Despite Dubious Evidence, Men Convicted Of Stephen Lawrence Murder Lose Appeal Bid

Stephen Lawrence

Brit Dee, Contributor

The men convicted of the murder of Stephen Lawrence have today lost their first appeal bid.

Whilst David Norris and Gary Dobson can still renew their applications before judges sitting at the appeal court, a single judge today rejected their first appeals after 'consideration of the papers'.

Norris and Dobson were given life sentences in January of 14 years and three months, and 15 years, for the racist murder of black teenager Stephen Lawrence in 1993.

In a previous article we detailed how the prosecution of Gary Dobson was only possible after a fundamental change in the ancient common law of 'double jeopardy', in which an accused, once acquitted, could never be tried for the same crime again.

Dobson had already been acquitted of murder during a private prosecution brought by Stephen Lawrence's family in 1994, after a judge threw out the case due to the unreliability of a key witness's evidence.

Dobson's and Norris's convictions in January were based entirely on new forensic evidence recovered by LGC Forensics many years after the crime - despite serious concerns about the credibility of that very evidence.