The deaths of 96 football fans in Britain's worst sporting disaster could be reinvestigated after the country's chief prosecutor launched a formal application to quash their inquests' verdicts.
The Liverpool supporters died in a crush in an enclosed, overcrowded terrace at the Hillsborough stadium in Sheffield in 1989 during an FA Cup semi-final against Nottingham Forest.
The Attorney General applied to the High Court to overturn the "accidental death" verdicts reached at the original inquests into the Hillsborough stadium tragedy.
An independent inquiry concluded in September that police tried to deflect the blame onto fans to cover up their own incompetence and suggested that 41 lives could have been saved if the emergency response had been quicker.
The families of the victims have campaigned for more than 20 years to overturn official accounts that smeared fans, blaming them for being drunk, ticketless and intent on forcing their way into the packed ground.
The main basis for the move is new medical evidence.
