UK: Lawrence inquiry reveals "the goodthe bad and the ugly"
01 May 1998
From March through July the initial phase of the public inquiry, held at Hannibal House, Elephant and Castle in south London, into the events surrounding the racist murder of 18-year old black student Stephen Lawrence has disclosed an astonishing saga of incompetence, racism and possibly corruption. The inquiry is being held under Section 49 of the Police Act 1996 and is chaired by Sir William Macpherson, a former commander in the SAS and High Court judge, who has been criticised for his record on "race issues". He is advised by Tom Cook (the former deputy chief constable of West Yorkshire), the right reverend Dr John Sentamu (Bishop of Stepney) and Dr Richard Stone (Jewish Council for Racial Equality).
The terms of reference for the hearing are:
"To inquire into the matters arising from the death of Stephen Lawrence on 22 April 1993 to date, in order particularly to identify the lessons to be learned for the investigation and prosecution of racially motivated crimes."
The second part of the hearing, which will start later this year, will see the inquiry team visit Bristol, Birmingham and Manchester examining "national issues relating to the investigation and prosecution of racially motivated crimes." A report will be presented to Home Secretary, Jack Straw, at the end of the year.
The police "investigation" and cover-up
The hearing has been characterised by severe criticism of the police for their incompetent "investigation" into the racist murder of Stephen. In their opening statements counsel to the inquiry, Edmund Lawson QC, and Michael Mansfield QC, counsel for the Lawrence family, listed a catalogue of errors that included:
* the failure to administer first aid to Stephen
* the failure to deal with important eye-witnesses
* the absence of systematic mobile or house to house searches
* the absence of written records of events
* the failure to liaise with Stephen's family
* the failure to act immediately on information from informers
* the failure to make any early arrests
The inordinate number of errors prompted Mansfield to ask whether "the initial investigation ever intended to result in a successful prosecution?" Introducing two themes that were to recur throughout the inquiry, he suggested that: "so much was missed that two propositions must be considered." One, that racism "permeated the investigation" and two, that the perpetrators were "expecting some sort of [police] protection". This claim was rejected by Jeremy Gompertz, for the Metropolitan police, who only accepted "shortcomings" in the investigation. His case echoed an earlier Police Complaints Authority (PCA) report into the police handling of Stephen's murder which accused officers of incompetence and identified serious errors, while denying that this amounted to anything more sinister.
Nearly 50 days of police evidence provided indisputable evidence of ineptness and incompetence that undermined the denials of racism and corruption and brought gasps from the public gallery. Many of the denials rested upon a secret 1993 internal review, carried out by a former head of the Flying Squad, Detective Superintendent Roderick Barker, which concluded that the police investigation was conducted professionally and that all lines of enquiry had been pursued. However, Barker's report had already been criticised by the PCA, which found that he had neglected his duty, but failed to bring charges against him.
Questioned at the inquiry, Barker conceded that the report had been "toned down" and contained "inaccuracies and omissions" because the information might have been used by defence lawyers in future prosecutions. He denied that this constituted a cover-up. His excuses saw him dismissed from the inquiry by Macpherson, who said: "...his value as a witness and his credibility in vital matters have already been much undermined for reasons which will be perfectly obvious for anyone here today. We feel we ought t