By William Cole For Mailonline. A four-year-old girl drowned in a swimming pool in front of horrified holiday makers after walking around an inadequate safety fence. Mya Piper's mum, Lisa, was distracted by a phone call as her her daughter and younger brother Jonah simply walked around the barrier designed to separate the children's pool from the deeper main swimming area. Andreas Ttofinis the owner of the Evalena Hotel in Protaras, Cyprus - which the family booked through Jet2 - was taken to court and received a suspended prison sentence for breaching safety rules and the hotel company received a significant fine.
The inquest heard there were no trained lifeguards on duty at the time. Lisa was with her father, sister and other family members with Mya and her younger brother Jonah on the first day of their holiday when she received a phone call while at the poolside on the first day of the family's holiday.
The call was from a witness care officer who wanted to speak to her about a domestic incident at home just before the holiday in which her partner, the children's father Dale Ferris, had been arrested and charged. Mr Ferris did not travel with the family on the holiday. As the call came to an end Lisa realised she could no longer see her children and began desperately searching for them. She realised a man on a first floor balcony at the hotel was pointing and yelling: 'There is a baby drowning in the pool.
A Russian woman, Oxana Kuzesh, leapt from her sunbed and dived into the water, scooping Mya up and bringing her to the surface. Tragically attempts to save her were unsuccessful and she was pronounced dead after being rushed to hospital by ambulance. In a statement to Cypriot police, read by Durham coroner Dr John Hamilton, Lisa from Darlington, said: 'We were at the kids pool, my son was just playing just beside me and Mya had armbands. The phone call was about five minutes and I moved myself a short distance.
I thought someone had taken her away from me. She was unconscious and her face was blue. Lisa said people rushed to help and tried to deliver CPR with no effect. She was worked on by paramedics before being rushed to hospital where she pronounced dead. CCTV from the poolside was examined by coroner's officer Dawn Carter who described to the inquest what she had viewed. She said: 'A long fence divides the children's pool from the larger swimming pool but the fence can be accessed from either side so you can just walk around it.
