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Stephen Lawrence

Encyclopedia : S : ST : STE : Stephen Lawrence

For the Zimbabwe-born Australian rules footballer, see Stephen Lawrence (footballer). Not to be confused with the former Brisbane Lions and St Kilda footballer Steven Lawrence.
For the UK scientist, see Stephen Lawrence (scientist).
Stephen Lawrence (September 14, 1974 – April 22, 1993) was a black British teenager living in London, UK, who was murdered in April 1993 at the age of 18.

While waiting at a bus stop with his friend Duwayne Brooks, he was attacked by a group of young white males and stabbed to death. Such attacks had happened previously, but this time widespread publicity attracted national attention that threatened civil disturbances and severely damaged relations between the Afro-Caribbean community, police and justice system.

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Murder, trials and aftermath

Born in Britain in 1974 to Jamaican parents, Neville and Doreen, Stephen Lawrence was a promising student who hoped to become an architect. At the time of his death he was a high-school senior with a history of meritous scholastic accomplishments.

He was attacked April 22, 1993 in Eltham, an area of southeast London. During the attack, one of the assailants yelled a racial slur and Lawrence was stabbed in the chest and shoulder. He suffered two deep wounds that cut major arteries, severed a vein and penetrated a lung. Although he tried to escape, he collapsed after running 130 yards and bled to death soon after.

As of June 2006, no one has been convicted of Lawrence's murder. The Crown Prosecution Service brought a case against two suspects but dropped it on July 29, 1993 after deciding that there was insufficient evidence. Stephen's family in April 1996 initiated a private prosecution against those two and three other suspects. Charges against the original two suspects were dropped before the trial and the others were acquitted at trial when the judge disallowed eyewitness testimony of Duwayne Brooks.

In February 1997 the Daily Mail newspaper labelled all five suspects "murderers", challenging them to sue the newspaper for libel. To date, they have not done so, but have used appearances in the media to protest their innocence. The Attorney General later cleared the Daily Mail of contempt of court. In 1999, all five defendants were prohibited from attending home football games in their community.

The case spurred changes in British law that would allow future cases to be brought back to court, even after an acquittal. The Parliament of the United Kingdom in the Criminal Justice Bill of 2003, introduced by Home Secretary David Blunkett, abolished a previously strict prohibition against double jeopardy. Retrials are now allowed if there is 'new and compelling evidence'.

Lawrence remembered

An annual architectural prize, the Stephen Lawrence Prize, has been established by the Royal Institute of British Architects in Stephen Lawrence's memory.

His mother, Doreen Lawrence, said, "I would like Stephen to be remembered as a young man who had a future. He was well loved, and had he been given the chance to survive maybe he would have been the one to bridge the gap between black and white because he didn't distinguish between black or white. He saw people as people."

Public inquiries into the police investigation

In 1997, Lawrence's surviving family registered a formal complaint with the Police Complaints Authority, which in 1999 exhonerated officers who worked the case of allegations of racism. Only one officer, Senior Detective Inspector Ben Bullock, was ordered to face disciplinary charges for neglect of duty. Bullock, who was second in command of the investigation, was later found guilty of failure to properly brief officers and failure to fully investigate an anonymous letter sent to police, but acquitted of 11 other charges. Four other officers who would have been charged as a result of inquiry retired before it concluded.

Bullock retired the day after his punishment was announced, which amounted to a caution. Neville Lawrence, father of Stephen Lawrence, criticized the punishment saying Bullock was "guilty on all counts" but a spokesperson for the Metropolitan Police Federation said Bullock was "largely vindicated" in the proceedings.

That same year, while the PCA inquiry was ongoing, Home Secretary Jack Straw ordered a public inquiry. During the inquiry, Detective Superintendent Brian Weeden said mistakes had made during the murder investigation. Results of that inquiry became known as the Macphereson Report, or the Stephen Lawrence Report

Conducted by Sir William Macpherson, the inquiry found that the Metropolitan Police Service investigation had been incompetent, charging that officers had committed fundamental errors including failing to give first aid when they reached the scene, failing to follow obvious leads during their investigation and failing to arrest suspects. He found that there had been a failure of leadership by senior MPS officers and that recomendations of the 1981 Scarman Report, compiled following race-related riots in Brixton and Toxteth, had been ignored.

Macpherson found that the police were institutionally racist, and made a total of 70 recommendations for reform in his report dated February 24, 1999. His proposals included abolishing the double jeopardy rule and criminalising racist statements made in private. Macpherson also called for reform in the British Civil Service, local government, the British National Health Service, Schools and the judicial system to address issues of institutional racism.

On 10 March 2006 the Metropolitan Police Service announced that it would pay Duwayne Brooks £100,000 as compensation for the way police handled his complaints about their actions toward him after the murder.

See also

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