SIXTEEN years ago this week, Stephen Downing was released from prison having served 27 years of an indefinite sentence for killing Wendy Sewell, in the town of Bakewell in the Peak District.

A year later his murder conviction was quashed, bringing to an end what is thought to be the longest miscarriage of justice in legal history.

And the man who fought for Mr Downing’s name was from Bury.

Don Hale was born in Prestwich and grew up in Whitefield, playing for Bury FC before going into journalism.

After a stint as editor of the Bury Messenger, Mr Hale transferred to the Matlock Mercury in Derbyshire, where he led the campaign to have Mr Downing’s conviction overturned.

Mrs Sewell was found badly beaten but still alive in a Bakewell graveyard by Mr Downing, a council gardener.

He was arrested and questioned without a solicitor for several hours but, aged 17 and with a reading age of 11, officers pressured him into signing a confession to the attack, filled with words he did not understand.

When Mrs Sewell died two days later, the charge was upgraded to murder.

Mr Downing immediately retracted his confession but was found guilty at a trial at Nottingham Crown Court.

After their son had spent two decades in prison, Mr Downing’s parents approached Mr Hale for help.

He faced obstacles at every turn, with police telling him all the evidence had been “burnt, lost and destroyed”.

He also received anonymous death threats and what he claims was police harassment.

But for Mr Hale, all of this simply confirmed he was onto something. “If Downing had done it, why would they have been worried about me finding more out,” he said.

After tireless investigative work by Mr Hale, Mr Downing’s case was one of the first to be looked at by the Criminal Case Review Commission (CCRC).

The CCRC recommended his conviction should be overturned on the basis that the circumstances in which he gave his confession made it unreliable evidence that should not have gone before a jury.

The conviction was quashed in 2001 with Mr Downing finally walking free in January 2002, receiving £900,000 in compensation.

Mr Hale was pleased but also disappointed, because Mr Downing had got off on a technicality.

“We got the result we wanted, but when you have put so much work into something, you want to see it heard by everybody,” he said.

In order to tell the full story, Mr Hale wrote Town Without Pity, a bestseller which was turned into BBC drama.

Police reopened their investigation, interviewing thousands of witnesses, at an estimated cost of £500,000, but failed to identify any alternative.

Mr Hale also famously helped overturn the convictions of Barry George for the murder of Jill Dando and former policeman Graham Huckerby for being an inside man on an armed robbery.

And he controversially helped footballer Ched Evans clear his name in a retrial after an initial rape conviction.

Mr Hale, aged 64, now lives in North Wales.