Neil Melvyn Dudley, aged 27, was serving a six-year sentence for causing death by reckless driving.

Staff at Gloucester Prison found him in his locked single cell on 3 September. He was hanging from a sheet tied to a bedframe.

They immediately called emergency services and began resuscitation, but he was pronounced dead.

Asphyxia

Gloucester coroner David Gibbons has opened an inquest into the death and adjourned it until 10 December when a jury will be sworn in to decide the case.

Mr Dudley was formally identified by his father, Melvyn Dudley, of Uplands Rd, Springfield Estate, Pontllanfraith. The cause of death was given by pathologist Dr Ben Codling as asphyxia due to hanging.

A Home Office pathologist, Dr Stephen Leadbetter, was also called in to assist in the investigation because of "background circumstances", said a spokesman for the coroner.

However, police are satisfied that no-one else was involved in the death and there are no suspicious circumstances.

Mr Dudley was sentenced at Newport crown court for causing the deaths of pedestrians Margaret Charles and Ken Griffiths, both 60, in June 1996.

A Home Office Prisons department spokesman said today: "The police, coroner and next of kin have all been informed and an internal investigation is being carried out by a senior governor from another prison."