Graduation January 2013
Posted on 29 January 2013
We were honoured to welcome Doreen Lawrence to the department after she received an Honorary Doctorate at the Graduation Ceremony.
Doreen Lawrence is a British campaigner and writerwho first came to public attention in 1993 as the mother of Stephen Lawrence, a black British teenager who was murdered in a racial attack in South East London.
In 1999, after years of campaigning, a wide-ranging judicial inquiry was established to investigate the circumstances of Stephen's death. The public inquiry concluded that the Metropolitan Police was "institutionally racist" and that this was one of the primary causes of their failure to solve the case. After the inquiry, Doreen Lawrence continued to campaign for justice for her son as well as other victims of racist crime. In 2003 she was awarded an OBEfor services to community relations.
She founded the Stephen Lawrence Charitable Trust to promote a positive community legacy in her son’s name and is a member of the board and council of Liberty,the human rights organisation, as well as a patron of hate-crime charity Stop Hate UK.