Betting account on 18th birthday, dead at 22: inquest probes death of Melbourne man who gambled $895,000

A Melbourne man gambled $895,733 through online betting platforms in the four years between his 18th birthday and the day he took his own life, an inquest has heard.

Victorian coroner Paul Lawrie’s inquest into the circumstances of Kyle Hudson’s death on 6 July 2021 began on Monday, and will interrogate whether betting companies accurately assessed the risk of gambling-related harm in the years prior to Werribee man’s death.

The inquest would also examine the immediate circumstances and likely contributing factors to the Werribee man’s suicide, his personal and financial history and his online gambling history with Sportsbet, Entain and bet365, counsel assisting the coroner, Georgina Coghlan KC, told the court.

In total, his online gambling turnover was $895,733 – with an overall net loss of more than $47,000, the inquest heard.

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During Monday’s hearing, Hudson was described by his girlfriend of seven years, Ashley Baker, as “a genuine good bloke” with a “quiet nature” who “would never swear or raise his voice at me”. But she said the construction management student also loved gambling, telling the inquest that he opened an online betting account with Sportsbet on his 18th birthday in 2017.

“The only thing Kyle and I would argue over was his gambling,” Baker told the inquest.

The first inkling Baker had that Hudson may have been struggling with betting was after his birthday when they were on holiday at Phillip Island and he was “unusually quiet”. She knew he had received $2,000 from his mother as a birthday gift, she said.

“I queried him on what was wrong, and he told me he lost all his money and that he wanted to die. It was a really unusual thing for him to say, and I asked him not to say that,” Baker told the court.

“I think this represented Kyle’s first significant [gambling] loss. This is really when Kyle’s habit turned bad.”

Hudson had tried numerous times to reduce and limit his gambling, Baker said, including imposing limits on himself and taking breaks. He eventually gave her control of most of his money and the password to his Sportsbet account after he lost $20,000 – all his savings – in December 2020.

The “cycle” was so frequent “it was almost normal”, Baker told the inquest.

In the days leading up to his death, Hudson began asking her for money, speaking to her in a way that “felt out of character for him”, Baker said. She eventually sent him about $5,500 and told him that their relationship was over. When she saw in his account that he’d been betting, she felt he “had made his decision”.

On Hudson’s computer, Baker said she discovered evidence that he had bet thousands of dollars in the last 24 hours of his life, and “had blown all his savings”.