A TRANSSEXUAL undergoing gender treatment was found dead in his fume-filled car, a Bury inquest was told.

Geoff Sheehan, aged 48, also known as Debbie Fox, was found by a neighbour in the car outside his home, with a hose leading from the exhaust.

Mr Sheehan, of Farringdon Drive, Radcliffe, had moved out of the home he shared with his wife Jacqueline in Bury last February, following his admission that he had dressed in women's clothes in secret for most of his life.

The inquest was told how the father-of-one changed his name and began dressing like a woman when he moved to Radcliffe.

A statement from his wife, read out at the hearing, said he had suffered from depression in the past due to money problems, but when she last spoke to him days before his death in August, she had no concerns for his health.

Mr Sheehan, an engineering technician, was also in contact with Dr Russell Reid, a London psychiatrist. Dr Reid said in a statement that Mr Sheehan showed no signs of depression when they had met.

Mr Sheehan was also taking medication, prescribed by his GP, but had to live and dress as a woman for two years before he could have an operation to alter his sex.

Coroner Simon Nelson told the inquest he had to say with some regret that he thought Mr Sheehan did intend to take his life.

He said: "He was looking forward to living as a woman. His death was a deliberate act of self harm whilst the balance of his mind was disturbed.

However, I don't think he would have self harmed if he had not had the anguish and the difficulties associated with his transsexualism and health problems, all of which I am sure contributed to an almost impossible dilemma on his part."