Teenager falls to death from 17th floor flat during police visit

Police and forensics officers attend the scene after a woman fell to her death from a block of flats. Photograph: Ian Nicholson/PA
A teenager who plunged to her death from the 17th floor of a tower block in south-east London fell soon after police entered the flat to make an arrest, Scotland Yard has said.

The Metropolitan police said officers went to the flat on Mulgrave Road, Woolwich, at 9.30am on Tuesday as part of a recall to prison inquiry.

"Shortly after the officers entered the flat, a woman – who is believed to be 18 – fell from a bedroom window on the 17th floor," he said. "She was pronounced dead at the scene."

He added that a man had been arrested by officers "on suspicion of assisting an offender", and was in custody at a south London police station.

He stressed that the officers had not been carrying out a raid but were at the flat on a "pre-planned arrest inquiry".

The spokesman said a formal identification of the woman's body had yet to be made, and that a postmortem examination would be scheduled in due course.

The Independent Police Complaints Commission has been informed of the death – as has the Met's directorate of professional standards, which is investigating the incident.

Prince Langlais, 42-year-old council caretaker, said he knew the victim and the man who had been arrested.

"I knew them to say hello to because I live just around the corner," he said. "They were very friendly people."

"A lot of people round here know each other, they see the same face more or less every day."

Langlais said the event was a tragedy and criticised the police for the time it took them to cover the woman's body.

"There were young kids out there running up and saying 'look at the body and all the blood'," he said.

"The police could have done their job a bit quicker and better than that."

Police later covered the body, which lay on a grassy area next to the block, with a tent.

Forensic officers were examining the scene, and police were patrolling the entrance to the building.

Another neighbour, whose flat is two floors below the one police visited, said his partner had heard a row from inside the flat a few minutes before the incident.

"He heard an argument, he heard shouting and bawling," said Michael Mulkerrins.

"About 10 minutes later she was out of the window. He didn't see the girl but he did see her on the floor."

The 28-year-old carpenter added: "I've seen him quite a lot by himself. It could be his flat and she was staying over."

Mulkerrins said he spoke to the man when they passed in the corridor, and described him as "an alright chap".

The man often had a skateboard, he said, and had lived in the block for about four months.

Another neighbour said the man was in his late teens or early twenties and had been living at the flat for about six months. He said the woman was his girlfriend and regularly stayed there.

"Sometimes I'd knock on the door and ask for a cigarette and she would be there," he said.

On the 17th floor two officers were standing guard where forensic teams were examining the flat.

A representative from the IPCC was also there.