27-04-2016, 17:49
(27-04-2016, 14:33)peiowl Wrote:(26-04-2016, 21:42)St Charles Owl Wrote:(26-04-2016, 17:10)madsteve Wrote: 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.
(26-04-2016, 20:50)peiowl Wrote: 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!!
SCO: see Owlskev's post Q8-11. It sounds to me that the jury does place part of the blame on SWFC, its physical plant and conduct. Would that hold up i a court of law? I don't know but the burden of proof in civil cases is not as high as in crown prosecutions. A class action suit by the parents and/or family members of the deceased seems more than likely to me.
I read yesterday that our situation in this verdict was no different to the previous inquests in terms of what our responsibility and role in this was. The safety certificate issue and layout of the turnstiles etc hasn't changed. This inquest didn't change anything as regards us from what I can see. On top of that we made a compensation payment to the families years ago so will that be classed as sufficient??
From what I can tell they key points from this inquest was the time of death for each individual was changed, Duckenfield was found guilty of unlawful deaths and the fans were completely exonerated. Going forward I can only see lawsuits arising out of this against someone, question is who they now go after, if it is us then I am sure we have insurance to cover the cost but this could well go on for some time yet.