One of WMP’s key tasks for the Taylor Inquiry was to provide some analysis and summary reports of the evidence that had been collected. In some cases, reports were produced in response to specific requests from the Taylor Inquiry team. In other instances, it appears WMP chose to produce summaries or reports on issues that senior officers viewed as relevant.
The largest of these reports was a document referred to by ACC Jones as “an interim report on the progress of our investigation.” Submitted to the Taylor Inquiry on 26 June, it was 148 pages long and appears to be a compilation of reports written by multiple different authors, some of which had already been submitted separately, such as the comparison of the Operational Orders.
The report was not made available to the HIP. The IOPC found a copy of it in some boxes of papers retrieved from the archives of the Government Legal Department in June 2015.
Towards the end of the report, there was a summary section which began by noting that, to date, because WMP had been “a supply on demand team for Lord Justice Taylor”, it had “made little progress in actual investigation work”. The report suggested: “The time is now approaching when we can assess the vast amount of written and visual evidence with a view to identifying major issues.” It then gave some examples of the issues that would be addressed, such as examining whether there was a link between supporters coming through Gate C, “the 'forcing' of the iron gates, the surges in Pens 3 and 4 clearly visible on video and related in numerous statements and the time the barrier broke.”
Strikingly, it also suggested: “Alcohol has featured to a large extent but there is no direct evidence of drunkenness to the degree of this factor alone being a primary cause. Nevertheless one third of [the] deceased were over the legal driving limit and a further third had traces of alcohol. Consideration is being given to a statistical analysis of this to the total amount of supporters on the terraces. Expert evidence is being sought because it is felt that the behaviour of the crowd was a factor and alcohol was a feature.”
The report did not state who felt that the behaviour of the crowd was a factor or that alcohol was a feature. Further, the observation about the number of those who died who were over the legal driving limit was neither accurate (the figure was far lower than a third) nor relevant in itself, or as the basis for extrapolating a figure for a crowd of over 10,000.
The IOPC has identified that, from even earlier in WMP’s evidence gathering for the Taylor Inquiry, ACC Jones wanted to bring the alleged behaviour of Liverpool supporters to the fore. In notes of a WMP management team meeting on 23 May, there was an action for ACC Jones “to write to Andrew Collins re his opening speech, include in the letter items such as: i) Alcohol ii) Fans without tickets.”
There is no record in the policy books of any letter to Mr Collins to that effect, but ACC Jones did send a letter dated 1 June to Mr Brummell, with information about ticket touts.
The WMP interim report picked up the issue of supporter behaviour, with the authors observing that “The video evidence for 1988 shows a totally different picture to 1989 in the crowd build up at, for example, 2.50pm. This needs to be explored and questions posed on the reasons why.” It included some possible reasons for this: all of these were related to the alleged presence of large numbers of supporters without tickets. However, it did not make any reference to the possibility that this different picture could have been linked to other factors, such as changes in police tactics or traffic delays en route, even though there was evidence available to WMP to suggest that either could have been relevant.
