When the family of Derek Bentley – hanged in 1953 for the murder of a policeman – attempted to obtain a posthumous pardon for his wrongful execution, they approached a local south London solicitor, Benedict Birnberg, for help.
It was the beginning of a more than 30-year-long, ultimately successful, legal campaign that helped pave the way for the abolition of the death penalty in Britain in 1969, and raised profound questions about miscarriages of justice.
Continue reading…This post was originally published on Human rights | The Guardian.