Hillsborough disaster exonerating the Liverpool fans, MacKenzie issued the following statement: In response, Trevor Hicks, chairman of the Hillsborough Family Support Group, rejected MacKenzie's apology as "too little, too late", calling him "lowlife, clever lowlife, but lowlife". A press conference held by families of the victims also banned all "Sun" reporters from entering, with a sign on the door reading "NO ENTRY TO SUN JOURNALISTS". Sales of "The Sun" remain poor in Merseyside and a boycott is still practised. In 2004, its average circulation in Liverpool was 12,000 copies a day. Following the April 2016 verdict of unlawful killing, "The Sun" and
Hillsborough disaster to be at the game" and published a front-page headline "Police attack 'vile' fans" on 18 April 1989, in which police sources blamed the behaviour of a section of Liverpool fans for the disaster. In Liverpool local journalist John Williams of the "Liverpool Daily Post" wrote in an article titled "I Blame the Yobs" that "The gatecrashers wreaked their fatal havoc ... Their uncontrolled fanaticism and mass hysteria ... literally squeezed the life out of men, women and children ... yobbism at its most base ... Scouse killed Scouse for no better reason than 22 men were kicking a ball".