Content warning: this article discusses self-harm.
The image was seen by millions: a bed in presenter Caroline Flack’s north London home, its white sheets stained starkly with blood. The photo was allegedly taken by her boyfriend Lewis Burton and sent to a friend after they’d had an argument on 13 December 2019 – an incident which resulted in Lewis sustaining a minor head injury. A few weeks later, the picture was plastered across front pages and retweeted endlessly. It amassed a deluge of comments – many branding Caroline an abuser.
At the time, the Love Island host messaged a friend: Can’t get over this, it’s so private.
In February 2020, it was confirmed that Caroline would be standing trial for the alleged assault. Only she went on to take her own life weeks before the proposed hearing, due to take place on 4 March.
That night in December, when the police were called to her home, kickstarted a rapid decline in Caroline’s historically fragile mental health, her mother, Christine Flack, tells Cosmopolitan UK, ahead of a new docuseries dropping on Disney+.
Caroline Flack: Search for the Truth, details how, in Christine’s view, the press, police and Crown Prosecution Service (CPS) embarked on a witch hunt that sought to make an example of the presenter, ultimately leading to her passing.
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A coroner later ruled that Caroline had killed herself following an 'exacerbation and fluctuation' of ill health and distress, a mitigating factor that the CPS did not take into account in spite of her known self-harm on the night of the incident with Lewis. This is likely because Caroline did not have any officially recognised form of mental illness, having stopped short of seeking professional support out of fear it would be made public, her loved ones claim.
The Flack family are adamant Caroline never intended to hurt Lewis and that the legal persecution that followed was not only harmful to her, but detrimental to ‘true’ domestic violence cases everywhere.
“This wasn’t domestic violence,” Christine states plainly. “I think most people reading this have experienced it in some way in their lives, with a family member or friend [if not personally]. So you know how bad that is. To run with this case was just ridiculous.”
Caroline’s mother believes it all “started with the way the police treated Caroline and why the detective inspector who came on duty that night, and who just overheard a conversation in the office, really wanted to press for Caroline to be charged after the Crown Prosecution Service (CPS) had already thrown it out.”
It was an unusual decision – and the first time this particular detective inspector had ever called to overturn a CPS verdict – least not because Lewis had made it clear he did not want to pursue a case against Caroline. His head injury, caused by Caroline’s phone, required no treatment. On the night police arrived at her flat, Caroline stated according to one report: “I hit him, he was cheating on me” and “I used the phone”, but adding that she did “so to wake him up” rather than to try and deliberately cause injury.
In a 999 call made on the night of the argument, Lewis told the operator, “She tried to kill me, mate.”
But the blood pictured in those infamous front page images was not Lewis’s; it was Caroline’s. While doctors decided that Lewis needed no medical treatment following the incident, having cut her arms, Caroline needed to stay in hospital for 12 hours. At one point, plastic surgery was considered, such was the extent of the harm. The pair were ordered not to talk while the case was being investigated.
“[She’d thought] ‘another partner, another betrayal’,” Caroline’s mum reflects, referencing her daughter’s much-chronicled love life, which included the likes of Prince Harry, Harry Styles and The Apprentice’s Andrew Brady, to whom she was once engaged. “I knew her so well, she didn’t take those things well. She would just feel she wasn’t worth anything.”
Still, much was written about the event (one analysis found the press published 387 stories about Caroline in the six months before her death; The Sun alone totalling 99) – and many crucial details were missing. The fact that the blood in the photo was Caroline’s, not Lewis’s, did not seem to matter. After all, approaching the story from that angle is far less clickworthy than ‘popular presenter is a secret monster who beats her boyfriend’, the slant many chose to run with.
Lewis posted on social media after the incident, amid press pick-up: “This isn’t my blood and I didn’t get hit over the head with a lamp. Can everyone stop now. I love this girl more than anything. No one knows what’s going on or what’s happened. She’s f*cking harmless and the most amazing person I have ever met.”
While the CPS have since apologised for errors made during the handling of Caroline’s case, it also denies treating Caroline’s case differently to anyone else’s. A spokesperson said the CPS decided to charge the presenter after concluding that there was sufficient evidence and that it was in the public interest to do so following a detective inspector’s appeal against its initial decision to issue a caution.
The case was ruled a form of ‘victimless’ prosecution, after Lewis tried to pull back his previous allegations. This happens in cases where the CPS proceeds without the victim’s support, because domestic abuse often involves power imbalances and intimidation, and dropping the case could leave a victim in a vulnerable position and the offender un-accountable.
A CPS spokesperson, when challenged during an inquest six months after Caroline’s death, added that it had kept her case under continuous review.
But Caroline’s family still feel strongly that she is the true victim in it all.
Fight for Caroline's truth
“The things that were being written were untrue,” Christine shares, her voice devoid of anger. “It was being written that she beat him with a lamp, she was a domestic abuser, everything was just untrue and we didn’t know if that was coming from the police [or elsewhere].
“In court, the prosecutor was allowed to read out that it was a ‘bloodbath’, that she’d hit him with a lamp, and of course, the press jumped on it.” The confusion relating to the lamp stems from Lewis’ initial interactions with police in which he said he was asleep and wasn’t sure what he’d been hit with, but suggested it could be a lamp or a fan.
Later in court, Paul Morris, who defended Caroline, told those present that the former tennis player saw himself as a witness rather than a victim, who repeatedly said he did not want to press charges.
One officer intent on pursuing the case against Caroline had never met the presenter – something Christine finds it difficult to swallow. “At the coroner's inquest I was allowed to speak to her, and I said, ‘How was Caroline that night?’. She said, ‘I didn't see her’ and yet, Caroline had been in a cell for hours.”
This treatment by the justice system, Caroline’s family believe, is one element that culminated in Caroline’s tragic death at the age of 40. They feel that the CPS wanted a high-profile representation that it was doing its job, given the public’s desire to see domestic abusers held to account amidst the UK’s abysmally low prosecution rate. [Editor’s note: It’s estimated by the National Centre for Domestic Abuse that of the 2.3 million adults who reported abuse last year (and it’s thought only 20% of those impacted do), just a fraction (38,776) resulted in a conviction.]
“I don't think anything could have stopped the police and the CPS from doing what they did. They were set on making an example of Caroline,” Christine says. “At the inquest, the detective inspector said to me, ‘Well, your daughter had a very good barrister, if she’d have been innocent she’d have got off’ and I said ‘Jesus could have been standing up there talking for her, there was no way you were going to change your mind’. There was no way out.”
“Over the last four years, the more questions that I’ve put to authorities, the less answers I seem to get,” she adds. “Disney have found out answers for me I couldn’t find out myself. There were new things even I didn’t know.”
Producers of the docuseries say the evidence amassed by Christine to show Caroline was treated unfairly is damning and undeniable. “It took us the best part of six weeks to go through all that she'd compiled,” says Sophie Clayton-Payne, the series producer. “It became clear very quickly that this wasn't just a mother's bias, that there were absolutely contradictions within the reports [from the CPS and Independent Office for Police Conduct] that were being sent to her.
“We knew straight away there were strands here that needed to be investigated.”
Clayton-Payne confesses that going into the project, she too believed that Caroline had hit Lewis with a lamp. “I'm not a massive reality TV fan. I didn't watch huge amounts of Love Island, but I knew of Caroline, knew that she was loved by the nation, that this incident had happened. It was really important for me and the director to remain open-minded and to not just straight away believe everything the family said. We wanted to be convinced ourselves.”
Behind-the-scenes struggle
This is not the first documentary the Flack family have made since Caroline’s passing. Caroline Flack: Her Life and Death was released a year after and sought to re-humanise the presenter, known by her loved ones as ‘Carrie’.
It painted a portrait of a young woman who yearned to be loved but who was often unlucky in relationships, who adored dancing and singing (ideally at a festival), whose job gave her deep fulfilment and who loved her nieces and nephews – as well as someone who behind-the-scenes had long been battling severe mental health challenges. This new offering further expands on all that, while unravelling the build up to Caroline’s untimely death.
At one point, her mother says, a doctor diagnosed Caroline with bipolar disorder, but she chose not to follow up on it.
“She was told many times by people, ‘Oh, you're mad, you're mental’ and I think she thought she was. She wasn't always down. When she used to come home with us, we had some wonderful times, but she used to get these of bouts of depression and a lot of it was around her period,” Christine says, sharing that PMDD (Premenstrual Dysphoric Disorder) can sometimes be mistaken for bipolar disorder.
PMDD is a severe form of PMS believed to impact between 1 to 8% of women, causing extreme mood swings, depression, and anxiety before menstruation. It can be serious enough to disrupt daily life or lead to suicidal thoughts.
“It wasn't bipolar [...] I think a lot of ladies get it,” Christine continues. “We used to laugh, Jody [Caroline’s twin] and I. We’d say it was all right because in three days time she'll feel better, and she did. But that's not something ladies talk about. It’s her ‘time of the month’, it’s a joke, you know? But it can affect your life so badly.”
In recent years, we’ve seen celebrities such as Vicky Pattinson and Married At First Sight’s Kristina Goodsell open up about their own experiences of PMDD and how at times it has derailed their lives, but Christine says Caroline would never have felt comfortable discussing her own story so publicly. Still, she believes her daughter would heartily approve of the new docuseries.
“Before her passing, Caroline actually came to Curious Films [who produced the series] and spoke to them about a potential documentary, about this period [following the incident with Lewis],” Clayton-Payne reveals. “She wanted to set the record straight herself.”
Christine agrees, adding softly, “There’s people out there now who still won’t believe me, who will say ‘Of course she did it’... [Others] say ‘Why didn’t you sue?’ but money’s nothing. I don’t want anything like that, or even for people to lose their jobs. I just want the truth. [For it to be] put out there: she was not a domestic abuser, that was her blood, because of how bad she’d felt that night.”
Cosmopolitan UK reached out to Lewis Burton ahead of publication
If you’re struggling with your mental health, Samaritans are on-hand to listen day or night, call 116 123 any time for a confidential chat. You can also email jo@samaritans.org (please note: it may take a couple of days for a response).
Caroline Flack: Search For The Truth premieres 10 November on Disney+
Jennifer Savin is Cosmopolitan UK's multiple award-winning Features Editor, who was crowned Digital Journalist of the Year for her work tackling the issues most important to young women. She regularly covers breaking news, cultural trends, health, the royals and more, using her esteemed connections to access the best experts along the way. She's grilled everyone from high-profile politicians to A-list celebrities, and has sensitively interviewed hundreds of people about their real life stories. In addition to this, Jennifer is widely known for her own undercover investigations and campaign work, which includes successfully petitioning the government for change around topics like abortion rights and image-based sexual abuse. Jennifer is also a published author, documentary consultant (helping to create BBC’s Deepfake Porn: Could You Be Next?) and a patron for Y.E.S. (a youth services charity). Alongside Cosmopolitan, Jennifer has written for The Times, Women’s Health, ELLE and numerous other publications, appeared on podcasts, and spoken on (and hosted) panels for the Women of the World Festival, the University of Manchester and more. In her spare time, Jennifer is a big fan of lipstick, leopard print and over-ordering at dinner. Follow Jennifer on Instagram, X or LinkedIn.
