Henry Nowak’s killing exposes Britain’s dangerous two-tier justice system
Before George Floyd, before Michael Brown, there was Trayvon Martin.
Back in 2012, the 17-year-old was shot and killed during a struggle with another young man in a Florida gated community. The tragedy that day was discussed in the national media and eventually adjudicated in a court of law.
When the trial was over, President Barack Obama said: "When Trayvon Martin was first shot, I said that this could have been my son."
Last December, an 18-year-old college student was stabbed by another young man in Southampton, England. The victim’s name was Henry Nowak. The American press ignored the story. The British press and politicians largely did too.
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Like Obama, I thought: this could have been my son.
Martin and Nowak were killed by private citizens, not in encounters with the police. There are many differences between the two cases — the races of both killers and victims; the locations, the motives. But while the tiny Sanford, Fla., police station was merely accused of "sloppy work" by the New York Times in handling the Martin case, many in Britain believe that woke police bias contributed to Nowak’s death.
Britain has admitted millions of immigrants in a short time. As late as 2001, the "White British" (English, Irish, Scottish or Welsh) were over 90% of the population. Today, at most 75% are. Last year, only 53% of births were to women described as "White British." With huge demographic change has come an equally abrupt cultural change.
Despite being home to the "mother of parliaments," where the oratory of William Pitt and Winston Churchill once rang, Britain is now one of the most repressive Western countries when it comes to speech. The Times newspaper reported 12,183 arrests for offensive online messages in 2023. Freedom House rates the UK only 76 out of 100.
At Speakers’ Corner in London’s Hyde Park, you’d be risking your life today to say anything "transphobic" or derogatory about Islam.
British police have become highly attuned to the sensitivities of race and gender minorities. In 2005, the national College of Policing started recording "non-crime hate incidents," which are based entirely on the perceptions of a claimed victim, who needs produce no actual evidence.
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The UK National Police Chiefs Council’s "Police Anti-Racism Commitment" advocates a "commitment to racial equity" that "means [p]roducing equality of policing outcomes for people from different ethnic groups by responding to individuals and communities according to their specific needs, circumstances and experiences, with understanding that these will be racialised and with the aim of reducing harm."
In plainer language, the guidance says that anti-racism "does not mean treating everyone ‘the same’ or being ‘colour blind’ (racial equality)." It means "equity."
With guidance like this, it is not surprising that police on Nowak’s murder scene appeared "more concerned with accusations of racism" by the convicted stabber Vickrum Digwa "than they were in helping a dying man," as Chris Philp, a member from the Conservative Party, said in Parliament. The police officers took Digwa’s accusation seriously but scoffed at Nowak’s repeated cries that he’d been stabbed.
Philp mentioned another case where a paranoid schizophrenic with a violent past, Valdo Calocane, was not placed in a mental institution involuntarily because health workers were concerned about "an overrepresentation of young black males in mental health detention." In 2023, Calocane stabbed three people to death in Nottingham, England.
In today’s Britain, mass demonstrations for Gaza or LGB+ causes are generally tolerated by authorities, while flying the English flag is considered suspect. Standing with your eyes closed too close to an abortion provider can get you arrested under a "Public Spaces Protection Order." Speaking against mass migration to the West from the "global South" is considered "far right," and got Dutch commentator Eva Vlaardingerbroek banned from the country.
Social media is full of complaints about "two-tier" policing, the accusation that indigenous British people and conservatives are treated worse in criminal law than illegal immigrants and leftists. "Woke" official bias has been alleged in several high-profile criminal cases.
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When he was leader of the Labor Party in opposition, current Prime Minister Keir Starmer kneeled in support of the Black Lives Matter movement after the death of George Floyd, thousands of miles away in America. He also championed the release of a foreigner whose speech "would usually be considered criminal under English law," according to the Wall Street Journal, yet had nothing to say in 2024 when an English young mother was jailed for over a year for one offensive tweet she quickly removed.
Nigel Farage, head of the new but surging Reform party, has accused Starmer of a double standard, where harsh punishments are meted out to right-wing speech compared to the far-left.
Starmer is nicknamed "Two-Tier Keir" by critics. His unpopular Labor government is desperate not to alienate recent immigrants it depends on for votes. But its simultaneous attempts to placate the outrage of a (barely) native majority are unconvincing.
Without serious attempts to roll back "equity" initiatives and restore equal treatment in crime and punishment, Starmer and Labor are sitting on a steadily boiling pot.