A member of staff working at a Pembrokeshire school has refuted claims that the institution ‘persecuted’ a teenage girl who later took her own life.

Megan Evans, 14, was found dead at her Milford Haven home on February 7, 2017. A post-mortem gave the cause of death as hanging.

The inquest into the circumstances surrounding the teenager’s death is taking place this week, with the conclusion expected to be given by HM Coroner for Pembrokeshire late next week.

Megan’s family believe that she was in receipt of unkind messages and posts on social media before her death.

In messages found on her phone there were references to people telling her to kill herself and a picture message saying ‘die’ followed with a stream of insults and obscenities.

The inquest heard that the provenance of this offensive message was unclear, with retrieved data saying that it had come from Megan’s account. However, this could have been because she had saved as a screen shot in her Snap Chat memories.

A photo of Megan ‘smoking’ had also been posted on Facebook without her consent which led to reports of name calling at school.

On Monday, Megan’s mother, Nicola Harteveld, said that her daughter had been ‘persecuted’ and ‘let down at every possible opportunity’ by the school.

She said that teachers had ‘chipped away’ at Megan over uniform issues and that the school should have notified her and her husband when Megan’s behaviour at school deteriorated in the weeks before her death.

Giving evidence at the inquest yesterday, Wednesday, November 21, pastoral assistant Nicola Edwards said that she made ‘dozens of phone calls a week to parents regarding uniform’.

She said that she did not agree that Megan was being ‘persecuted’ over her trousers and that hundreds of pupils did not have the correct uniform.

She said that Megan did not appear upset that she had been told to change her trousers and get the proper uniform .

She added that her records showed that the issue of school trousers had been resolved shortly after January 12, 2017.

“It was dealt with, it was finished, it was fine,” she said.

Ms Edwards had also dealt with the Facebook photo in which Megan appeared to be smoking.

She said that she had asked the pupil who posted it to take it down and he agreed. She had then carried out restorative work with Megan who seemed happy with the way it had been dealt with. For this reason, she did not escalate the incident further.

The inquest continues.