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HILLSBOROUGH COPS FINALLY GET THEIR DAY IN COURT

RELATIVES of the 96 people killed in the Hillsborough football stadium disaster looked on in court yesterday as former chief constable Sir Norman Bettison faced criminal charges relating to the tragedy.

Bettison, 61, who was a chief inspector at South Yorkshire Police when the lethal crowd crush occurred, appeared with four others — two of them also retired police officers — at Warrington magistrates’ court.

They were remanded on bail to appear at Preston Crown Court on September 6.

More than 30 relatives of the 96 Liverpool fans who died in the tragedy sat in the public gallery.

The former West Yorkshire and Merseyside Police chief constable is charged with four offences of misconduct in public office, linked to alleged lies he later told about his involvement in the disaster.

Appearing with him was former Sheffield Wednesday Football Club company secretary and safety officer Graham Mackrell, who is accused of two offences involving the stadium safety certificate and a health and safety offence.

Also in the dock were Peter Metcalf, the solicitor who acted for South Yorkshire Police after the disaster, former chief superintendent Donald Denton and Alan Foster, a former detective chief inspector, who are all facing charges of perverting the course of justice over changes made to police officers’ witness statements taken after the tragedy.

No formal pleas were entered by the defendants.

Match commander David Duckenfield faces 95 counts of gross negligence manslaughter.

From P1: But he will not be formally charged or appear in court until an application to lift a stay imposed after a prosecution in 2000 has been approved by a High Court judge.

The disaster took place at Sheffield Wednesday’s Hillsborough football stadium on April 15 1989, when Liverpool were playing Nottingham Forest in an FA Cup semi-final.

A crush developed in the stadium’s Leppings Lane stand resulting in the deaths of 96 Liverpool supporters. Another 766 were injured.

The disaster was followed by a torrent of false accusations in the right-wing media against the Liverpool fans, who were variously accused of causing the disaster, of being drunk, of stealing from the dead, of hooliganism, and of urinating on police officers.

Since the event Rupert Murdoch’s Sun newspaper, which infamously slurred matchgoers under the headline “The Truth” has been boycotted in Liverpool.

A coroner’s inquest in 1991 ruled that the deaths were “accidental,” but families of the Liverpool dead were outraged at the ruling and campaigned for 20 years for a public inquiry into the disaster.

In 2009 the Hillsborough Independent Panel reviewed the evidence, absolving Liverpool fans of any responsibility and in 2016 a new coroner’s inquest quashed the original ruling — and a jury returned a verdict of “unlawful killing.”

The verdict was followed by a criminal investigation into Hillsborough, and an inquiry by the Independent Police Complaints Commission, resulting in charges being brought.

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