[St Charles Owl]

The primary cause for the loss of lives was the culture in football at the time.

I attended over 70 different grounds in the 70s & 80s and was regularly placed in similar situations at the majority of grounds where a poor policing decision, lots of fans arriving at once or a few drunken idiots could have caused a crush situation. It was just a question of when & where it happened because it was inevitable. Sadly, it happened on our patch.

Hopefully, this gives solace to everyone & they move on rather than pursuing financial gain from the various parties. I know from personal experience that little is gained from these actions.

I think any fan who regularly went to football games in those times, who stood on the vast terraces or were herded like cattle as away supporters would have found themselves in similar, albeit thankfully less fatal situations.  Unfortunately due to the cover up by the Government, Police and media and the stories of drunkeness and ticketless fans being the  sole cause in their spin from the beginning meant that the fans and culture in football at the time were never going to be apportioned any blame.  

The design of that terrace with the fences and the pens was totally as a result of fan behavior and the police desire to put segregation and containment of fans above their safety, and marauding fans running across terraces like was seen at Heysel was a major factor in the pens being erected to control fans.  

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does/did the club carry insurance to protect itself from liability? In the case of negligence though, any such policy may be invalidated.

Have the club beeen found criminally negligent or has that indictment just been placed at the feet of SYP??  I am sure the club has liability insurance but would it be the insurance from 1989 that would be used as we are now a wholly different company to what we were then.  I am sure that MM and DC both looked into the likely fallout from a verdict like this when they bought the club, you would be a very poor businessman if you didn't and neither of those guys strike me as being bad at their jobs!!