A woman has been found dead in her bed one year after she died – and her last conversation was with ChatGPT.
Charlotte Leader, 23, from Bolton, Greater Manchester, was discovered under her duvet in her flat during a police welfare check on August 6.
Officers were alerted after staff at the property managing company in charge of the address found they were unable to enter the home to conduct a utility inspection.
It is suspected, after an inquest into her death at Bolton Coroner’s Court concluded this week, that the young woman passed away last summer.
Detectives found food in her fridge with sell-by dates of July 2024 and were met upon arrival with a large number of letters piled up behind the door.
And in another tragic twist, investigators also discovered the only conversations on Ms Leader’s phone were with ChatGPT, which she had asked for help.
Her final message to the chatbot, on July 30 last year, read: ‘Help me, I’ve went and got food again.’
The AI assistant replied, ‘You sound conflicted about having food’, which saw her respond: ‘It’s food that I didn’t want and that’s frustrating.’
Charlotte Leader (pictured), 23, from Bolton, Greater Manchester, was discovered under her duvet in her flat during a police welfare check on August 6
Detective Inspector Paul Quinn told the court: ‘There were others all in the same context – there’s no conversations with anybody, her only contact was with ChatGPT.’
Ms Leader’s mother Chantay Simm said the family lost contact with the young woman in September 2021.
They had tried to find her but she was ‘impossible to locate’, she said.
Neighbours had also told police they rarely saw the young woman leave her flat.
Assistant Coroner Stephen Teasdale said Ms Leader had struggled with her mental health.
She declined a mental health appointment in 2022 – and then did not have any further contact with the service.
The judge explained: ‘In time, she becomes a stranger from the family, she pushes people away, and she disengages from the services as well.’
Ms Leader’s sister Caroline Calow also explained the young woman had struggled with eating disorders, including bulimia, from a young age.
It is suspected, after an inquest into her death at Bolton Coroner’s Court concluded this week, that the young woman (pictured) passed away last summer
But DI Quinn said when officers searched her flat, they found ‘no suggestion she intended to take her life or anything to suggest she would do anything untoward’.
He described her home as ‘immaculately clean’, with Ms Calow similarly saying it ‘looked like someone who cared’ rather than ‘the flat of someone who had given up’.
The sister also said detectives found ‘absolutely no medication’ in the property.
And the assistant coroner similarly confirmed ‘no illicit drugs’ were found at the flat, with nothing in Ms Leader’s diaries to ‘suggest that as a problem’.
Examining her remains was also ‘difficult’, according to pathologist Dr Andrew Coates, from Royal Bolton Hospital, because her body had ‘mummified’.
He said it was ‘not unreasonable’ for this to take roughly a year to happen.
In the end, the judge was forced to conclude the inquest with an open verdict – meaning there was not enough evidence to establish a cause of death.
Ms Leader’s family have since paid tribute to her on social media: ‘Charlotte was a very beautiful and talented young woman.
‘Her many talents were playing the guitar and keyboard and she also had a love for art. She was loved tremendously by the family and will be missed every day.’
