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The jury at Preston crown court has been sent to consider its verdict on the charge of manslaughter against David Duckenfield, who as a South Yorkshire police chief superintendent, commanded the 1989 FA Cup semi final at Hillsborough, at which 96 people were killed.
The judge, Sir Peter Openshaw, finished his summing up of the evidence and sent out the jury, seven women and three men, at 2.21pm on Monday.
Openshaw told the jury they should draw no inference against Duckenfield for not having given evidence, as he suffers from post traumatic stress disorder, which makes it “undesirable” for him to have done so.
Concluding his summing up of the evidence, Openshaw reminded the jury of a “lie” which he said Duckenfield has admitted telling at 3.15pm on the day of the disaster, 15 April 1989, as the disaster was happening at the semi-final between Liverpool and Nottingham Forest.
After the match was stopped at 3.06pm, Duckenfield told the Football Association chief executive, Graham Kelly, according to Kelly’s colleague Glen Kirton, that Liverpool supporters had forced a gate open and rushed in.
Duckenfield did not tell Kelly that in fact he had ordered a large exit gate, C, to be opened, to allow a large number of people in quickly to alleviate a crush which had built up at all 23 of the Leppings Lane turnstiles allocated to the 24,000 people with tickets to support Liverpool.
At a subsequent meeting of the clubs’ directors approximately half an hour later, Duckenfield did not correct that version of events, and he subsequently admitted that it had been a lie.
Approximately 2,000 people came into the Leppings Lane end of the Hillsborough ground through the opened gate, and many went down a tunnel facing them, which led to the crowded central “pens” 3 and 4 of the terrace. The lethal crush that killed the 96 people developed from overcrowding in those pens.
Openshaw referred the jury to the case made by Richard Matthews QC, lead barrister for the prosecution, who argued that Duckenfield lied because he knew at that time that he had made “a terrible mistake.”
The barrister for Duckenfield’s defence, Benjamin Myers QC, Openshaw said, had argued that Duckenfield’s conversation with Kelly took place “when the scene was like a battlefield,” within minutes of the disaster.
“Mr Myers says Mr Duckenfield was bound to have a sense of responsibility and it wasn’t in the least surprising that he sought to avoid responsibility,” Openshaw told the jury.
Myers, he said, argued that the circumstances of the disaster were “far more complex than Mr Duckenfield can possibly have understood at the time,” and he does not accept that it was a sign of admission of guilt.
“[Myers] cautions you against using the lie as a shortcut to conviction, which he suggests the prosecution is attempting to do,” the judge said.
Openshaw summarised the evidence Duckenfield gave in March 2015 at the new inquests into the disaster, when he admitted a series of failings under questioning by Paul Greaney QC, who represented the Police Federation. Duckenfield’s admissions included that he failed to foresee that the tunnel led to the central pens, that it should have been closed off, and that the deaths of the 96 people resulted from the failure to do so.
The prosecution, Openshaw said, argued that Duckenfield was, in effect, admitting the charge against him. Myers had countered that the admissions had been “wrung out of him” after six days of “gruelling” questioning, and that when considered in context, in fact Duckenfield “robustly set out his defence.”
Openshaw asked the jury to reach a verdict on which they are all agreed, He said that if they reach circumstances where he could accept a majority verdict, he would “take the initiative” and let them know.
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