Kieran Street: Sheffield family's frustration after murder charge dropped following ‘caring’ dad’s drugs death

Kieran Street was aged 33 when a neighbour tragically found him unresponsive on the floor of his flat, on Manor Park Way, in Manor, on October 1, 2020. 

An inquest held at Medico-Legal Centre, on Watery Street, Sheffield, on Thursday, August 24, heard how emergency services attended Mr Street’s address, where following resuscitation attempts, he was declared dead by paramedics at around 8am.

A post-mortem found no injuries, but needle punching marks were identified, as well as a presence of heroin, cocaine and alcohol in his system.

Mr Street, a father of one, was unemployed at the time of his death. He was described by his family and friends as a “caring, optimistic and loving person” who was “taken before he had the opportunity to see his daughter grow”.

His mother, Sharon, said the day before he had died, Mr Street called his step dad and said he was “feeling good”, and talked about getting part-time work and “sorting himself out”.

In court, Mr Street’s loved ones said they were aware that he had a history of drug and alcohol use, but that he was “scared to death” of needles, and always said he would never take heroin.

But in the pathologist’s report, there was found to be no pathological evidence to suggest that he had been “injected without his will”. 

Giving evidence, investigations officer Rhiannon Brown, of South Yorkshire Police, said she was one of the officers who attended Mr Street’s flat on the morning he died. A number of neighbours reported seeing him in the days leading up to his death and reported that he “seemed fine”.

Stefan Gregorasz identified himself to officers as the last person who had been with Mr Street, the inquest heard, and he admitted to getting the heroin for them. When an officer asked him how Mr Street had taken the heroin, Gregorasz did not want to reply, before stating: “Because I injected him - this might turn into a murder charge.”

Gregorasz was charged with the murder of Mr Street and on the way to custody, he was recorded saying: “Kieran was also my brother until I killed him. I told him I’m not doing it. I kept saying it’s not happening, it’s not happening. But he begged me, I said okay, just once and only once, and that’s what has happened. Only once.”

IO Brown told the court that Gregorasz later retracted his statements during an interview, stating that he was drunk, on drugs, in shock, and did not know why he had said it. Insufficient evidence saw the murder charge dropped.

IO Brown said: “We still had a duty to investigate and wanted to get to the bottom of it - don’t just take his word for it, we will look down all avenues to see what we can do.

“Unfortunately… the crux of this particular investigation, which would be for murder, would be to prove beyond reasonable doubt, the threshold within a criminal investigation, if we were to go to the Crown Court. So we have to be sure we have enough evidence to prove, in this case, that Stephan had injected Kieran, with the intent to kill him.

“We wouldn’t be satisfied without some sort of outcome with regards to what happened, so we pushed for consideration of what charges we could go for so some justice could be done.”

Ultimately, on June 29 2023, Gregorasz, aged 48, of Jeremy Lane, Heckmondwike, West Yorkshire, was handed a nine-month prison sentence, suspended for 24 months, after he pleaded guilty to two counts of supply of Class A drugs, relating to heroin and cocaine.

The family claimed they were not told by Crown Prosecution Service that Gregorasz’s sentencing hearing had been moved by a day, and they missed it.

Sharon said the family felt they were in a 'silly limbo' nearly three years on from her son's death. She said they had not seen Gregorasz, which she described as 'frustrating'. She added: "We don’t know what went on that day. It probably all came out that day, but we don’t know.”

Reading a conclusion, assistant coroner Rebecca Connell said: “I’ve heard helpful evidence from IO Brown. I’ve heard that Kieran didn’t have a history of heroin use, and had always maintained that he would never inject heroin. I have also heard that an associate of Kieran had admitted to injecting Kieran, however he later retracted that, stating he had been intoxicated at the time, and he maintains that account.

“I have also heard that there was no evidence of a struggle at the premises, and there was no evidence of Kieran having been forcibly injected.

“Therefore, on the balance of probabilities, I have to conclude that this was a drug related death… as a result of heroin, cocaine and alcohol toxicity.”