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Hillsborough Disaster: Six People Charged
Topic Started: Jun 28 2017, 12:38 PM (5 Views)
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The Guardian: Hillsborough Disaster - Six People, Including Duckenfield, Charged

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Six people, including two former senior police officers, have been charged with criminal offences over the deaths of 96 people at the Hillsborough disaster and the alleged police cover-up that followed. David Duckenfield, the South Yorkshire officer who was in command of policing at the FA Cup semi-final between Liverpool and Nottingham Forest in 1989, has been charged with the manslaughter of 95 people.

The 96th, Tony Bland, died four years later after his life support was switched off; a manslaughter charge cannot be brought in his case because his death came more than a year and a day after his injuries were sustained.

Sue Hemming, the Crown Prosecution Service head of special crime and counter-terrorism, said the CPS would allege that Duckenfield’s failure to take personal responsibility on the day was “extraordinarily bad and contributed substantially to the deaths of each of those 96 people who so tragically and unnecessarily lost their lives”.

Sir Norman Bettison, the former chief constable of Merseyside and West Yorkshire police, who was an inspector in the South Yorkshire force at the time of the disaster, has been charged with four counts of misconduct in a public office.

On the four charges of misconduct in a public office relating to Bettison, Hemming said the officer allegedly told lies about his involvement in the disaster. “Given his role as a senior police officer, we will ask the jury to find that this was misconduct of such a degree as to amount to an abuse of the public’s trust in the office holder,” she said.

Graham Mackrell, the Sheffield Wednesday chief executive and officially designated safety officer for the Hillsborough stadium, has also been charged with breaching the terms of the ground’s safety certificate and failing to take reasonable care under the Health and Safety at Work Act.

The three other men are all charged with doing acts with intent to pervert the course of justice, for the process by which statements made by South Yorkshire police officers on duty at Hillsborough were subsequently reviewed and changed.

Donald Denton, the South Yorkshire police chief superintendent who operated in a senior role in that process, his deputy, chief inspector Alan Foster, and the then South Yorkshire police solicitor, Peter Metcalf, have all been charged.

Trevor Hicks, president of the Hillsborough Families Support Group whose teenage daughters Sarah and Vicki were killed, said the news was a vital step forward.

“If I’m honest I didn’t think we would get to this day, no,” he said. “We didn’t think we would. This is a success for society at large. There are no winners but it sends a message out that nobody is above the law. After Grenfell Tower and others, the message is ‘watch out, families will come after you.’”

Margaret Aspinall, whose 18-year-old son James was killed, said she felt the families had turned a corner. “The message this sends is ‘never give up. Carry on fighting’. This should never happen again. No one should go through this to get to the truth. That’s the legacy of this.”
-Read more: https://www.theguardian.com/uk-news/2017/jun/28/hillsborough-six-people-including-two-senior-police-officers-charged
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