BRITAIN: The police investigation into Damilola Taylor's death has come in for strong criticism, writes Rachel Donnelly
The Metropolitan Police and the Crown Prosecution Service (CPS)faced damning criticism yesterday as two teenage brothers were cleared of the murder of schoolboy, Damilola Taylor, in dramatic scenes at the Old Bailey.
The 16-year-olds, known throughout the high-profile three month trial as Boy A and Boy B, wept and embraced their relatives as the jury delivered unanimous not guilty verdicts on charges of murder, manslaughter and intent to rob Damilola, whose death shocked Britain nearly 18 months ago. The 10-year-old schoolboy bled to death in a stairwell in Peckham, south London, from a thigh wound caused by a broken bottle.
His parents, Richard and Gloria Taylor, sat motionless as the verdicts were read out. Their solicitor, Mr Neil O'May, said the verdict had come as a "shock" to the family who had vowed to continue their search for justice. Scotland Yard and the Crown Prosecution Service vigorously defended their handling of the case, rejecting criticism that officers had overseen a "fiasco" or bowed to public and media pressure to solve the case quickly.
The public outcry over Damilola's death, which was widely viewed as a senseless murder, sharpened the political focus on street crime and even prompted the British Prime Minister, Mr Tony Blair, to tell a sombre House of Commons that everything must be done "to bring the killers to justice".
But it was against that backdrop of overwhelming public pressure to secure a conviction, and criticism over the failure to convict anyone for the murder of black teenager Stephen Lawrence, which led police to round up "the usual suspects", the boys' lawyer said outside the Old Bailey.
Insisting he was not criticising individual officers but the police investigation, Mr Christopher Hartnell, said the jury had reached the only verdict that "truth and logic" would allow.
"The largest squad of detectives ever assembled by the Metropolitan Police were pursuing the idea they first thought of and were not interested in what they regarded to be extraneous matters. Evidence was not tested or collated unless it served their common goal," he said.
Among the criticisms levelled at the police investigation and the CPS was the reliance on evidence from several youths held in the same young offenders' institution as the boys. These youths maintained that the boys had confessed to the murder or to being present during an attack on Damilola. The evidence of a key prosecution witness - who claimed she saw the boys attack Damilola - was discredited during the trial and murder charges against two other boys were dropped.
The prosecution case was further undermined when it failed to challenge evidence that showed mobile telephones belonging to Boy A and Boy B were being used nearly two miles from the death scene as passers-by telephoned the police.