sports // no. 8 theotherpress.ca

The 1989 Hillsborough Disaste

» Paul Chapman of 'The Province’ shares a very personal story

Brandon Yip
Senior Columnist

 

ver three decades have passed since the

Hillsborough Disaster, where 96 Liverpool fans died
during an FA Cup semi-final match. It has been a very
painful period for the victims’ families. They have been
ona mission fighting for justice for their loved ones.

The families have endured years of delays due to
police cover ups and erroneous false stories circulated in
the media damaging the reputation of their loved ones.
The main culprit was The Sun newspaper, which has
been boycotted by Liverpool fans (to spell out its name
is sacrilege to them). Also, the families protested an
inquiry’s conclusion that “accidental death” was the cause
of all 96 deaths at Hillsborough. The ruling was later
overturned by a coroner's findings in December 2012.

In April 2016, a second inquest led toa jury ruling
that the 96 people were “unlawfully killed.” However,
another setback occurred in 2019, when David
Duckenfield was found not guilty of the gross negligence
manslaughter of 95 Liverpool fans. He was the former
South Yorkshire Police chief superintendent and the
then match commander at Hillsborough.

Paul Chapman, Deputy Editor for The Province,
remembered what he was doing the day of the
Liverpool and Nottingham Forest match. “Well, [I
was] up early waiting for the score on the game to be
released on CBC radio,” Chapman said in an email
interview with the Other Press. “There were no all
sports channels, no internet. The game was supposed
to kick off at 7 am our time, and when I heard the
bulletin that the game was being abandoned 15 minutes
in. What followed was a flurry of phone calls from our
kitchen to the United Kingdom.”

Chapman also has a very personal connection to
Hillsborough. “The next day we got word that my dad’s
cousin, Ray Chapman, was amongst the dead,” Chapman
said. “While the whole city was in disbelief at what
happened, the days, weeks, months, and years that
followed did nothing but pour salt in the wound. The
characterization that Liverpool fans were at fault played
toa painful stereotype about the city.’

In April 2009, the Liverpool Echo profiled Ray
Chapman as part of a larger project to honour the 96
victims who died at Hillsborough. The Echo wrote,

“Ray Chapman shouldn't have been at Hillsborough. The
50-year-old dad-of-two did not have enough vouchers to
qualify for a ticket, but at the last minute a friend in his
Prenton local gave him his because he couldn't travel.’

Ray was from Prenton and worked at the Champion
Spark Plugs factory in Birkenhead. He had been looking
forward to retirement with his wife, Joan, who told the
same publication, “I went with him into Liverpool to
get the ticket. Before he set off on the day, we arranged
to meet at the Halfway House for a drink that evening