SIR Allan Walker QC, whose role as Sheriff Principal of Lanarkshire

from 1963 to 1974 included presiding over the fatal accident inquiry

following the Ibrox disaster in 1971, has died. He was 87.

Educated at Whitgift School, Croydon, and Edinburgh University, he

practised at the Scottish Bar from 1931 to 1939 when he became a

sheriff. He served in Selkirk, Peebles, and Dumbarton before being

appointed to Glasgow in 1950 where he became senior sheriff.

He was promoted to sheriff principal in Lanarkshire at a time when

sheriffs were almost invariably appointed from the practising senior Bar

in the Parliament House.

The confidence the legal profession placed in his judgment was

reflected in his large weekly roll of appeals from sheriffs in civil

cases, according to a legal source. It seldom resulted in any further

appeal to the Court of Session and few such appeals were successful.

Sir Allan's judgments were said to have illuminated many areas of law

and practice and formed what was described by the source as ''the most

outstanding series of sheriff court decisions to have been reported

since the regular reporting of such decisions in 1885.''

It was widely believed he declined promotion to the Bench of the High

Court and the Court of Session.

Sir Allan was the first chairman of the Sheriff Court Rules Council

from 1972-74 and was also a member of the Law Reform Committee for

Scotland from 1964-70. Glasgow University awarded him the honorary

degree of LLD in 1967.

Perhaps his most lasting memorial will be The Law of Evidence in

Scotland, a publication he wrote with the late Norman L. Walker, which

is often cited today with approval in the supreme courts and remains an

invaluable resource for modern practitioners and scholars.

Sir Allan is survived by his wife and a son.