Collapsed court case relied on student chats in pub 30 years ago
THE collapsed prosecution of Sir Norman Bettison over Hillsborough coverups hinged on 30-year-old recollections of pub conversations.
Sir Norman faced claims he told fellow students on a part-time university course that Liverpool fans – rather than his South Yorkshire police colleagues – were to blame for the 96 deaths.
The allegations, vehemently denied by the former Merseyside chief constable, were first raised to Maria Eagle, the Liverpool MP, in 2012, before the 62-year-old was eventually charged with four counts of misconduct in a public office, all relating to alleged lies he told following the 1989 disaster.
Yesterday, however, the Crown Prosecution Service was forced to drop the case partly because Mark Ellaby, who had reportedly been studying with Sir Norman on the MBA course at Sheffield Hallam University, had died.
The case was further undermined after the Independent Office for Police Conduct (IOPC) revisited another key witness, an 85-year-old woman, and “significant contradictions” emerged in her evidence.
Sir Norman, a chief inspector for South Yorkshire Police in 1989, was off duty on the day, but in the aftermath of the tragedy was part of a team tasked with finding material for police lawyers to present to the public inquiry, led by Lord Justice Taylor.
Mr Ellaby was due to be a key witness in the case, having claimed in 2012: “Sir Norman was very clear that South Yorkshire Police did not have anything to do with the tragedy and that it was the fault of the Liverpool fans.”
His evidence first emerged when he called Ms Eagle to offer his support after she used parliamentary privilege to claim Sir Norman had been asked to help “concoct” a story that drunken fans were to blame for the tragedy.
At the time, Ms Eagle raised similar claims from John Barry, another witness, who corroborated Mr Ellaby’s assertions that, after attending classes, Sir Norman would join students at the pub.
“I heard Bettison dismiss John Barry as though it never happened, and that made me extremely angry,” Mr Ellaby said in 2012. Yesterday, Sarah Whitehouse QC, the prosecution barrister, told judge Sir Peter Openshaw that Mr Ellaby would have been able to provide supporting evidence.
Ms Whitehouse told the court that, since the defendant was charged, in June last year, the “state of the evidence has changed”. The barrister said that, under the victims’ right of review process, those with a “significant” interest in the case had three months to seek a review of the decision.
Sir Norman was charged for allegedly telling lies in 1998, when he applied for the chief constable job at Merseyside Police, and in 2012, when the Hillsborough Independent Panel report was published.
But Paul Greaney QC, defending Sir Norman, told Preston Crown Court there had been “naked political interference” in the case, and that a “false understanding” that Sir Norman was part of an alleged cover-up had been fostered by political figures including Ms Eagle.
Margaret Aspinall, chairman of the Hillsborough Family Support Group, said: “We have grave concerns about the handling of this case by the CPS and can confirm that we will be exercising our right to an independent review under the right to review scheme.
“It is our view that the wrong charge was brought in the first place and we will be using the review process to argue this point strongly.
Speaking outside court, Sir Norman said the decision to discontinue the case “vindicated” his position.
He added: “Six years ago, I was driven from the job that had been my vocation for 40 years, and some commentators, who didn’t really know anything about me or the facts, rushed to judgment and predetermined my guilt.
“Something I learnt, though, early in my police service, is that no injustice was ever satisfactorily resolved through being unjust.”
Five other men, including David Duckenfield, the Hillsborough match commander, are due to face trial for offences related to the disaster next year.