The Natural Philosopher wrote:


Well the fact is the dickhead D-I-Y er put a screw through a cable, and
didn't earth the appliance.

Not quite: they put a screw through a cable, but it wasn't holding an
Appliance, just a bit of metalwork (some fancy-pantsy chromed cutlery
rack, mfg cost 2 squid, yours-at-Heals-for-only-40-notes or some such).
And it was the all-too-effective earthing of a nearby appliance which
provided a low-impedance path to earth for the fatal current.

Hey presto. What happened to t[h]e RCD [...] ?

RCDs good. RCDs sensible. RCDs not definitely required for kitchen
sockets, though - a damn good idea, but currently only required for
"sockets reasonably foreseeably used for powering portable appliances
outside the house"...

Me with coroner he main chunk of blame on kitchen installer
misrouting cable, with contributory lack of care from later householder
putting screw into wall without cable-detector (10? 15? quid from your
d-i-y emporium) and from family members going "ooh, it tingles" but
doing sod-all about it...

Stefek