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Book review: Hidden Stories of the Stephen Lawrence Inquiry

The Stephen Lawrence Inquiry was ordered in 1997 to investigate the matters arising from the racist murder of a young black man in April 1993 and to make recommendations to improve the policing of racially motivated crime. Reactions to the Inquiry were mixed but the main narrative contained elements of catharsis following a painful examination of racially malign and incompetent policing; indeed Jack Straw was later to describe the commissioning of the report as the proudest achievement of his career. There is little doubt that the Inquiry was a landmark moment in the development of British justice but despite the overdue conviction of Gary Dobson and David Norris in 2011 ugly stories still swirl around the case such as revelations of undercover police spying on people close to the Lawrence family, or the increasing evidence of probable police corruption in the original investigation, and even continuing racist vandalism of the monument commemorating the spot where he died. So it was with great interest that I read Dr Richard Stone’s account of his role on the Inquiry, along with a senior ex-detective and the Archbishop of York, Dr John Sentamu, as one of three advisers to the chair, Sir William Macpherson. Motivated by anger and frustrated by a lack of change, Stone breaks with accepted convention to ‘lift the lid’ on the internal dilemmas and behind the scenes machinations which have largely remained hidden except to those at their centre. The result is horrifying for anyone who might care about justice as Stone outlines the lengths that powerful institutions mainly the Metropolitan Police, but also the Home Office will go to defend their reputations and fortunes. While reading the The Journal of Community and Criminal Justice