A 1998 public inquiry,[6] headed by Sir William Macpherson, concluded that the original MPS investigation was incompetent and that the force was institutionally racist.

It also recommended that the double jeopardy rule should be repealed in murder cases to allow a retrial upon new and compelling evidence: this was effected in 2005 upon enactment of the Criminal Justice Act 2003.

[19][20] During his teenage years, Lawrence excelled in running, competing for the local Cambridge Harriers athletics club, and appeared as an extra in Denzel Washington's film For Queen and Country.

[21] At the time of his murder, he was studying technology and physics at the Blackheath Bluecoat School and English language and literature at Woolwich College, and was hoping to become an architect.

[1] The six aggressors forced Lawrence down to the ground, then stabbed him to a depth of about 5 inches (13 cm) on both sides of the front of his body, in the right collarbone and left shoulder.

[29] In February 1999, officers investigating the handling of the initial inquiry revealed that a woman who might have been a vital witness had telephoned detectives three times within the first few days after the killing, and appealed for her to contact them again.

[31] Four weeks before Lawrence's death, Dobson and Neil Acourt were involved in a racist attack on a black teenager, Kevin London, whom they verbally abused and attempted to stab.

[33] The stabbings of victims Gurdeep Bhangal and Stacey Benefield, which both occurred in March 1993, in Eltham, were also linked to Neil and Jamie Acourt, David Norris and Gary Dobson.

Detective Superintendent Brian Weeden, the officer who had been leading the murder investigation from its third day, and who led the murder squad for 14 months, explained to the McPherson inquiry in 1998 that part of the reason no arrests had taken place by the fourth day after the killing (Monday 26 April) was that he had not known the law allowed arrest upon reasonable suspicion – a basic point of criminal law.

[36] The main issue was with the identification evidence by Brooks, which was seen as both tainted by procedural irregularities, and not strong enough under case law: this view was borne out by the later private prosecution.

The family were not entitled to legal aid and a fighting fund was established to pay for the analysis of forensic evidence and the cost of tracing and re-interviewing witnesses.

[citation needed] The family were represented by leading counsel Michael Mansfield QC, assisted by Tanoo Mylvaganam and Annie Dixon who all worked pro bono.

On 23 April 1996, the three remaining suspects were acquitted of murder by a jury at the Central Criminal Court, after the trial judge, the Honourable Mr Justice Curtis, ruled that the identification evidence given by Duwayne Brooks was unreliable.

The Macpherson report endorsed the judgement, stating that "Mr Justice Curtis could [have] properly reach[ed] only one conclusion" and that "[t]here simply was no satisfactory evidence available".

[41] The inquest concluded on 13 February 1997, with the jury returning a verdict after 30 minutes' deliberation of unlawful killing "in a completely unprovoked racist attack by five white youths"; this finding went beyond the bounds of their instructions.

In 2002, David Norris and Neil Acourt were convicted and jailed for racially aggravated harassment after an incident involving a plain-clothes black police officer.

It opined that the Law Commission had been unduly cautious by limiting the scope to murder and that "the exceptions should [...] extend to other grave offences punishable with life and/or long terms of imprisonment as Parliament might specify.

[59][60] With the prosecution led by Mark Ellison QC, the case centred on the new forensic evidence and whether it demonstrated the defendant's involvement in the murder, or was the result of later contamination due to police handling.

For much of the intervening period the mainstream press, including the Daily Mail, were openly hostile and suspicious of a family that so vocally criticised the police.On 5 January 2012, it was reported that the Attorney General was reviewing the minimum terms at the request of a member of the public, to determine whether he believed them to be "unduly lenient", and if so whether to apply to the Court of Appeal for an increase in the minimum terms.

[6] Detective Superintendent Brian Weeden said during the inquiry that mistakes had been made in the murder investigation, including his own ignorance that he could have arrested the suspects four days after the killing simply on reasonable suspicion, a basic point of criminal law.

[75] The report was criticised in an October 2000 article in The Times by Michael Gove (later an MP and cabinet minister), who wrote, "The tendentious reasoning and illiberal recommendations of that document have been brilliantly anatomised by the ethical socialists Norman Dennis and George Erdos and the Kurdish academic Ahmed al-Shahi in the Civitas pamphlet Racist Murder and Pressure Group Politics.

[81] Neil Putnam, a former corrupt police detective turned whistleblower, told a BBC investigation that Clifford Norris was paying Davidson to obstruct the case and to protect the suspects.

The Metropolitan Police Service announced that it was to open up a special incident room to field calls from the public, following the BBC documentary The Boys Who Killed Stephen Lawrence.

Dr Richard Stone, who sat on the Macpherson inquiry, commented that the panel had felt that there was "a large amount of information that the police were either not processing or were suppressing" and "a strong smell of corruption".

Baroness Ros Howells, patron of the Stephen Lawrence Charitable Trust, agreed: "Lots of people said they gave the police evidence which was never produced.

"[85] On 1 March 2010 the IPCC announced that "No further action will be taken against the two men arrested following concerns identified by the internal Metropolitan police service (MPS) review of the murder of Stephen Lawrence" and the two were released from bail.

[92][needs update] Following the 2012 convictions of Dobson and Norris, further inquiries by both Scotland Yard and the Independent Police Complaints Commission ruled that there was no new evidence to warrant further investigation.

After discussions with Doreen Lawrence, the home secretary Theresa May commissioned Mark Ellison QC (who had prosecuted Dobson and Norris) to review Scotland Yard's investigations into alleged police corruption.

by that charge for fifty years.”[100] On 7 February 2008, the Stephen Lawrence Centre, designed by architect David Adjaye, opened in Deptford, south-east London.

Crombie includes an explanation of the murder in her author's note at the end of the book, but specifies that the rest of the characters are not meant to represent actual people.