A former inspector in the West Midlands police has denied accusations that he “put words in the mouth” of another officer, and pressured him to change his statement about a 15-year-old boy who was one of the 96 people killed at Hillsborough in 1989.

Matthew Sawers also denied he had the statement by the other officer, Derek Bruder, changed because it was “inconvenient” to the original coroner’s “cut-off period” for evidence to be heard of 3.15pm on the day of the disaster.

The fresh inquests into the 96 deaths were told that Sawers is the subject of a complaint to the Independent Police Complaints Commission by Bruder, then a Merseyside police constable, who alleges that Sawers made a “deliberate attempt” to get him to change his statement.

In his first statement, made on 27 April 1989, 12 days after the crushing disaster at the FA Cup semi-final between Liverpool and Nottingham Forest, Bruder said that Kevin Williams, 15, was still alive when he went to help him on the pitch at 3:32pm. Bruder said he saw Williams move twice, in “convulsions”, when he was lying on his own unattended, and that when he reached him, he found a pulse in his neck. Bruder also said that Williams vomited during the efforts, with a St John Ambulance volunteer, to revive him.



Giving evidence at the inquests in Warrington, Bruder emphatically maintained that he stands by that account and remains “absolutely 100% confident” that he did feel a pulse in Kevin’s neck when he first checked him, after climbing down from his seat in the north stand to help him.

Bruder said that he only made a second statement, in May 1990, after Sawers came to his house and stayed for six hours making a “deliberate attempt” to get him to change it, which included a phone call with a pathologist, Dr David Slater. In that second statement, which Bruder signed, he revised the first, saying he may have been mistaken about feeling a pulse, that Kevin’s convulsions were more like “a twitch” and that Kevin did not actually vomit.

Sawers also told Bruder that he was wrong to have said in his first statement that an ambulance came onto the pitch at 3:35pm while he was treating Kevin, which in fact was correct. Bruder told the inquests he believed Sawers was “less than honest” about the ambulance; Sawers said it was a genuine mistake which, the court was told, the original coroner had also made.

Bruder, who was not on duty at the match and was there supporting Liverpool, said Sawers had with him a sheet of A4 paper with two columns; the left-hand side listing key details of Bruder’s first statement, the right-hand column headed “Change to”. Sawers denied that, saying he did not go to Bruder’s house with any notes but may have made notes during the meeting.

Bruder said he was not intimidated by Sawers because he was a self-confident police officer, but that after about four hours of “debate” Sawers made a phone call and put him on to Slater, a pathologist advising the original coroner, Dr Stefan Popper. Bruder said Slater told him that given the medical circumstances and evidence of other witnesses, it was “highly unlikely” he felt a pulse, saw convulsions or that Kevin vomited.

Asked by Christina Lambert QC, for the coroner at the new inquests, Sir John Goldring, whether he felt under pressure to change his statement after his conversation with Slater, Bruder said: “I felt under pressure to concede to his medical superiority, if you like.”

In a statement which Bruder sent recently, supporting his complaint to the IPCC, the court was told he wrote: “I felt strongly that Detective Inspector Sawers and Dr Slater had made a conscious and determined effort to put words into my mouth.”

Asked if he stood by his complaint, Bruder said he did. He said of Sawers: “I don’t think he was honest in his portrayal of events when he came to see me.”

Sawers, giving evidence himself, denied that, saying he was asked by Popper to see Bruder, to check his evidence with him, and that Bruder reconsidered his first statement due to their conversation and further first aid training he had done since the disaster. Sawers said Bruder had already completed the second statement before he telephoned Slater, and that Slater had “reassured” Bruder that the medical details were right.

Pete Weatherby QC, representing Kevin Williams’ family – Kevin’s mother, Anne Williams, died in 2013 after a long campaign for a new inquest – put to Sawers that he had gone to Bruder’s house with the intention of getting him to change his statement. That, Weatherby said, was because Bruder’s evidence of Kevin having “vital signs” at 3:32pm, were “inconvenient” for the 3:15pm “cut-off point” imposed by Popper.

“Isn’t it the case that you made a determined effort to change Mr Bruder’s account of vital signs after 3:30pm that he saw in Kevin?” Weatherby asked Sawers.

“No, that’s not the case,” Sawers replied. “Everything I did in my encounter with PC Bruder was done with integrity and the best of intentions.”

John Towler, the St John Ambulance volunteer who worked with Bruder to try to revive Kevin, said in his original statement that he checked for a pulse and did not find one. Asked if he could have been mistaken, Towler said he was trained to check for a pulse continually during resuscitation efforts, and believed he would have done so, and that he would not have continued with chest compressions had Kevin had a pulse.

Finally, Towler said, after he and Bruder had worked to revive Kevin Williams, a woman came up who said she was a doctor. She took over from Bruder, but after about five minutes, stood up and said Kevin was dead. Towler said he left Kevin to be taken away in an ambulance, but in fact, the court heard, he never was put in an ambulance and instead was taken to the gymnasium at Hillsborough.

The inquests continue.