Liverpool fan Michael Shields is languishing in a Bulgarian prison for an attempted murder last summer - a crime he says he did not commit. His sister, Melissa, is at the forefront of the campaign for his release.
It was a homecoming that any sister couldn’t even have dreamed of looking forward to. Having watched Liverpool FC come back from three nil down at half time to beat AC Milan on penalties in a pulsating European Cup final, Melissa Shields and her family could hardly contain their excitement whilst awaiting the homecoming of her brother, Michael, who had been lucky enough to travel to Istanbul to witness one of the greatest footballing performances of all time.
Michael, a 19-year-old student, had crossed the Turkish border to Bulgaria after the historic match for a celebratory holiday at the Crystal hotel in the Golden Sands resort of Varna with friends. The day after the match he rang home to say that he had seen the victorious Liverpool team returning to a hero's welcome on Merseyside via Bulgarian television.
“He said he had the best time of his life and couldn’t wait to come home,” Melissa said. “He had a cover from his seat in the stadium to bring home for my dad as a souvenir.”
But little did Melissa know that a brutal attack on a local Bulgarian barman just minutes from Michael’s hotel would deny her brother's return home for up to another 10 years. At 5:30am, whilst Michael (backed up by several alibi’s) said he was tucked up in bed, barman Martin Georgiev was being violently kicked and punhced to the ground just outside Varna’s Big Ben fast food café. One of the attackers, said to be of British origin, dumped a large slab of rock directly on Mr Georgiev’s head, splitting it open. Only immediate surgery saved the victim’s life.
Later that morning, 30th May, while many Liverpool fans were waking up with sore heads after Bank Holiday celebrations, the Shields family received a worrying phonecall from one of Michael's friends which any sister, mother or father dreads. Michael had been arrested in connection with the incident and taken to a local police station.
Initially Melissa and her family weren’t too concerned as the friend assured them that there had been a mistake because Michael was fast asleep at the time of the attack. Witnesses to the assault said the main assailent was a “big fella” with dark hair. Michael had blond hair.
But within two months, the Wavertree student had been charged, convicted and sentenced to fifteen years in a Bulgarian prison, more than 15,000 miles from home. This was despite a written confession given by Graham Sankey, a 20-year-old electrician from Liverpool, who returned to the UK after being questioned, being rejected as evidence by the court.
“We were totally shocked,” Melissa, 27-years-old, said. “We couldn’t believe it.
Everyone was really really upset and we’re still really angry. Just everything about the case shocked me.”
Two months ago, Michael was refused a retrial for the second time in a year. Although his sentence was reduced to ten years, the initial fine imposed by the court was increased to £71,000. Millessa’s only hope now is to try and persuade the Bulgarian authorities to extradite her brother back to the UK.
“We’re trying to get Michael back to prison in England,” Melissa, who is a beautician, said. “We’ve got a Human Rights lawyer who’s taking his case to the Supreme Court in Strasburg. We’ll hopefully get the Bulgarian authorities to overturn the decision and hope that all the truth gets out.”
Such is the injustice felt towards Michael’s case, that over 26,000 people have signed a petition to free him and many others have lent their support in other ways. A Google search for “Free Michael Shields” yields almost 30,000 results. Supporters include Michael’s MP, Louise Ellman (Lab, Liverpool Riverside), the Bishop of Liverpool and actor Ricky Tomlinson. Even a leading Bulgarian newspaper, The Sofia Echo, is sympathetic to Michael’s case.
Prime Minister Tony Blair has also sensationally backed the campaign to free Michael and said that his conviction was unsafe. He said the government would be taking very close interest in the case and would support the Shields family in “whatever way we can”. Although the family is happy that Mr. Blair is behind the campaign, the news will come as little comfort to Melissa, who is angry with the lack of assistance provided to Michael by the Foreign Office.
“We aren’t happy with what the Foreign Office has promised us. Their promises are empty. But we have still got to stick with the Foreign Office to try and get Michael out.”
Support for the teenager’s case grew significantly after a documentary aired by the Tonight programme for ITV in April concluded that Michael’s jailing was a “mockery of justice”. The former head of Nottinghamshire Police's Serious Crime Squad, Peter Coles, who led more than 100 murder investigations, investigated the case for the programme and claimed that the Bulgarian police made a series of errors over his arrest. Mr. Coles dismissed the evidence as "not worth the paper it's written on".
On the morning of Micheal’s arrest, police initially detained three men at 8am, including Graham Sankey, who was to dramatically confess to the crime after returning to Britian. The Police came to the hotel to question another of Sankey’s friends, Anthony Wilson, who was staying in the room nextdoor to Michael’s. But when Wilson was missing from his room, they arrested Michael, even though he had no connection whatsoever with Shankey’s group.
Bizzarly, the officers ordered him to put a white T Shirt on before taking him away. Eye witnesses to the attack identified the assailent as wearing white. The police first drove Michael to Big Ben’s café, the scene of the attack, in a marked police car. One of the arresting officers got out to speak to a group of witnesses, with Michael in full view of all of them, cringing with fear in the back of the car.
On arrival at the station, the teenager from Wavertree was handcuffed to a radiator for a whole night in the central lobby, in full public view. The other suspects initially arrested, including Sankey, were kept in separate cells.
Next came the identity parade, consisting of Michael wearing the white T-shirt (despite sound evidence that he had been wearing beige on the night of the attack) and four other Bulgarian men in jumpers, despite onlookers being convinced that it was a British man who carried out the attack. He was identified by several witnesses, who were reportedly placed in a room and allowed to confer. But the witnesses, including the victim himself, were inconsistent over whether Michael was the first assailant or the second.
The trial itself was also completely flawed, found Mr. Coles. Firstly, Michael was convicted without a shred of forensic evidence linking him to the violent crime. He was found guilty purely on the strength of eyewitness identification. The Bulgarian authorities dismissed the statements given by Michael’s roommates, who had placed him in bed at the time of the attack.
A further twist was the refusal of the Varna Regional Court to accept the written confession of Sankey as evidence. In a statement made through his solicitor, the electrician, who is now thought to be suffering from a nervous breakdown, said “an innocent man has received blame for what I did. I accept that I must have caused the serious injury to Mr Georgiev. My conscience has been tormenting me ever since.”
Sankey said that on the night of the attack he had been drinking larger most of the day and had polished off a full bottle of vodka. He described himself as being “very, very drunk.” The 20-year-old got involved in a disturbance after a bottle smashed into a wall behind his head. “I panicked and stupidly picked up a brick and threw it in the direction of the men running towards me,” he said. “I saw the brick hit one of them. I panicked and I turned and ran away and returned to the hotel.”
After the confession made through his solicitor, Mr David Kirwan, was refused by the court, Sankey made a signed confession saying that he was “horrified” that the court did not accept his admission.
Despite recently backtracking on his original statement, saying that he was referring to a different brawl, Sankey has never been questioned over any of his admissions. Because he case is under Bulgarian jurisdiction, only they can request that Mersyside Police quiz him over the attack on Mr Georgeiv.
Speaking about Michael Shields’ case in a House of Commons adjournment debate last November, Louise Ellman MP said the fact that Sankey had not been questioned over his statements raised “major questions”.
“The Bulgarian Ministry of Justice issued a summons for Graham Sankey and four others to attend court before the confession was made,” she said. “So before the confession was made the Bulgarians did want Graham Sankey to come to court for questioning. After the confession was made, they did not want to talk to him, nor did they want anyone else to do so.”
The most shocking thing about the Tonight programme, from Melissa’s point of view, was the claim that Michael’s photograph had been released by local police and shown breifly on national television to allow witnesses to come forward.
“I saw that for the first time on the TV documentary,” she said. “I didn’t know about that before. That made me even more angry.”
As for Bulgaria’s ongoing attempt to be accepted into the European Union, Melissa is not happy that they have met sufficient standards on justice. A decision is to be taken by January 1 next year on whether Bulgaria is ready to join the EU but it is thought that Britain will seek to block moves to allow them to join until Michael is brought to justice.
“I don’t think its right for them to be accepted into the EU,” Melissa said. “They’ve had a chance to sort out their justice system but they just haven’t done that.”
Earlier this year, Melissa traveled across Europe to see Michael in prison and said how difficult conditions were for him. “He seems to be getting treated like everyone else in the prison. But he shares a cell with four Bulgarian men. He doesn’t get to hear English so it’s quite hard for him in jail. Their standard of living is completely different to ours.”
In May, the Bishop of Liverpool, The Right Reverend James Jones, was granted permission to visit Michael in his jail cell to say prayers with him after previous requests had been denied. He looked Michael in the eye and asked him if he had done it. “He said to me gently and firmly ‘No, I didn't’,” Rt Rev Jones told the Liverpool Echo.
Despite the huge and public support for Michael, not everyone believes he is innocent. The Michael Shields Campaign Office, which is staffed on a voluntary basis by friends and family of the Wavertree teenagers, and where Melissa spends a lot of her free time, occasionally gets hate mail from people who think he is as guilty as sin.
One received by the Campaign in April read: “Have you even bothered to look at ALL the evidence? It is so glaringly obvious that he did it its untrue. Just let him serve his rightful punishment for the disgusting act he committed.” Another sent by “Sam” from Bury said: “I hope that guilty c**t is enjoying his ring of fire. Fry Michael Shields.” A Manchester City fan called ‘Tamsen’ simply wrote, “Die u murdering bastard.” But the e-mails are few and far between.
A petition submitted in February by a Liverpool fan on the internet, which is ridden with spelling mistakes, claims that “there is a large proportion of people living in Merseyside who believe that Michael Shields, DID actually commit the crime he has been imprisoned for.” It states that the undersigned would not want Shields walking the streets of Liverpool nor continue blackening the name of Liverpool FC. Yet the petition has but one signature.
In fact, Liverpool FC seemed to have been very supportive. At the beginning of last season, fans held up a large mosaic on the Kop, which read, “Free Michael”.
“The players have been fantastic in supporting Michael,” Melissa said. “Jaime Carragher comes to visit us regularly at the office and is there for us. But the club can’t really commit because it wasn’t a football incident.”
