The dramatic naming of a sixth suspect in the racist murder of Stephen Lawrence has left Scotland Yard facing new questions about its ability to deliver justice for Black Londoners.
The Metropolitan Police confirmed that Matthew White had been arrested twice over Stephen’s murder in April 1993 after a BBC investigation named him as a suspect in the notorious killing.
The BBC said that White, who died in 2021 aged 50, had been present at the killing and matched the description of an unidentified fair-haired man seen by witness Duwayne Brooks at the scene of the crime in Eltham, south-east London.
The investigation said a relative had tried to report White’s involvement soon after the murder but was only contacted 20 years later because of a blunder in entering the testimony into a police database.
It further disclosed that a witness told the Met in 2000 that White had admitted being part of the attack — as well as testifying that brothers Neil and Jamie Acourt, who have never faced justice, took part — but detectives failed to corroborate the evidence.
It said the force had also failed to pursue a recommendation three years earlier that it should consider whether White had been present at the murder and reported claims by a detective involved in bringing two of Stephen’s killers to justice that former Commissioner Dame Cressida Dick had discouraged him from pursuing other suspects.
The revelations provoked an angry response and calls for a fresh investigation to establish if others beyond the two killers, David Norris and Gary Dobson, already convicted of Stephen’s murder, could still be brought to justice.
They also shone a spotlight on the Met’s continuing problems with racism in the wake of Baroness Casey’s report earlier this year condemning the force as “institutionally racist” and placed fresh pressure on Commissioner Sir Mark Rowley to deliver his commitment to improve the policing of Black Londoners.
Baroness Doreen Lawrence, Stephen’s mother, said officers responsible for failing to investigate her son’s death over the many years since his murder should face “serious sanctions” including dismissal if still working.
“Only when police officers lose their jobs can the public have confidence that failure and incompetence will not be tolerated,” she told the BBC.
Lord Sentamu, the former Archbishop of York, who served as an adviser to Sir William Macpherson’s inquiry into Stephen’s killing, said that it was “absolutely shocking” that wrong information had been entered into the police database about the testimony from White’s relative about his involvement.
In its statement, the Met admitted that “too many mistakes” had been made over Stephen’s murder. It said that White “first came to our attention as a witness in 1993”, a month after Stephen’s killing “when he told officers he had visited the home address of two other suspects on the night of the murder”.
It said that he had been seen again in 1999 “by officers when he refused to attend the Stephen Lawrence inquiry”, led by Macpherson, before being arrested in 2000 after testimony was received from a witness.
A file was submitted to prosecutors in 2005 and again in 2014 following White’s re-arrest the previous December after the discovery of an un-investigated 1993 report of his involvement from a relative.
It said on both occasions the Crown Prosecution Service had decided that there was “no realistic prospect of conviction of White for any offence”.
But the force said that it accepted that errors had blighted its investigations and that it wanted to repeat the apology offered earlier this year by Commissioner Sir Mark Rowley on the 30th anniversary of Stephen’s death.
Assistant Commissioner Matt Ward said: “Unfortunately, too many mistakes were made in the initial investigation and the impact of them continues to be seen.” Assistant Commissioner Matt Twist told LBC that “any fresh information will be reviewed”.
Stephen was stabbed to death aged 18 in an unprovoked, racially-motivated attack while waiting for a bus. The bungled original investigation hampered by racism and alleged police corruption meant it took nearly 20 years for two of the killers to be brought to justice, with three named suspects never prosecuted. Gary Dobson and David Norris were jailed for life at the Old Bailey in 2012. Two of the three remaining suspects, brothers Neil and Jamie Acourt, have since served jail time for drug dealing, while Luke Knight has remained free.
In its investigation, the BBC reports that Clive Driscoll, the detective who helped secure the convictions of Dobson and Norris, said Dame Cressida had suggested that he should not bother pursuing the other suspects. He said that he went onto arrest White in 2013 but was made to retire before completing his investigation.
The Independent Office for Police Conduct announced in 2020 that, following an investigation launched in 2014, they had submitted a file to the CPS to consider whether four former officers who were in senior roles during the opening weeks of the murder investigation may have committed criminal offences of misconduct in public office.
