Tag Archives: INQUEST

Hillsborough Inquest – a lawyer’s perspective (guest blog by Anna Morris)

Dedicated to the memory of the 96 victims of the Hillsborough Stadium disaster who died on 15 April 1989.

On 26th April 2016, I hugged two of my clients with elation after a jury of 6 women and 3 men set the record straight after 27 years about what happened at Hillsborough stadium on 15 April 1989. Moments later, they looked at each other and said, without missing a beat, “so, what do we do tomorrow?” They hadn’t dared to believe there could be a day when they would not have to fight for justice, to fight to clear the name of their loved one. This had been a life-defining fight for a generation of children, wives, parents and siblings of those 96 men, women, boys and girls.

The jury’s conclusions finally saw their families achieve something they recognise as justice. Much has rightly been reported about their tenacity, commitment and patience. But I want to say something about their humanity.

The families have endured the longest jury case in English legal history. 319 days of witnesses, evidence and submissions. For many of the families, attending Birchwood business park had become a full time job. Employers who asked, “haven’t you got over it yet?” had to be negotiated with, child-care had to be arranged, health problems had to be managed, life continued to be put on hold. But when they could be there, they were there. Sitting, listening. Waiting.

At the start of the process, many approached with caution after decades of being let down again and again by lawyers, judges and politicians. They had no reason to trust us, their lawyers but as they sat there in our conferences, polite but knotted tense with questions and anger, their thoughts were never just of themselves; “who will look after the jury?” “What about the survivors, who speaks for them?” “How do I find the man who helped our brother, I want to thank him?” We could only tell them, “we will try and get these answers for you. We hope we can”.

Most of the families had an encyclopedic knowledge of the papers disclosed as part of the Hillsborough Independent Panel. As their lawyers we had to be able to call up documents at the click of a finger to answer the broad and complex questions that troubled them. More than one set piece of witness examination conducted by our team of advocates was centered on a document recalled through the mists of time by one of our clients, tracked down in the 250,000 plus pages of disclosed material. In fact, one of my clients, when she presented 10 neatly typed pages of devastatingly precise and searching questions to Operation Resolve, the Coroner’s Investigation team, was (with only a hint of humour) offered a job as an investigator. We all had to be at our best. No one wanted to let these families down.

But on many occasions, it was our clients looking after us, using their 27 years of pain to help us navigate our way through the sea of changing emotions. From flasks of pea-whack soup served from the boot of a car, to cups of tea in their homes, we were shown such warmth and respect that it was truly humbling. I took great strength from one client who, when I asked her how she kept going through all the lies being told about her brother, about him being a drunken hooligan who caused his own death, she simply smiled broadly and answered, “eyes and teeth, eyes and teeth”. I have repeated that mantra many times since that day.

During the inquest I was the mother to one young boy and pregnant with a second. I was representing the family of boys who were 15 and 19 when they died and I was incredibly moved by the loss of so many young boys’ lives. I couldn’t imagine them just not coming home one day. One client, on the morning of her young son’s inquest, presented me with a bag full of hand knitted baby clothes specially made for my son. It absolutely floored me that this woman could even think about anyone else in the circumstances, let alone extend such deep kindness. I have a drawer full of beautiful blankets and clothes, made by those strong women of Liverpool. Nothing could make me prouder.

When my youngest son finally made his first trip to Birchwood, he was passed from mother to mother, bounced on knees and fussed over as if he was one of their own. It only struck me later, like a tidal wave, that I had been swapping teething, sleeping and feeding stories about children who would never grow old.

There are many small moments that made the Hillsborough Inquests more than just an inquiry into the circumstances into how 96 people died that day. Moments that might have started in the court room but resonated far wider. The pen portraits that painted the real pictures of 96 cherished loved ones who attended a football match and never came home with humour and dignity. The vigorous handshake in the corridor between a father and the off-duty Metropolitan Police Officer who pulled his son from the pen, the damp-eyed slap on the back for the fellow fan that carried someone’s brother on a stretcher and wished he could have done more. The sympathetic words for colleagues who also lost loved ones during the months of the inquests. The jurors who when discharged when court concluded that final time, were each hugged by the families, each thanked for their commitment. The families in their grace never left anyone un-thanked. I hope that those witnesses, relieved of their burden after 27 years were the lighter for it.

Every day of the inquest we shared tea and tears with those who traveled to that grey box on a business park. On the some of the most difficult days of evidence, the families would always be able to find a joke, a smile and a hug for each other. Willing each other on. Someone was always in charge of making sure there was milk for tea and the biscuit tin was always full.

They are the best in all of us. It could have been any of us in their shoes whose brother, father, sister or son went to that match. They have defied the state’s attempt to define them by gender, geography, class or type. We can all aspire to their dignity and strength. It has been a privilege to walk with them on a small part of their journey.

No one can now deny the success and the power of the families’ campaign for justice all these years. They are the reason that 96 verdicts of ‘accidental death’ were quashed. It is their demands that ensured the truth has now been heard. We should never be in doubt that this is the reason why families should be at the heart of the inquest system.

Anna Morris, May 2016


NOTES/LINKS

Hillsborough Independent Report: http://hillsborough.independent.gov.uk (disclosed materials and report)

Inquest Charity: http://www.inquest.org.uk/

Michael Mansfield: “Hillsborough families were my rock ” (Liverpool Echo)

A full if harrowing account of the evidence, the inquest and the outcome reported in the Guardian here.

Why the police “apology” was neither sincere or believable explained by Mark George QC. 

Call for a rebalance of the justice system and equality of arms at Inquest hearings (reported here in the Guardian May 2016)

Another Hillsborough Lawyer, Elkan Abrahamson, interviewed here in the Liverpool Echo.

And don’t miss this survivor’s account by Adrian Tempany. Powerful and moving.

About the author

Anna Morris is a barrister at Garden Court chambers. Anna’s practice focuses on criminal justice and civil liberties and encompasses criminal defence and appellate advice, inquests into deaths in custody, civil actions against the police and public law. A human rights specialist, Anna has extensive experience of successfully representing clients whose cases challenge public policy and promote civil liberties. Read full profile on Chambers website here.

The Death of Imran Douglas:- A Suicide in Custody is no Cause for Celebration

In some parts of Morocco, after a funeral the family gather and share a meal of couscous, the legend being that each grain eaten atones for a sin during the life-time of the deceased. This week I joined a family for couscous (picture below) to mark the passing of 18 year old Imran Douglas who sadly killed himself in Belmarsh prison. Imran was British born, his maternal Grandmother from Morocco.
You might think that an awful lot of couscous would need to be eaten to atone for the sins of young Imran, who had brutally murdered a pensioner in her own home.
Imran, who had (unusually in a murder case) pleaded guilty for the crime committed when he was just 17, had been sentenced to a period longer than his age (a minimum term of 18 years), and sent to high security Belmarsh prison (until very recently he would have been detained in a Young Offenders Institution until he reached 21).
Less than a week later he was dead, having apparently ended his own life.
It will take years for an Inquest to establish if that is right, or whether there was foul play (or as previously seen at Belmarsh, excessive restraint)

Few will shed tears or care about his demise, the memory of his horrific crime being fresh in the mind, having been vividly reported at the time, again at his sentence, and now once again on the news of his own death (the circumstances of which appearing to attract little curiosity).
Indeed his passing appears to be celebrated by those who feel the need to express a view at all, commentary being summarised as “he got what he deserved, prison too good for him” etc.
Yet watching the small gathering of family and friends who cared for or about Imran, one is reminded that he leaves behind his own family, including mother, sister, grandparents, and although they never condoned or tried to justify his terrible homicide they too have the same grief and feel the same loss as anyone bereaved.
And perhaps our collective conscience should be pricked just sufficiently to remind ourselves that he was still a teenager,that he was in the institutionalised care of the State, and that by allowing him to hang himself he was failed by the State. As many have been before. (About 50 prisoners AGED 21 OR YOUNGER IN THE LAST SIX YEARS ALONE)
There will be many more deaths by suicide of vulnerable young people held in adult prisons, if proposals currently being consulted on by Government are implemented, as the Howard League argue powerfully here

At least Imran Douglas acknowledged his responsibility by pleading guilty to his crime. It is a safe bet that nobody will admit responsibility for his death, and very unlikely that anyone will be found responsible.
And the fact that nobody (other than his grieving relatives) care, allows this culpable negligence to continue year after year, which should be a matter of shame. How we treat prisoners is a mark of our society, as Winston Churchill amongst others acknowledged. So even those who won’t shed tears at the passing of a convicted murderer should still ask:-
Is it right that someone so young was serving his sentence in an adult prison?
Was he assessed as a suicide risk, and if not why not?
Alternatively, if an acknowledged risk, how was it apparently so easy for him to take his life?
Will the Inquest uncover any facts or (as Imran’s family hope) help prevent further suicides of young people? (There are reportedly eight outstanding inquests into deaths in Belmarsh

And in the unlikely event that anyone had the time or inclination to look at why this young man ended up committing his crime in the first place, they could start by looking at the incident in April 2012 ago where he was hit by a speeding car, and put into a coma on life-support with severe neurological damage. Although no angel before, this was a life-changing incident, and when he came through his demeanour and personality had changed beyond recognition.
Whether he then received the after care from occupational health and/or medical authorities is not clear, and may be out of the remit of the inquest into his death.
The car that hit him? That was a police vehicle. No charges brought in respect of that. But that incident isn’t something you will have read about in the media reports about his death, as it doesn’t sit comfortably with the simple “evil murderer” narrative that allows us to share a feeling of revulsion and moral superiority.
His family, at the wake in their small East London flat, know there was more to Imran than just the one awful crime for which he will be infamously remembered. And they have never stopped thinking about the consequences of that hideous crime, or feeling compassion and sympathy for the family of Margery Gilbey, along with guilt that it was Imran who was responsible.
Nothing in this article should be considered as trying to justify that crime, but it is important that we at least try and understand it. And we can and should as a society deplore that murder, but it is not necessary as a corollary of that to celebrate the death by self-harm of the murderer. A suicide of a young person should always be a cause for concern, not a cause for celebration.
Nothing can now bring back the victim of Imran Douglas’ crime, but at least justice was done when Imran pleaded guilty and was sentenced.
It is unlikely that there will be any justice for Imran’s family, who have lost their son and been treated with indifference or outright contempt. And to our shame, few will care.

NOTES

1 BELMARSH prison have confirmed that 18 year old Imran Douglas (detained at age 17) died in custody at the prison on 13 November 2013.
2 The cause of death is said to be suicide, although an inquest will take place to confirm the cause.
3 Police attended the prison and stated there were no suspicious circumstances.
4 Imran’s mother Carla heard the news informally via a third party the following day, but could not get official conformation of her son’s death for over 48 hours. She was in shock and taken to hospital, the prison initially refused to confirm where the body was taken.
5 Imran Douglas was buried following a service at East London mosque on 18 November. It was on the day of his funeral that the Daily Mail reported on his death and readers posted their gloating comments.
6 Imran’s family will be asking for help from Inquest, the charity providing free advice to bereaved people facing an inquest, with a focus on deaths in custody. They work for truth, justice and accountability for families and for policy change at the highest level.
7 This article/blog is written in a personal capacity, with the support of Imran’s mother Carla. 

Imran’s mother said “I am heartbroken. It was hard enough coming to terms with the fact that he had committed a serious crime, and had such a long sentence, but now he has gone for ever. How is it that the prison service can let this happen? “

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One of the more moronic comments following the Mail article was one that claimed “you can tell from his photo he was born evil”.
I disagree- in the charge photo, cloaked in a blue police custody blanket, he looks to me young and frightened.
He was not born evil- and his family will remember the happy times shared together, although they cannot forget his crime, or stop thinking about how desperate, sad guilty and frightened he must have been when he took his own life.
With permission of Carla, I include above a photo of Imran as they will try and remember him.
I hope their questions are eventually answered.