Mike Lynch's friend killed by car while jogging, which he took up ‘to combat fraud trial stress'

A friend of tech billionaire Mike Lynch was run over and killed by a car after taking up running to deal with the stress of a fraud trial in which he was acquitted, an inquest heard.
Stephen Chamberlain, 52, was crossing a road between two parts of a bridleway when he was struck by a Vauxhall on Aug 17 last year.
He was an associate of Lynch, who died when the Bayesian superyacht sank off the coast of Sicily. Lynch was celebrating his acquittal in the same fraud trail when the ship capsized, killing seven people. It happened just two days after Chamberlain's death.
Lynch, his 18-year-old daughter, Hannah, Morgan Stanley International bank chairman Jonathan Bloomer, 70, and his wife, Judy, 71, were the four British victims of the tragedy. His US lawyer Christopher Morvillo, his wife, Neda, and chef Ricardo Thomas also died.
Chamberlain sustained a traumatic head injury in the collision on the A1123 near Stretham, Cambridgeshire.
The injury was deemed unsurvivable and his life support was withdrawn three days later.
Chamberlain was the co-defendant in a US trial alongside Lynch. Both men were cleared of conducting a massive fraud over the sale of software company Autonomy to Hewlett-Packard (HP) in 2011.
His widow, Karen Chamberlain, said that her husband took up running after he was charged with fraud.
'He discovered it helped him mentally stay calm and focus on what was ahead,' said Mrs Chamberlain, in a statement read by lawyer Sally Hobson.
She said her husband would 'meticulously spend hours planning his routes' and competed in ultra-distance races.
He was safety conscious, she said, and would wear just one earbud, leaving the other ear free.
'That was no exception on the day – his other earbud was left at home,' Mrs Chamberlain said.
She said he had been home from the US for two months and was 'making up for lost time, enjoying getting his life back'.
On the day of the collision, he had planned to run 17 miles, starting in Ely and ending in Longstanton, Cambridgeshire. He was just over six miles into his run when he was struck.
The coroner directed that the female driver of the car should not be named at Tuesday's hearing.
The driver said, in a statement summarised by area coroner Caroline Jones, that as she 'approached the bridge she proceeded down the incline' and a man 'suddenly emerged into the road'.
She said she saw Mr Chamberlain 'looking to his left away from her and only looked to his right just before the collision'.
The driver said she had 'braked hard and steered to the nearside', but 'he was too close' and the front offside of the vehicle collided with him.
She said she had been driving within the 60mph speed limit and was on her way to a shop in Newmarket, Suffolk.
Grahame Cornwall, a motorcyclist who witnessed the collision, said that Chamberlain was thrown 'approximately 15ft' into the air.
'In his opinion the driver wouldn't have seen anything until she was on top of the rise (of the bridge) and wouldn't have had a chance to stop,' the coroner said.
Police forensic collision investigator Pc Ian Masters said it was 'not an ideal crossing point by any stretch of the imagination'.
Asked by the coroner if it was his view that it was not an avoidable collision, Pc Masters replied: 'Yes, that's correct.'
'Glue of our family'
The coroner recorded a conclusion that Mr Chamberlain died as the result of a road traffic collision.
Chamberlain's daughter, Ella, said in a statement to the inquest that her father was the 'perfect role model in every way'.
His son, Teddy, said: 'He was the glue of our family, always ready with an answer.'
'The mental and physical strength he showed was beyond anything I could imagine.'
In a statement outside the court read by lawyer Elena Abraham, the family said that they 'still have questions unanswered'.
'We will be inviting the police to refer the case to the Crown Prosecution Service for consideration,' the statement said.

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