We solved the murder of Stephen Lawrence – three key pieces of evidence cracked the case

DETECTIVES who solved the mystery of Stephen Lawrence’s racist murder have revealed three key clues that helped them crack the case.
The 18-year-old was stabbed to death by a gang as he and a pal waited at a bus stop in Eltham, South London, on April 22, 1993.
8Stephen Lawrence was stabbed to death at a bus stop in Eltham, South London, on April 22, 1993Credit: PA:Press Association8David Norris’s sweatshirt proved vital in bring Stephen’s killers to justiceCredit: Handout8Stephen’s blood-stained jeansCredit: HandoutFor years, cops failed to catch the killers and a huge national campaign for justice by Stephen’s broken parents Doreen and Neville Lawrence, led to a public inquiry.
The resulting Macpherson report, released in 1999, found key failings in the police investigation and found the Met guilty of “institutional racism”.
Stephen’s killers – original suspects Gary Dobson and David Norris – were finally bought to justice in 2012.
In 1996, Dr Angela Gallop, a forensic science expert, was bought in to crack the murder but the technology to prize out evidence simply didn’t exist.

It meant Stephen’s killers were still walking free without any evidence to send them down.
But it would not be until 2006 until she revisited the case where, going via an “indirect” route, her team worked out who killed Stephen.
GARY DOBSON FIBRES
Speaking to ITV’s Cold Case Forensics on Thursday, Dr Gallop said there was “plenty of opportunity” for contact between Stephen’s clothing and his killers.
This was because the attack – which involved a group of five assailants – was carried out over a longer time that previously thought.

Dr Gallop’s team then began looking for fibres that may have transferred between Stephen’s red polo shirt – that was shedding fibres – to Dobson’s jacket and Norris’s sweatshirt.
Despite the polo being three or four layers deep, the cotton and polyester fibres had managed to transfer to the outside of Stephen’s jacket he wore that night.
It made it more likely the fibres would have transferred to the teen’s attackers.
Forensic examiner April Robson revealed how she later found eleven red fibres on Dobson’s jacket and a single one on Norris’s sweater.
“The analysis found that these fibres matched Stephen’s red polo shirt”, she said.
CORDUROY TROUSERS
Fibres from Stephen’s jacket were also found on Dobson’s clothing.
Meanwhile green fibres from the teenagers cord trousers were also found on the sweatshirt Norris wore the night of the attack.
But these fibres could not prove the men guilty of Stephen’s murder, that required blood.
BLOOD
The investigators then checked all the packaging the killers clothing was ever kept in.
Incredibly, they found a flake of blood, attached to tiny blue fibres, on the packaging Dobson’s jacket was kept in.
The blood did not match the clothes that had been stored there.
Particle examiner Roger Robson said the discovery “was huge”.
“Blood had never been found before, so it was a great eureka moment”, he added.
Blood was later found on the inside of the collar of Dobson’s jacket while a hair of Stephen’s was also found on his clothing.
The blood is believed to have got to the back of Dobson’s collar as he raised the knife that killed Stephen above his shoulder.
The presence of Stephen’s blood on Dobson and fibres Norris’s clothes proved they were with Stephen that night.
Dr Gallop told how the technology to identify such a “tiny” blood stain simply did not exist in the early 1990s.
And it was this that was critical in bringing Dobson and Norris to justice in 2012.

Dobson and Norris were handed life sentences with a minimum 15 years and 2 months, and 14 years and 3 months respectively.
The judge said the sentences reflected the fact the men were juveniles at the time of the killing.
8Dr Gallop’s team cracked the case by looking for fibres that transferred between Stephen’s red polo shirtCredit: Times Newspapers Ltd8Scientists found a flake of blood, attached to tiny blue fibres, on the packaging Dobson’s jacket was kept inCredit: ITV8Gary Dobson was handed a life sentence with a minimum 15 years and 2 months in 2012Credit: PA:Press Association8David Norris was handed a life sentence with a minimum 14 years and 3 months in 2012Credit: PA8Stephen Lawrence was stabbed to death in Eltham, South London, on April 22, 1993Credit: ITV
Story Credit: thesun.co.uk