Tag Archives: stephen lawrence

Stephen Lawrence Day

By Isabelle Parasram | Wed 22nd April 2020 - 2:45 pm

Isabelle Parasram interviewing someone affected by knife crime

On 22nd April 2020, we commemorate the life of Stephen Lawrence – a black British teenager who, in 1993, was killed in an unprovoked racist attack by a gang of white men.

Stephen had been waiting for a bus with his friend, Duwayne Brooks (who later went on to become a Lib Dem Councillor). Duwayne escaped unhurt, but Stephen died of his injuries.

Five suspects were initially arrested, but the charges were dropped, and a private prosecution by The Lawrence family of three of the suspects failed. At Stephen’s inquest, a verdict of unlawful killing ‘…in a completely unprovoked racist attack by five youths’ was delivered by Sir Montague Levine.

The day after this, The Daily Mail newspaper used its front page to name the five men it says killed Stephen Lawrence. It invited them to sue if they were wrong.

Duwayne Brooks interviewed on Today

By NewsHound | Mon 9th January 2012 - 8:54 am

Liberal Democrat Councillor Duwayne Brooks, the only witness to Stephen Lawrence’s murder, talked movingly to Radio Four’s Today programme this morning.

He described some of the effects of his post-traumatic stress disorder following the murder, praised the police for the conviction of two of the attackers and expressed some doubt that the other attackers will ever be brought to justice.

You can listen to the full interview here.

Posted in News | Also tagged race relations | 2 Comments

Opinion: Race issue must not be trivialised

By Ashley Day | Mon 9th January 2012 - 7:54 am

It’s been a busy week for “race” and ethnicity in the media. We’ve had the Stephen Lawrence verdict as well as Diane Abbott’s wayward tweet. The latter of these was analysed in a frustratingly blasé manner by the press, trivialising the issue of racism after it had been covered so thoroughly in the wake of the Lawrence trial verdict.

Gary Dobson and David Norris had finally been put behind bars for the murder of black teenager Stephen Lawrence, bringing a degree of closure on what has become a dark stain on the conscience of both the Metropolitan Police and the country …

Posted in Op-eds | Also tagged diane abbott and race relations | 15 Comments

Has our police force been ‘completely transformed’ by the Lawrence case?

By Sid Cumberland | Fri 6th January 2012 - 1:15 pm

Like the summer riots, the Stephen Lawrence case provides us with yet another attitudinal Rorschach test; we screw our eyes up, peer closely, and conclude that what we have seen is just what we expected. At least, that’s my view, after hearing Paul Dacre’s astonishing self-congratulation on Tuesday.

For him, the verdict was ‘a glorious day’ for the Lawrences, the police, British justice, politicians, British newspapers (especially, of course, the Daily Mail, without whose ‘relentless campaigning’ none of this would have happened).

For me, it was a good day; but it was also a reminder of

…

Posted in Op-eds | Also tagged daily mail, metropolitan police and racism | 3 Comments