At 6ft 3in, Oliver Campbell cuts a striking and imposing figure when he walks into the room.
But within moments of meeting the softly-spoken man with an infectious laugh, the idea of him committing any crime, let alone murder, seems incomprehensible.
Mr Campbell, who suffered a severe brain injury as an eight-month-old baby, was just 19 when his ‘life stopped’ after he was unjustly sentenced to life in prison for the 1990 murder of shopkeeper Baldev Hoondle in Hackney, east London.
After being linked to the crime because his baseball hat was found near the scene, he was pressured into confessing to the fatal shooting after hours of intense questioning in the 11th of 14 police interviews.
His co-defendant Eric Samuels, who was found guilty of just the robbery, even told police that his accomplice was a man named ‘Harvey’ and that Mr Campbell was not involved, but his statements were deemed ‘hearsay’.
Now aged 54, Mr Campbell is a free man after appeal judges ruled his conviction was ‘unsafe’, putting to an end one of the longest miscarriages of justice in Britain – spanning 34 years.
‘It’s disgusting what certain people said and did in 1991, knowing they stitched up an innocent person,’ Mr Campbell tells after the Court of Appeal quashed his conviction earlier this month.
Filled with a mixture of anger and relief, he adds: ‘I walked into police custody innocent, I went through all of the police pressure innocent, and I came out innocent.
‘I knew from day one it wasn’t me. All this should have stopped in 1990. It should not have gone this far. I’ve lost faith in the whole criminal justice system.’
Mr Campbell says the verdict is ‘slowly sinking in’, adding: ‘Certain authorities might not like it, it’s egg on their face, but its not my problem. It’s the people that started this all off.
‘They are the ones that have the guilty conscience. My conscience has always been clear. I know I can go to bed smiling, it hasn’t ground me down, it’s made me stronger.’
But in an astonishing testament to his character, Mr Campbell says he will never truly feel ‘free’ until the murderer is found.
‘I’ll be free if certain people do their jobs right and go after the person who did this,’ he says as he sips a glass of apple juice. ‘At the end of the day, I still haven’t got justice. I’ve got justice in a little way, but the people that are going to be suffering are the family members and the friends of the shopkeeper who haven’t got justice.
‘We’re both victims of the system. Where’s the justice for the family? There’s still a big question mark – if it wasn’t Mr Campbell, who was this person?
‘They’ve got the DNA to go after the person, but they don’t. It’s on a national database. Who is going to give that order out?’
The Crown Prosecution Service, who opposed the bid, said they respected the decision to quash Mr Campbell’s conviction on September 11.
‘The Court of Appeal rejected 17 grounds of appeal and these convictions were only quashed on the basis of new evidence providing more information about Oliver Campbell’s mental state when he confessed to murder,’ a spokesperson said.
Mr Campbell, who grew up in a children’s home in Devon before moving to London and now Felixstowe, Suffolk, celebrated his victory with eight close friends at a Turkish restaurant where he enjoyed a meal with two fruity ciders.
His colleagues at the local cafe he has worked at for around 20 years gave him a round of applause when he returned to work, while a pub owner gifted him a bottle of champagne and random members of the public have come up to him to shake his hand.
Despite having the conviction being quashed, one of the grounds of appeal rejected was a claim of ‘serious allegations of manipulation, deliberate misleading bullying’ made against police officers.
Mr Campbell, who has a mental age of seven, an IQ of 73 and continues to struggle with memory, concentration and retaining information, is vulnerable to manipulation and highly suggestible.
He had the ‘extreme tendency to just, when in doubt, say ‘yes’.’ The judge said it was a ‘narrow but very important basis’, suggesting the conviction was quashed by a small margin.
Mr Campbell says although he is ‘very happy’ the judges overturned his conviction, he still has a lot of anger about the way he was treated.
‘The police put me under pressure, under duress, that’s how I felt,’ he says. ‘It was like speaking to a brick wall. If I turned to a brick wall, I would have got more sense out of it. It was a waste of time speaking to them.’
Mr Campbell had no solicitor present and there was no DNA linking him to the murder of Mr Hoondle, who was fatally shot during a botched robbery at his off-licence, G&H Stores, in Hackney, on July 22 1990.
Mr Hoondle was shutting his shop on Lower Clapton Road with his son and a shop assistant when two men tried to rob it. One of the men shot Mr Hoondle in the head and both fled the scene.
Mr Campbell could not remember where he was on the night many months before and had heard about the murder on Crimewatch.
Mr Hoondle’s son said the shooter was wearing a ‘British Knights’ baseball hat, which was found discarded in an alleyway near the shop. Police later traced the cap to Mr Campbell, who said the cap was stolen from him shortly after he purchased it.
DNA evidence proved hairs from the hat did not belong to Mr Campbell, who was living in Newham at the time.
There were other factors which seemingly proved he was not involved. The gunman was right-handed, while Mr Campbell is left. And a witness from outside the shop said the shooter was around 5ft 11ins, several inches shorter than Mr Campbell.
Mr Hoondle’s son was also unable to pick out Mr Campbell in an identity parade, despite claiming he had come ‘face to face’ with the gunman.
Mr Campbell, who recalls working in a Cash and Carry at the time, was taken to Plaistow police station and was processed in just 12 minutes, signing a custody record to confirm he did not want a solicitor or an appropriate adult.
Initially, he denied involvement but then admitted he had been the unarmed robber after an officer misleadingly suggested he had dropped his hat in the shop, the court heard.
Mr Campbell agreed to this and was then taken to Hackney police station where he was seen by a doctor who found him to be of limited intelligence.
He was then interviewed at length and one officer even created opportunities to talk to Campbell off the record, when no tape recording could be made.
One of the main symptoms of his brain damage is problems with memory and concentration, the court was told.
During another interview with the force, his solicitor left and the police station called his foster mother to act as an appropriate adult.
It was in that interview that he admitted to being the gunman, saying the gun had gone off accidentally.
Mr Campbell then claimed to have hired the gun, together with a number of bullets but could not remember where from, his barrister claimed.
He said he had practised with the gun and hidden it, but could not remember if he had done so in a field or a forest. He also initially said he fired the gun with his left hand and then changed to say he had done so with his right hand.
Mr Campbell explained when he was in the shop ‘I said: ‘Hand over the money’.’
Hardip, the son of Mr Hoondle, who was 22 at the time, never mentioned being asked for money to be handed over.
Mr Campbell also claimed he had the gun tied with string under his left arm as ‘that is the only way I thought it would be comfortable.’
He was asked which hand he had the gun and answered: ‘This hand,’ pointing to his right hand.
Campbell’s co-defendant at trial, Eric Samuels, who died in 2014, was cleared of murder but was jailed for five years after admitting robbery.
Barristers told the appeal hearing that Samuels had told his solicitor Campbell was not the gunman and there is ‘irrefutable’ evidence that he ‘told people over 10 years that Oliver was not with him in the robbery’.
But this was not disclosed to jurors at trial as it was deemed ‘inadmissible hearsay’, with Campbell’s learning difficulties meaning he was ‘simply unable to do justice to himself’ when giving evidence.
The court heard Samuels told a police officer, Detective Sergeant Cater, that it was a man named ‘Harvey’, not Mr Campbell, who was with him during the robbery.
Speaking about Samuel telling police he wasn’t involved, Mr Campbell says: ‘Everyone involved in this case, if in 1990 they knew about that why did they carry on and put pressure on?’
His close friend, Sarah, adds: ‘We were amazed when previous attempts to get Ollie’s case referred back to the Court of Appeal were unsuccessful.’
The Criminal Cases Review Commission (CCRC) previously referred Mr Campbell’s case to the Court of Appeal, arguing his conviction should be overturned.
He had lost his first appeal, had a second application turned down by the CCRC, but then persuaded it he had a good case.
Mr Campbell spent 11 years in prison, moving around ‘six or seven’ different jails where he ‘kept myself to myself’.
He adds: ‘It’s not me that put myself in prison, it’s the system. The people who worked on it bent over backwards to suit themselves.
‘I’ve lost 34 years. Nothing can bring that back. I could have had a relationship, I could have had kids, I could have been a granddad.’
Speaking about his time in prison, he says: ‘I did everything under protest, they did not like it. I didn’t like prison, but everything they asked I did under protest. I should be still in prison because I was saying I’m innocent, and the system does not like that.’
Mr Campbell was freed on licence in 2002, but had been living under restrictions including needing permission to get a job and was unable to travel abroad.
He now hopes to go on holiday and has vowed to randomly drop a pin on a map for the destination.
‘If it means I end up on the other side of the world, tough luck I’m going,’ he jokes.
He also hopes to go and see some of his family in America.
‘It felt like a weight being lifted off of my back after over 33 years fighting, fighting fighting, not giving up,’ he explained.
‘Loads of people have come up saying good luck for the future. It just keeps going and going.
‘I was at a pub out in the sticks and the landlord shook my hand and said ‘I heard what has happened to you and I want to buy you a drink on the house’. While we were sat down, he came along with a bottle of champagne.
‘I thought if he knows about it, who else knows about it? It’s opened people’s eyes.’
Mr Campbell is unsure whether he will ever receive compensation for the time he has lost.
‘Since legal aid has been cut, the goalposts have moved on everything,’ he says
‘Everything’s been changed over the years.
‘If I am going to be compensated, it should be from 1990. Tough luck about this 11 years [in prison], it has to from when the police knocked on my flat door in West Ham.
‘My life stopped in 1990. This all started when I was 19. I’m one of the longest miscarriages of justice.’
Our interview ends with Sarah, who sports a bright pink hair do, asking her good friend what he plans to do next.
Despite having been put through hell, Mr Campbell still has a wonderful sense of humour and replies: ‘Not having a hair colour like yours!’
Miscarriage of justice lawyer Glyn Maddocks KC, who has represented Mr Campbell for 25 years, told : ‘I’m very sad that it has taken so many years to clear Oliver’s name and persuade the Court of Appeal to quash this blatant and obvious wrongful conviction.
‘I guarantee that anyone who spent no more than 5 minutes in the company of Oliver who describes himself as the BFG (big friendly giant) would realise that he was simply incapable of doing what he was alleged to have done.
‘This is a shameful injustice on a massive scale and is compounded by the State’s failure now to compensate those it locks up often for many years for something he/she hasn’t done. We really could do so much better!’