Stephen Lawrence: How the Met Police failed to spot suspect Matthew White

The most notorious racist murder in British history has never been fully solved, but everyone thinks they know who attacked Stephen Lawrence.

Five names.

David Norris and Gary Dobson were convicted of murder a decade ago. Luke Knight and brothers Neil and Jamie Acourt have been suspects for 30 years. All three have denied being involved. Neil Acourt and Knight were acquitted of murder in 1996.

Duwayne Brooks, who was with Stephen on the night of 22 April 1993, said there were six attackers. His descriptions of the man who led the attack and first struck Stephen – along with other eyewitness accounts – do not match the appearances of the five main suspects.

Who was the mystery figure?

After the Met stopped looking into Stephen’s murder three years ago, I decided to investigate myself.

The BBC can now name a sixth suspect – Matthew White.

I traced witnesses, saw police documents, and uncovered new evidence that shows how officers mishandled investigations relating to White.

The BBC has found that witnesses told detectives White had said he was present during the attack, and has uncovered evidence that shows his alibi was false. For the first time, police surveillance photos from 1993 are published, in which White is depicted bearing a striking resemblance to eyewitness descriptions of the unidentified attacker.

But at key moments the police failed to pull together all these pieces of evidence on White.

Responding to the BBC’s revelations, Baroness Doreen Lawrence, Stephen’s mother, said it was “infuriating” that the man said to have led the attack on her son had evaded justice due to police failings, but not a single officer had faced consequences.

She said: “The failure to properly investigate a main suspect in a murder case is so grave that it should be met by serious sanctions. Only when police officers lose their jobs can the public have confidence that failure and incompetence will not be tolerated and that change will happen.”

Like the five original five prime suspects, Matthew White has been in the case since the start. For years he was a witness, not a suspect, and known publicly as Witness K.

After the murder, detectives heard White had been in the local area on the night of murder, and had interacted with various people. They were also told he had been at the home of two of the suspects that night, and less than two weeks into their inquiries, officers spoke to him.