A FATHER took his own life after taking the drug mephedrone — but it is not clear if the substance had any effect on him, an inquest heard.

Mark Jolly, aged 30, was found by his brother on the afternoon of March 19 of this year hanged from railings in the grounds of the flats in Tonge Moor Road where in lived.

Bolton Coroners Court heard Mr Jolly he had earlier taken the drug “bubble”

— a street name for mephedrone — which was legal at the time but has since been banned.

But pathologist David Bissett said that the effects of the drug are not yet properly known and it was unclear how, if at all, it would have affected him.

The hearing was told how Mr Jolly had transformed from an outgoing person to one who had become aggressive in the two months leading up to his death. He had been having relationship problems with his girlfriend Lindsey Finley.

Mr Jolly’s mother Linda Burns said in the two months prior to his death he had a “change of personality”

and told her he had started taking ‘bubble’.

“It made him high, and then he would come down low,” said Mrs Burns.

The day before he was found, Miss Finley said Mr Jolly was drinking from 11am and had taken the drug later in the afternoon.

In the evening she said she alerted the emergency services because of his threats to kill himself.

Mr Jolly was released into the care of his family and he was taken back to his flat by his brother, Philip Newby, who spoke to him later that evening.

Mr Newby found him at 12.30pm the next day.

A post mortem examination revealed that Mr Jolly was two-and-half-times over the legal drink drive limit and evidence he had taken the drug was found.

The cause of death was hanging.

Assistant deputy coroner Peter Watson recorded an open verdict.

He said: “There is a possibility that the drug he had ingested and alcohol he had taken had an effect on his judgement.

“He was a young man in the prime of his life who had a lot to live for.”

Paying tribute to her son after the hearing, Mrs Burns said: “His daughter Lucy, aged three, will know everything about her father.

“We are a very close family and he is so terribly missed. He was a fantastic brother and son.”

● Last month a inquest into the death of 23-yearold Wesley Sharples, who shot himself after coming home from an all-night party in which he took cocaine, mephedrone and methylone, was told his death was one of nine across the country in which otherwise happy people had inexplicably killed themselves after taking mephedrone.