Tell that to Humberside Police who apparently cannot investigate muggings, burglaries and other things because of shortage of staff but can send officers all over the country observing City fans and spend months tracking down someone who set a flare off, something which didn't bother the local police, and have dozens lounging around st the KC, with mobile cells (have they ever been used?) parked outside. Of course there is little need for them, they use City as a cash cow. Needless to say the very few occasions they were needed they made a lash of things, not arresting any of the away fans causing trouble but nicking City fans doing very little to show they "were doing something".
Had checkpoints down the roads leading up the stadium, where they can check tickets and then only let 100 fans through at a time when the turnstiles were free. As they had done at every single other semi final held at Hillsborough. People wont get crushed at a checkpoint on a road 300 metres from the ground.
Irrespective of your petty politics, I think we might agree that it's intolerable and it's acceptance should be criticised.
Had the people responsible known the layout of the ground they wouldn't have even needed to do that. Fans naturally went to those two pens after entering through the turnstiles as the tunnel to them was immediately opposite the fans coming in. For this reason it was possible to close those pens off when they were full so that fans had to go to the other pens. Had this been done before the opening of the exit gate, instead of the sudden influx of fans being channelled into an already full area they would have been channelled into the other sections of the stand.
There still might have been crushing at the turnstiles though. By having the checkpoints down the road the whole situation wouldve been avoided. This isnt hindsight, Mole had always done this.
All true. But the question was about the crush *outside* the turnstiles, which precipitated the opening of Gate C. That would have been avoided using the crowd control plans that, as BCC has said, had been deployed numerous times for previous fixtures. Duckenfield didn't put these controls in place, he probably didn't even know they existed as a possibility. He was parachuted into the match commander role only 3 weeks before the fixture.
The 3 weeks isnt an excuse. In one meeting with Mole he couldve learned everything he needed to know.
As much as the conduct of the police ****ed it up and was then totally inappropriate throughout the cover up, they're not even as bad as the journalists. When you know that as it was happening Duckenfield said to one of his superiors that it was fans misbehaving you can see how (not condone) it escalated, with people ****ting themselves about the cock up and trying to cover their own arses and it snowballing into this. Police officers have got an "oh ****, what am I going to do, if this comes out I'm ****ed, my family is ****ed, I'm just going to have to run with this and make it stick" self preservation thing they can use to convince themselves it's necessary to be scum on this one. What's the process for the journalists involved to try to justify their actions to themselves though? There was no negative to them in reporting the actual truth that was apparent to everybody else.
do you think it's the journalists setting the agenda in the newsrooms, deciding on the headlines? More likely the editors and paper owners (establishment). Imagine the individual journalists were as frustrated by their bosses as the coppers on the pitch trying to do cpr on dying fans.
Ok, sub the word media in for journalists. The people making those decisions whoever they were weren't going to lose out from the truth.
Hillsborough families to sue police for 'abuse on industrial scale' http://www.theguardian.com/football...or-abuse-on-industrial-scale?CMP=share_btn_tw
Did you see Mackenzie on the TV the other night? He's still saying he was duped into printing the lies because he believed what the police were telling him (or what an agency had got from the police).
No I didn't. I introduced the opinion that the rejection and condemnation of police abuse was not, as other posters had claimed, the preserve of "lefty liberals". Anyone with any understanding or concern for social justice would be likely to reject and condemn it. I also suggested that to accept police abuses against innocent civilians was indicative of a degree of acceptance of fascistic ideology. An ideology which, as your unnecessary example illustrated, can rear it's ugly head anywhere people are not on guard against it. Hence my particular and unapologetic challenging of it. If you are offended by your perception of implied criticism of fascism in my post... **** you!
We talk about lessons been learnt but I had a thought back to our night match approx 2005/6 when we won 4-2 and took around 8000 fans. We turned up to the leppings lane end to see massive queues ,not enough turnstyles open and late entry to Hillsbourough. . A steward said to me " we was not expecting so many to come" Why wernt they. We where near the top and only 60 miles away. Did they open any more turnstyles? No. Because they had no more staff. This was at the ground where 96 died 16 years before and still the locals be it SWFC or SYP had not done their planning properly. How after time can things slip back to how they where.
Interesting piece in the Guardian about how things don't change. http://www.theguardian.com/commenti...-police-views-liverpool-fans?CMP=share_btn_tw
They would have lost out from being matey with the police, government etc - the media relies on a certain amount of co-operation from the establishment to get their stories, even more so 30 years ago before the days of the internet and citizen reporters.
