Families cheer justice as Hillsborough police face prosecution
POLICE officers could face criminal charges after an inquest jury ruled that the 96 victims of the Hillsborough disaster were unlawfully killed.
Relations of the Liverpool supporters who were crushed to death at an FA Cup semi-final in 1989 sobbed, cheered and applauded the jury as it found that officers were guilty of gross negligence and that fans’ behaviour played no part in the tragedy. Senior officers – one of whom has admitted lying about the day’s events – have been interviewed under criminal caution by investigators examining manslaughter charges.
The news emerged as South Yorkshire Police came under further fire from families who accused them of using the inquests to repeat unproven and discredited “slurs” against Liverpool fans, blaming them for the disaster. The Home Office was also crit- icised for allowing the spending of £19 million on lawyers to represent officers who repeated the allegations that drunken fans were to blame.
The families said their long and often lonely 27-year fight for justice had finally been “completely vindicated” by the two-year hearing, the longest jury proceedings in British legal history.
David Duckenfield, the former South Yorkshire Police chief superintendent who was the match commander at the stadium, could now face charges including manslaughter through gross negligence as an £80 million joint inquiry between detectives and the police watchdog nears its conclusion.
It was Mr Duckenfield’s decision to open an exit gate to let in more fans at Hillsborough in Sheffield minutes before the match that led to a fatal crush on the terraces. He has also admitted lying as part of an attempt to deflect blame. Mr Duckenfield and other offic- ers could also face charges including misconduct in a public office, perverting the course of justice or perjury over an alleged cover-up that followed the tragedy. Assistant Commissioner Jon Stoddart, the former chief constable of Durham who heads the police inquiry into Hillsborough, said: “We have a number of suspects, both individuals and organisations, and we have conducted a large number of interviews under caution with those suspects.”
While families of the dead regarded
the verdicts as a victory, there was anger that South Yorkshire Police, funded by £19.4 million in Home Office grants, had dragged out the inquest by recycling long-discredited smears about drunk and ticketless fans contributing to the tragedy.
They accused the police and Yorkshire Ambulance Service of going back on apologies made in 2012 after the publication of an independent report into the disaster. Their legal teams even refused to allow the inquest jury to be told that they had previously admitted responsibility for their roles.
Margaret Aspinall, the lead family campaigner, called for the resignation of the current South Yorkshire Chief Constable, David Crompton, saying: “This is on him. He should go, no doubt about it.” The families also called for Rod Barnes, the current chief executive of Yorkshire Ambulance Service, to “resign or be removed”.
Trevor Hicks, who lost his daughters Sarah, aged 19 and 15-year-old Victoria, said he was “disgusted” that police had reheated the discredited evidence, while the families’ lead lawyer, Marcia Willis-Stewart, said: “It is shameful that, rather than focusing on the search for truth and despite having made public apologies, the approach to the inquests taken by South Yorkshire Police and the Yorkshire Ambulance Service was to fight tooth and nail to avoid adverse findings by the jury.
“This turned the inquests into an adversarial battle that probably doubled the length of time it might otherwise have done.”
Mr Crompton said his force “unequivocally” accepted the jury’s findings and apologised “unreservedly” to the families for officers’ “catastrophic” errors. Mr Duckenfield was not at home in Dorset last night.
South Yorkshire Police Federation, the union that represents constables, sergeants and inspectors, refused to apologise for officers’ behaviour. Its chairman Neil Bowles said the officers on duty “did their best” but “it is not my place to apologise for what my predecessors may or may not have done”.
The jury in Warrington, Cheshire, decided by a 7-2 majority that the 96 victims, aged 10 to 67, were unlawfully killed because Mr Duckenfield owed a duty of care to them, that he was in breach of that duty, that the breach of duty caused the deaths and that this amounted to “gross negligence”.
The jury found that police planning errors and failings by the ambulance service “caused or contributed to” the tragedy. Stadium design, oversight of the stadium, the stadium’s owners Sheffield Wednesday FC and its engineering consultants also shared part of the blame, they said.
Operation Resolve, the police investigation into the events of April 15, 1989, and the Independent Police Complaints Commission, which is investigating the alleged cover-up, expect to deliver reports to the Crown Prosecution Service by December.
The CPS will then decide whether to charge any individual officers, while charges including health and safety breaches will also be considered against South Yorkshire Police, the Football Association, Sheffield Wednesday FC, Sheffield City Council, and Yorkshire Ambulance Service.
Police have not named any suspects, but eight former officers were represented by barristers at the inquests and what they said in the witness box forms part of the criminal inquiry.
David Cameron described the verdicts on Britain’s worst stadium disaster as a “long overdue day” and praised the families’ “tireless bravery in pursuing the truth” that had led to official confirmation that Liverpool fans were “utterly blameless”.
Rod Barnes, of Yorkshire Ambulance Service NHS Trust (YAS), said the service fully accepted the jury’s conclusions and he extended his “deepest sympathy” to the bereaved families.