Crushed to death by garbage truck

A TEACHER who fell asleep in a wheelie bin after a pub crawl was crushed to death when it was emptied into a refuse truck.

The body of New Zealander Scott Williams, who lived in the UK, was found among the rubbish when the truck was emptied more than 24 hours later.

Mr Williams, 35, is thought to have climbed into the communal bin, about the size of a small skip, to sleep off an evening's drinking in Brighton, south of London.

The maths teacher and rugby coach was still in the bin when it was scooped up and its contents tipped into the crusher.

His remains were found at a waste recycling site in nearby Newhaven soon after the truck emptied its load.

One worker at the depot said: "It is horrendous, a horrible way to go.

"It looks like he decided to go for a lie down in a skip at some point. Then he was picked up and crushed to death. It's unthinkable."

A friend said Mr Williams "loved a drink. I just don't know what must have been going through his head to have got into a bin".

Mr Williams was last seen at 1am on Sunday and was reported missing by friends at 8am on Monday, an hour after his body was found.

Staff at Sussex Waste Recycling have not located the street where he climbed into the bin, which was used by residents in blocks of flats.

Mr Williams had been to several pubs with a friend on Saturday night during a weekend in Brighton.

"It is assumed Scott had been in one of the wheelie bins," a police spokesman said.

"Police are investigating how he came to be there and are treating his death as being unexplained rather than suspicious."

His death follows several near misses involving Brighton bins.

Two homeless men asleep in bins almost died in separate incidents as they were lifted into trucks.