DOREEN: I WANT HIM TO BE REMEMBERED AS A ROLE MODEL NOT A VICTIM
If good ever came from evil, then it could be felt inside the church of St Martin-in-the-fields yesterday afternoon. Some 25 years after the racist murder of black teenager Stephen Lawrence, his family and friends came together to celebrate his life and legacy, alongside political leaders and Prince Harry, who was accompanied by his bride-to-be Meghan Markle.
There was sadness and reflection, of course. But also laughter, applause and expressions of hope for a better future. Stephen’s family will now seek to ‘draw a line’ under a quarter of a century of heartbreak, anger and frustration knowing that his name will be immortalised in a national memorial day.
It is but a new start. The present dangers to inner city youth from a knife crime epidemic did not go unremarked upon during the service.
‘I must take a deep breath,’ is how Stephen’s mother Doreen, Baroness Lawrence of Clarendon, began her address to the 800 guests – as if summoning up energy for one last effort of her tremendous will.
She recalled the milestones of her campaign for justice. Along the way she did not spare criticism of the Metropolitan Police, whose initial investigation into the murder of her 18-year-old son in Eltham, south-east London, on April 22, 1993, failed in part because of ‘institutional racism’, the Macpherson report later decided.
It made for uncomfortable listening for the current Met Commissioner Cressida Dick, present inside the church. So too was retired Detective Chief Inspector Clive Driscoll, whose lead role in securing the belated convictions of two of Stephen’s killers in 2012 was acknowledged by Lady Lawrence in her address.
THE Prime Minister Theresa May read a passage from Scriptures, while Labour leader Jeremy Corbyn chose a passage from Nelson Mandela’s autobiography Long Walk to freedom. Mr Mandela had met the Lawrence family when he visited London shortly after Stephen’s death.
Prince Harry and his fiancee were met with whoops and cheers by the watching crowd as they arrived at the church, and were greeted outside by Lady Lawrence and Stephen’s brother Stuart.
At the memorial service, the Prince read a letter of support on behalf of his father the Prince of Wales, who delivered the annual Stephen Lawrence memorial lecture in 2000.
He said: ‘I remember vividly the profound shock that I felt at this senseless murder, a feeling shared by so many people across the country. I remember too just how deeply moved I was by the determination of Stephen’s family to build something positive from the tragedy they endured and to ensure Stephen’s story did not end with despair, but continued with hope.’
The Prince added: ‘A quarter of a century later, we can only imagine the man who Stephen would have become, and just how his extraordinary potential might have been fulfilled.’
Stephen’s father Neville, who last week announced that he has decided to forgive his son’s killers, sat beside actor and comedian Sir Lenny Henry – and two rows behind his ex-wife Doreen.
Sir Lenny asked for the Windrush generation of immigrants to be given a round of applause, which duly came – an awkward moment for the politicians present who have squabbled over blame for their shabby treatment by immigration officials. Stephen’s parents are both of that Windrush generation.
The comedian also interviewed three young beneficiaries of the Stephen Lawrence Charitable Trust, including Victoria Ibitoye, who received a scholarship as part of the Trust’s partnership with the Daily Mail and City University. She is now a working journalist.
In her programme notes Lady Lawrence said: ‘I wish for Stephen’s name not to be defined by his murder, but by the mark he has left on this country and the wider world and for the role model he was and continued to be for many young people today.’
The school children who were present in the church yesterday were not born when Stephen was alive. But his legacy is a matter of looking out for their futures. There is much work to be done and only two of the suspected killers have been brought to justice for the crime.
DAVID Norris and Gary Dobson are serving life sentences. The three other men whom the Mail also accused of being Stephen’s murderers in a famous 1997 front page are Jamie Acourt, now 41, his brother Neil, 42, and Luke Knight, 41.
Neil Acourt is currently serving a six-year sentence for drugs offences. Jamie Acourt has been living in Spain and is on the run from police in connection with cannabis smuggling. Knight still lives in Eltham and works as a roofer. Scotland Yard has admitted it has no new lines of inquiry in the investigation into Stephen’s murder. The force said that unless detectives receive new information the investigation is ‘unlikely to progress further’.
But as Sir Lenny said after the service yesterday: ‘There is no finish line to racism. It is an ongoing problem we have to solve, something we have to keep on fighting.’
Waiting outside the church meanwhile, without invitations to the service but wishing to show solidarity with the Lawrence family, were four black woman of Neville and Doreen’s generation.
One, a grandmother called Doreen, had travelled to Trafalgar Square from North London with her friends to support her namesake.
‘We are here because in Stephen we lost someone who had the potential to do much good,’ she said. ‘It’s been so hard for that family. And the truth is nothing much has changed since Stephen died.’
That is the challenge for the country. The establishing of a Stephen Lawrence Memorial Day must be more than lip service to a young life taken.