There are a couple of high profile criminal cases being heard at the moment and so it is with measured caution that I write these notes. I really truly do not want to stray into the details of the cases themselves, both of which are likely to take weeks to conclude but there is one aspect of each of them that I suggest makes detached comment legitimate.

The first concerns the accusation against former police commander David Duckenfield on a single charge for the manslaughter by gross negligence in which 95 people died in the Hillsborough disaster way back in 1989 and Graham Mackrell, a former chairman of Sheffield Wednesday FC who is accused of health and safety failings and issues concerning the stadium safety certificate.

A touch more recently, there is also the trial of Andrew Hill, the pilot whose plane crashed on the A27 near Shoreham in Sussex in 1995 killing 11 men and who is also accused of manslaughter by gross negligence.

The Hillsborough tragedy took place 30 years ago - David Duckenfield is now 74 - and the Shoreham air disaster happened getting on for four years ago.  Now I know that legal processes take time and setting aside any personal opinion about the accused in both cases, it does seem an inordinately long time for all of those involved, both the victims, the bereaved and the accused, to have to wait for these events to be drawn to a close, at least in legal terms.

There`s an old saying about justice delayed being justice denied - denied  to\ the victims, the bereaved and to the accused of course..