Briton Ryan Lock killed himself in Syria to avoid being captured by IS
The British chef, who travelled to Raqqa to fight against IS, wanted to avoid capture or torture at the hands of the terror group.
A British man who travelled to Syria to fight against Islamic State shot himself to avoid a “painful and frightening death”, an inquest has heard.
Ryan Lock, from Chichester, died last December fighting alongside Kurdish forces in Raqqa.
The 20-year-old had only been in the war-torn country for four months, and he died from a single gunshot wound to the head.
Mr Lock had been seriously injured in battle and was surrounded by IS fighters when he decided to kill himself to avoid being captured or tortured.
His mother, Catherine Lock, had no idea that her son was planning on travelling to Syria. Instead, she thought he was going backpacking around Turkey.
She said: “He just said that he had planned this for ages and that he had time off work. He said he would be going for a few weeks, maybe a month.
“And when I found out he was going to Turkey I said: ‘You do realise that’s right next to Syria, where there is a war.’
“I hadn’t twigged that was exactly his plan, to head to Syria.”
A day after Mr Lock arrived in Turkey last August, he told his mother that he had signed up to fight for the People’s Defence Units (YPG), a Kurdish military force.
She contacted the police immediately and continued to stay in contact with her son on Facebook Messenger, where he regularly posted pictures of himself during his military training.
Belfast Child 