An on-duty referee at the Hillsborough disaster has claimed that his statement was altered to allege that Liverpool FC fans were drunk.
Ray Lewis halted the game between the Anfield club and Nottingham Forest in April 1989 as 96 football supporters lost their lives on the Leppings Lane terrace.
A new documentary ‘Hillsborough: Smears, Survivors and the Search for Truth’ about the tragedy in Sheffield is set to be broadcast on ITV this evening.
In the programme, Mr Lewis tells presenter Peter Marshall that his eyewitness account was doctored to support police claims against Liverpool fans on the day.
The former official, now 72, said: “When I received the typed-up version it said these spectators were pissed, so they changed the word ‘mixed’ to ‘pissed’.
“The handwriting, I must admit from the police superintendent, isn’t particularly good.
“But I’m sure that anyone who would actually look at that would identify the word is definitely not ‘pissed’.
“I just feel it’s been placed in there to give support possibly to police actions.”
Earlier this year a Government inquest ruled that Liverpool fans were innocent of any wrongdoing and that those who died at Hillsborough were unlawfully killed.