Career
He is most noted for his involvement with the Beatles" early career and subsequently high-profile cases such as the Hillsborough and Heysel Stadium disasters, the Walton sextuplets and the re-opening of the Cameo Murders case. A freeman of the City of Liverpool, he has also supported the arts and holds an honorary professorship at Liverpool John Moores University. He also writes a weekly column in the Liverpool Echo.
Born in 1925, Makin is the only child of Joe and May Makin.
His family moved to Liverpool in the 1850s and his great-great grandfather set up shop as a seamens" outfitter in Old Hall Street. His father was brought up on Park Lane in the Chinatown area of Liverpool, where he made and supplied trunks to seamen.
Makin studied law at the University of Liverpool, gaining his Bachelor of Laws in 1945 and Master of Laws in 1947. Makin was the family solicitor to Brian Epstein, who in 1963 sought his advice on setting up a perpetually binding contract between himself and the Beatles.
However, Makin advised Epstein that such an agreement would be legally indefensible.
He has been credited with inventing the term "Beatlemania". Following Epstein"s death in 1967, Makin arranged his funeral.
