A former Marlborough College student was handcuffed to his bed as he lay dying in Kenyan hospital, it has been claimed.

Alexander Monson, 28, a contemporary of Pippa Middleton at the college, had been arrested for allegedly smoking a cannabis joint in Diani, Kenya, where he lived with his mother, Hilary.

Mrs Monson had received a call from the local police to say her son had been taken to hospital and was very sick.

She rushed from the Kenyan capital, Nairobi, where she had been staying with her brother, and found that Mr Monson was handcuffed to his bed, though he was unconscious.

It was only minutes before he died that police officers agreed to undo the handcuffs.

According to two independent pathologists’ report, Mr Monson died after a brain haemorrhage brought on by a blow to the head.

Kenyan police deny this and say the brain haemorrhage was caused by Mr Monson smoking a strong local variant of cannabis, called bhang.

Hilary Monson told a reporter in Kenya: “I moved heaven and earth to get on a flight (from Nairobi), but even by that point my brother had been talking to doctors and they were saying that everything was all right.

“But then when I got to the hospital he had developed breathing problems. I saw his eyelashes flutter just once, probably because he heard my voice, but he was completely unconscious.”

Less than an hour after Mrs Monson arrived at her son’s bedside, his condition deteriorated.

She said: “Something changed with his oxygen and he suddenly went a very weird colour. I knew that was it and he died in front of me.”

Mr Monson is the son of Lord Monson, the 12th baron. He and Mrs Monson are divorced.

Mr Monson was educated at Marlborough College at the same time as Pippa Middleton, the Duchess of Cambridge’s sister, attended the school.

Four years ago he moved to Kenya to live with his mother at the beachfront property her family has owned since 1964.

Mr Monson had recently started a bamboo-growing business and a fish-smoking enterprise with a close friend.

A memorial service for him took place last Saturday during which some of his friends kite-surfed in formation in his memory.

Mr Monson is expected to be cremated some time this week on a funeral pyre of local timber covered with palm fronds and bougainvillea flowers.