(1) Thankfully, the media’s response to Macpherson was not entirely favourable, ditto the academic response. A very fine example of the latter is Racist Murder and Pressure Group Politics: The Macpherson Report and the Police, by Norman Dennis, George Erdos and Ahmed Al-Shahi, published by the Institute for the Study of Civil Society, London, (2000). Pages xii-xiii details how the inquiry started, including how the man in charge of the murder investigation for the first three days was “called from his bed”.
(2) Peace plea over murdered youth, by Jeff Postlewaite, published in the Evening Standard, LATE PRICES EXTRA, September 14, 1993, page 5.
(3) The nadir of this was the Welling riot later that year when an “anti-racist” mob tried to storm the Party’s headquarters.
(4) The so-called suspects made equally unflattering remarks about other people too, in particular the police, but these were not greeted with such outrage.
(5) THE STEPHEN LAWRENCE INQUIRY, Cm 4262 – I & 4262 – II (Revised), published by HMSO, London, (February 1999), Volume 1, page 20. [Henceforth this will be referred to as the Macpherson Report].
(6) Macpherson Report, Volume 1, page 20.
(7) See for example By any means necessary, by Malcolm X, Second edition, published by Pathfinder, New York, (1992), page 11.
(8) The 1993 film Poetic Justice starring Janet Jackson is an appalling example of this. The word nigger is very much alive on the black music scene including as a proper now, eg the black “hip-hop” group N.W.A (ie Niggaz Wit’ Attitude).
(9) The Stephen Lawrence case was neither the only nor the first murder to lead to calls for the abrogation of the double jeopardy law; the 1989 murder of Julie Hogg led to a campaign by the victim’s mother for the retrial of William Dunlop, who confessed to the crime after his acquittal; subsequently, while in prison for another offence, he was given six years for perjury. In November 2005, the Director of Public Prosecutions decided to refer the case back to the Court of Appeal.
(10) Neville Lawrence came to Britain from Jamaica in 1960; Doreen Graham in 1962; they married in 1972. [Macpherson Report, Volume 1, page 11].
(11) Mother attacks ‘racist’ justice, by Alison Daniels, published in the Guardian, February 11, 1997, page 5, [Compiled from CD-ROM].
(12) Macpherson Report, Vol 1: page 11, (op cit).
(13) Macpherson Report, Volume 1, page 57, (ibid).
(14) Macpherson Report, Volume 1, pages 209-10, (ibid).
(15) Macpherson Report, Volume 1, page 16, (ibid). According to WPC Smith, Duwayne’s actual words were “Who called you fucking cunts anyway, pigs......I only called the fucking ambulance”. I had intended to quote verbatim – which would undoubtedly have raised a laugh or two ordinarily – but decided against it because one of the speakers had brought his young daughter with him.
(16) To be scrupulously fair, Duwayne Brooks denied emphatically using this sort of language, * although personally I am not inclined to believe him. He is obviously an emotional type, and considering the circumstances and the trauma he suffered such an outburst was forgivable, if a little bizarre.
* Steve And Me
My Friendship with Stephen Lawrence and the Search for Justice, by Duwayne Brooks with Simon Hattenstone, published by Abacus/Time Warner, London, (2003), page 3.
(17) See for example the Vikram Dodd interview with Duwayne Brooks published in the Guardian, February 25, 1999, page 20. There appears to be genuine acrimony between the two, at least on Doreen’s side, and in October 2004, she won a libel action against the publishers of Duwayne’s book.
(18) Macpherson Report, Volume 1, page 16, (op cit).
(19) Life sentence for triple murderer, published in the Times, May 3, 1977, page 2.
(20) REVENGE AT WINSON GREEN, by T.J. Leech, published in TRUE DETECTIVE, February 1997, pages 15-21.
(21) Metro, May 10, 2000, page 6.
(22) Police narrow Dando focus to 10 boyfriends, by Nicholas Hellen, published in the Sunday Times, May 16, 1999, page 1.5.
(23) Including me!
(24) Bennett was an habitual criminal. On October 9, 1990, he was sentenced to 12-25 years for an armed robbery on a video store on October 2, 1989. [The New York Times, (Late Edition), October 11, 1990, page A26].
(25) This shocking case was widely reported but see for example THE SUSAN SMITH CASE: WHY DID SHE DROWN HER SONS?, by Richard Devon, published in TRUE CRIME Detective Monthly, August 1995, pages 18-25. Smith’s trial was reported in the August 7, 1995, issue of Time magazine; she was sentenced to life imprisonment.
(26) Harvey was white, as is Andrews, but his dark complexion often led to his being mistaken for a non-white. Andrews claimed her lover had been stabbed to death by an enraged motorist who had branded him a “Paki bastard”, but forensic and other evidence clearly implicated her. The case was the subject of an in-depth feature in TRUE CRIME Detective Monthly magazine, October 1997, and was widely reported at the time. Her appeal against conviction was dismissed, and later she owned up to the murder.
(27) In the hunt for the serial killer known as the Yorkshire Ripper (Peter Sutcliffe) an anonymous tape resulted in a big drain on police resources.
(28) Macpherson Report, Volume 1, pages 154 & 157, (op cit).
(29) Sunday Telegraph, February 28, 1999, page 2.
(30) See for example News Shopper, March 3, 1993, page 4.
(31) Macpherson Report, Statement of Doreen Lawrence, March 8, 1998, from APPENDIX 6, Volume 2.
(32) The Mirror August 7, 1999, page 1.
(33) The Mirror, August 10, 1999, page 13.
(34) Macpherson Report, Volume 1, page 14, (op cit).
(35) Lawrence mum: UK’s shunned me, published in the Voice, ISSUE No. 932, October 30, 2000, page 4. She was addressing an
NUJ conference.
(36) The Times, April 24, 1993, page 3.
(37) Macpherson Report, Volume 1, page 1, (op cit).
(38) Macpherson Report, Volume 1, page 2, (ibid).
(39) See for example the Times, February 19, 2000, page 8.
(40) Graham Geddis – who was on his way home from a prayer meeting! The writ was later withdrawn, along with writs against other junior
officers.
(41) Kentish Times, Bromley & Beckenham Edition, October 19, 2000, page 8.
(42) The United States has retained the Grand Jury. In Britain full committal hearings have now been abolished and indictable cases are dealt with purely on the papers.
(43) The Times, April 24, 1993, page 3.
(44) It was claimed in the Guardian that Neville Lawrence had been provided with this car by the police for “security reasons”. A legal source informed me that this may have been the reason he was stopped.
(45) Searchlight, April 1999, No 286, page 8. This may be because such a law could cause acute embarrassment to Gable’s agents provocateurs or “moles” as he styles them, although to be fair to Gable he also opposed the abolition of double jeopardy.
(46) Which has been defined as “the use of dishonest practices to secure convictions or boost performance figures”. [PCA 10 Police Complaints Authority – The First Ten Years, published by HMSO, London, (1995), page 16].
(47) Macpherson Report, Volume 1, page 11, (op cit).
(48) Macpherson Report, Volume 1, page 3, (op cit).
(49) Mario Pereira was gaoled for life for the murder of Michael Menson; two other men received hefty prison sentences for manslaughter; one of them was tried in Northern Cyprus.
(50) The Times, October 1, 1999, page 4.
(51) The Voice, Issue No. 889, January 3, 2000, page 1.
(52) The veteran broadcaster piped up in September 2003, obviously a case of unwitting racism, or perhaps unintentional racism, or benign racism...
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