Woodvale Coroner’s Court in Brighton.
In an emotional statement read on his behalf, Jacobsen recalled watching his daughters grow from young girls into intelligent women, describing the loss of all three as devastating.
There are no words that can adequately express the pain of losing a child. To lose all three of my precious daughters is heartbreaking, he said.
His statement conveyed the profound grief experienced by the family following the deaths.
During the hearing, Schofield told the court that the sisters had lived private and secluded lives, making it difficult to establish why they acted as they did or why they travelled to Brighton.
The coroner said the court could not speculate about their reasons and acknowledged that the circumstances behind their deaths might never be fully explained.
The inquest therefore established the coroner’s conclusion regarding the deaths, but the sisters’ underlying motivations remain unknown.
The family also expressed its grief through a fundraising appeal established on GoFundMe in June.
In the appeal, the sisters’ uncle, Adesoji Adetoro, reflected on their lives and the pain their deaths had caused their relatives.
He said the sisters had so much ahead of them and that their loss had left a deep emptiness in the family that words could not adequately describe.
The tragedy has left their loved ones mourning three lives lost together, with the coroner acknowledging that some questions surrounding the incident may remain unanswered.
