All language subtitles for Cold.Case.Forensics.S01E03.The.Murder.of.Stephen.Lawrence.1080p.HDTV.H264-DARKFLiX

NARRATOR: They are the murders
that shook the nation...

REPORTER: The savagery
of this murder

has shocked
even the most hardened detectives.

REPORTER: He was attacked
by this bus stop by a racist mob.

REPORTER: This flat
was the scene of a horrific killing.

For decades, the truth lay hidden,
and the killers evaded justice.

Until one woman took up the hunt.

Angela has solved some of the
biggest cases in British history.

Dr Angela Gallop is a world-leading
forensic scientist.

I've clone a lot of work
with forensic scientists,

but she's the best.

She led the team
and set the standard.

She put the bar where it was.

She's helped solve
hundreds of high-profile cold cases,

finding clues
where others have failed.

Without the forensic input,

the murder
would never have been solved.

Now Dr Gallop is opening
her extraordinary casebook

to reveal the forensic secrets

behind some of the country's
most infamous crimes

and how they caught the killers

who thought
they'd got away with murder.

It's a puzzle
that you have to solve.

Every contact leaves a trace.

It's just whether or not
we are clever enough to find it.

NARRATOR: Tonight, the racist
murderers of a teenager

had remained free
for well over a decade.

Stephen Lawrence
was brutally killed.

It must be
the most high-profile criminal case

in recent criminal justice history.

It's a despicable attack.

NARRATOR: Could forensic science

finally find the clues
to bring the killers to justice?

We were going to give it
our very best shot.

In all murder cases,

the one that nails you in the end
is the forensics.

It was a sort of murder you'd expect

in the Deep South in the States
in the '50s or '60s,

not in 1990s South London.

Stephen Lawrence
was brutally killed

by a group of racist thugs.

They came in
to attack any Black youngsters

for no reason other than clue to
the colour of the person's skin.

It was like
an old-fashioned lynching.

Stephen Lawrence,
a teenager at the time,

was with his friend Duwayne Brooks,

and they were waiting at a bus stop

in Well Hall Road
in South East London.

They'd just missed a bus
to get home...

...and it was
a "wrong place at the wrong time,"

where they
went on the turf of a racist gang.

And they were subjected
to an unprovoked racist attack...

...by a number of young white men.

Er, and he wasn't able to be saved,
you know?

Dead, really,
when he got to hospital.

A mother goes to the hospital
and finds a dead body of her son.

How painful can that be?

NARRATOR: Stephen Lawrence's murder

was a despicable crime
which shocked the nation.

But the investigation which followed

was to cause more pain
for the family

and bring shame
on Britain's largest police force.

Stephen's suspected killers
remained free.

Thirteen years after the murder,

the evidence to catch the
racist gang still eluded the police.

A new team of detectives
was brought in,

and they turned to Dr Angela Gallop

to carry out a detailed review
of the forensics.

So, it all came down to science.

It was gonna come down to science.

NARRATOR: Angela Gallop is one of
Britain's top forensic scientists.

She has helped solve
hundreds of cases since the 1970s.

Although concentrating
on the science of crime detection,

she has always been driven
by a keen sense of justice.

I think at a fairly early stage,

I got absolutely gripped by forensic
science and by what it could do.

Ancl it's partly about fairness,
and that matters very much to me.

I think
a lot of this sense of justice

probably came from our mother.

She was a very thoughtful person,

and we were kind of brought up
with this notion

that that is fair,
and that is not fair.

You could see very strongly
in Angela that she is, I think,

driven very much by this sense
that justice should be clone.

You know,
bad people should be punished,

and good people
should not be punished.

Ancl that takes her, interestingly,
to forensic science,

which is exactly what
forensic science does.

Society gets better justice.

NARRATOR: Now Angela needed
to help solve a case

which had shocked a nation.

A case which continued to highlight
racial injustice in society

and in law enforcement.

It must be
the most high-profile criminal case

in recent criminal justice history,
I would think.

Ancl of course we were delighted

to accept what was
a great challenge, actually,

cos so much had been talked about
and thought about this case.

In a way, it was quite unlike
any of the others.

NARRATOR: Angela went back
to the case files

to get an initial understanding
of the attack.

Stephen and Duwayne Brooks

had been minding their own business
at the bus stop

when they'd caught the eyes
of a gang of five white youths,

evidently racist
in the language they were using.

Ancl Stephen got surrounded
by this gang,

kicked, punched and knifed twice.

Stephen was fatally injured
in that attack

while him and Duwayne Brooks were
trying to escape their attackers.

NARRATOR: Angela brought together
a team to review the evidence.

Forensic examiner April Robson,
hair evidence expert Deb Hopwood...

...and fibre and particle examiner
Roger Robson.

The scientists knew this was
probably gonna be the last time,

erm, we were gonna get
to try and find the evidence.

Everybody else had failed,

and it just takes that little bit
of extra perseverance, really.

If the evidence is there,
we should be able to find it.

We were aware that there was an
enormous amount of additional trauma

that the family had been through

because of all the various legal
stages and enquiries and so on.

So we were going to give it
our very best shot.

NARRATOR: Four years before Angela
had joined the cold case team,

a judge had led a public inquiry
into the original investigation.

REPORTER: This was
supposed to be the final word

on a disastrously incompetent
police inquiry.

NARRATOR: After hearing
extensive evidence,

Lord MacPherson had reported

that the Metropolitan Police's
search for Stephen's killers

had been marred
by "professional incompetence"

and "institutional racism."

Key, now,
to getting justice for Stephen

would be Angela's partnership
with the experienced detective

in charge of the new inquiry,
Clive Driscoll.

Investigating a murder
is like a thousand piece jigsaw,

but the jigsaw's been thrown here,
there and everywhere,

so the scientists
have some of the pieces,

the police have some of the pieces,

the witnesses
have some of the pieces,

some of the pieces are exhibits.

Ancl that's exactly what happens.

You're just putting it all together
so the jury can see the picture.

NARRATOR: For both Clive and Angela,

the first piece of the jigsaw
was the crime scene.

Nearly 20 years on,

they are meeting up again at the
spot where Stephen was attacked.

I always feel quite sad when I come
back here, funnily enough,

because it's almost like a memory.

Even when I drive through here
occasionally,

I always get a bit of a sad feeling,
really. Yeah.

Young Stephen lost his life here,
and...

It's the normality of it

which makes it even more horrific
in a way, isn't it?

A nice suburban street

and that sort of awful sort of thing
that can happen.

If we look over there,
that's Dickson Road.

That's where the attack took place,

and if you look down the road
to the zebra crossing,

that's where the five or six lads
ran across the road.

Ancl once the attack took place,
they then ran, crossing over,

and Stephen got just a bit further
down the road there,

where, in fact, his injuries
caused him to lose his life.

Stephen wouldn't have known
what was about to happen to him.

He had headphones on.

They were running across the road,

and they all actually just descended
like a pack of wolves.

Stephen was stabbed twice.

The first injury actually
went down here by the clavicle

and severed the artery there.

The next injury came up there
and actually severed another artery.

He had lots of bruising,
he had lots of other marks on him,

and you've got someone
who's obviously,

as we all would be
if we were attacked,

your heart goes faster.

Then he did the most normal,
natural thing you could ever do.

He's running away from danger
which made his heart pump faster.

The worst thing he could have clone

but so understandable
why he'd clone it.

So understandable.
Absolutely.

NARRATOR: But in 2006, when taking
on the forensics for the cold case,

Angela was aware
that there was a problem.

In the 1990s, there had been
no effective scientific evidence

leading to Stephen's killers.

Angela knew this because
she had already investigated

and found nothing.

Stephen's parents,
Neville and Doreen Lawrence,

had had their doubts

about the competence
of the police investigation

from the very beginning.

You've got to remember there
were stereotypes of young Black men.

He didn't fit the stereotype,

and it's not a stereotype
that I was aware of.

I knew that police
and the community and society

suggest a stereotype
of young Black men.

Ancl he didn't fit that at all.

Stephen was a high achiever,
he was gonna be an architect.

He hadn't been in
any sort of trouble,

he was incredibly well-loved

and liked by his immediate family
and those around him.

So it wasn't long before the family
started to become a bit cynical

about the police response
and what they were doing,

and then they came to the conclusion

that perhaps it was because it was
a Black man who had been killed,

and they were a Black family,

that somehow they were not
getting the treatment

that others in the community got.

If it had been a white boy,

they would have
surrounded the Black community,

they would have arrested
as many Black boys as they could,

and they would not stop
until they get the killer.

NARRATOR: Although arrests were made
about two weeks after the murder...

...the suspects were soon released.

Well, I believe in fairness,

and I don't think what happened
today is fair at all.

When it became clear

that the CPS were not going
to progress with a prosecution,

the Lawrence family decided

that they were going to take out
a private prosecution,

and that was when I was contacted in
1995 by lmran Khan, their solicitor.

In all murder cases,
the key bits of evidence,

the one that nails you in the end,
is the forensics.

If you get the forensics right,

all of the other stuff
is icing on the cake.

Ancl so we had to look
at the forensic evidence

to see what could be found.

I was asked to go and check the work

that had been clone
at the police laboratory,

just to see whether everything had
been clone that could've been clone.

Ancl the searches at that time

focused very much
on tiny textile fibre fragments

that could have been transferred
from the suspects' clothing

to Stephen's clothing.

It was reason that, in the time
that he ran down the road,

not many of any fibre fragments,

which would have been transferred
to him immediately beforehand,

would have
had time to drop off and be lost,

whereas because the clothing
from the suspects hadn't been seized

for about two weeks
after the attack,

anything that might've been
transferred to them

on the night in question
could easily have been lost.

Ancl so the focus was very much
on looking for suspect fibres

on Stephen's clothing.

Ancl so I checked those,
but in the end of the clay,

didn't really come up
with any more evidence

than the original scientists
had found.

NARRATOR: This lack
of forensic evidence

had dealt a massive blow
to the family's hopes

of bringing a prosecution
against the suspects.

And when the judge ruled

that evidence
from Stephen's friend Duwayne,

identifying the suspects,

was inadmissible,
the case collapsed.

We knew then that was it.
We couldn't prosecute ever again.

NARRATOR: The three men acquitted
in the private prosecution

were now protected by law from ever
being tried for the murder again.

And there appeared to be no forensic
evidence to catch the murderers.

Many now believed
that the killers of Stephen Lawrence

would never be brought to justice.

But the one thing

that I've learnt about
forensic science over the years

is that you never say never.

NARRATOR I It was 2006.

Forensic expert Dr Angela Gallop
had been called in to find evidence

in one of the most notorious
cold cases in British history.

The racist murder
of Stephen Lawrence.

Stephen had been stabbed to death

while waiting for a bus
in South London

in April 1993.

Angela found that the senior
cold case detective, Clive Driscoll,

believed his new research
at the crime scene

had given him a fresh insight
into the murder.

I used to come down here a lot.

I spent loads of time
walking up and down

and trying to work out
where we were and what had happened.

Ancl one of the things that I quickly
worked out was there were...

If you took the longest time,
someone said it was a minute,

if you took the shortest time,

someone said it was over and clone
with in a couple of seconds.

And, erm... we re-enacted it,
and we formed the opin...

Ancl I still believe this
to this clay,

that it was about
between 15 and 23 seconds,

which is, for your world,
transference...

Yeah.
..and people...

It's a long time!
It's a long time, yeah.

Ancl I felt that,

you know, certainly,
from what I'd read from,

you know, the previous scientists...

that they'd... that they'd
always felt it was a brief attack.

Well, I didn't.

And, in fact,
Professor Gallop immediately said,

"Yeah, this isn't a brief attack.

"There's greater opportunities

"for transference
of all types of material."

You could begin to see
that, actually, the attack

would have taken place
over a bit of a period of time,

and there would have been plenty
of opportunity for,

particularly, contact between
clothing of the assailants

and... and Stephen's clothing.

And... And so,
that was ream], for us,

the start of being able
to look at this

in a different way
with Professor Gallop's team.

NARRATOR: Angela and her team
now had to explore the idea

that there had been greater contact
between the attackers and Stephen

than first assumed.

She decided to focus
on the possible transfer

of textile fibres from clothing.

Textile fibres
are an incredibly important source

of forensic evidence,
much underrated, I always think.

Because all the time,
most of our clothing

is shedding these tiny fragments
as we move about,

as we come into contact
with other surfaces.

They can be a fantastic way
of showing a connection

between clothing of one person,
clothing of another.

Some fibres you can see,

but the vast majority
are so small and microscopic,

you just wouldn't know what's sat
on the surface of your own garments,

and what then has potential
to transfer to somebody else's.

Which is a nightmare for a criminal,
it's great for a forensic scientist.

We were aware that the defendant's
clothing hadn't been seized

for at least two weeks
after the of fence.

So arguably, you would expect most
of the evidence to have been lost.

However, Stephen's clothing had been
seized and packaged immediately,

so hopefully they were a good source
of potential evidence,

even though we were aware

that they had already been
previously examined.

My role was to re-examine
all the exhibits.

We started off
with Stephen's exhibits.

So, again, we taped the exhibits,

and then we looked
at his exhibits for blood.

Ancl it was only then,

when I started looking at
the tapings from Stephen's clothing,

that I realised
that what I was identifying

was a lot of red fibres,
red cottons, and red synthetics.

Ancl at the time, it wasn't obvious
where they were from,

but then we realised
that Stephen's polo shirt,

that he was wearing three or four
layers down, were shedding fibres.

What it told us
was that these red fibres

might be worth looking for
on the suspects' clothing.

Because they were on the outside
of his outer clothing,

erm... and therefore,
available for transfer to anybody

who came into contact with him.

NARRATOR: This was
the initial breakthrough

that Clive Driscoll needed.

I can remember the phone call
because she... she actually said,

"We found thousands," was her words,
"of red fibres."

Ancl I said, "Oh, it's probably
the ambulance blanket."

Ancl she said, "No, it ain't."
She said, "It's a different colour."

That was his third shirt...
was shedding all over.

So, if it shed
from the third shirt outwards,

the chances of it going further
on other people's clothing

must be an opportunity.

In one way or another,
the fibres from the polo shirt

were transferring to other garments
that he was wearing,

and therefore they were sitting
on the surface of his jacket,

giving us the potential

to then look for those red cotton
and red polyester fibres

on the assailants.

NARRATOR: But the team would need
to analyse the suspects' clothes...

thread by thread.

We take an exhibit,

and in
a controlled laboratory environment,

the item of clothing
comes out of the bag.

We usually have it laid
on a piece of brown paper

just to collect anything
that might fall off.

And then we meticulously
work our way across the garment

with pieces of tape,

and each piece of tape
is then sealed

under an acetate sheet.

From there,
we then used low power microscopy

to look at each of those pieces
of tape,

mark up fibres
that may be of interest,

and then individually remove them
one by one.

NARRATOR: Among the clothes

were items belonging
to two of the original suspects,

David Norris,
and his friend, Gary Dobson.

But Dobson had already been
acquitted of the murder

in the trial which followed
the private prosecution

brought by Stephen's family.

I started looking at Dobson's jacket
for these red fibres,

and I found 11 fibres
that were very similar

to Stephen's polo shirt.

They were then sent
for additional analysis.

So I then looked at the sweatshirt
of David Norris

and found one red fibre
that was similar,

and again,
that was sent off for analysis.

NARRATOR: The analysis
found that these fibres

matched Stephen's red polo shirt.

Ancl that led us to think,

"Well, if we're finding
these fibres,

"you know, from Stephen's
clothing on the suspect,

"well, let's look for
some other types of fibres

"from his clothing on them."

NARRATOR: The team then found fibres
from Stephen's jacket

on Gary Dobson's clothing.

And green fibres
from Stephen's corduroy trousers

on the sweatshirt
that David Norris had been wearing

on the night of the attack.

Now we were beginning to amass quite
an amount of textile fibre evidence.

NARRATOR: But textile fibre evidence
alone

would not be enough to prove murder.

And despite many more days and weeks
hunched over a microscope,

the team could find nothing more
on the tapings

from Dobson's jacket
or Norris' sweatshirt.

So if they wanted to pursue
this lead further,

they needed a moment of inspiration.

These items of clothing
have been in packaging,

and they've been taken out
of packaging, put back into it,

lots of times over the years.

And, so, maybe,
what we should be doing

is having a look at
the original packaging itself.

NARRATOR: The team began
to carefully remove

tiny pieces of debris
from corners of the packaging

in which the suspects' clothes
had been stored.

They were searching for
more red fibres from Stephen's top.

But they found something which
appeared to be even more crucial.

So, we went
into every nook and crevice

just to make sure
we got everything out of there.

Ancl we were pretty surprised
to find a flake of blood.

NARRATOR: The blood in the bag
was attached to tiny blue fibres

which didn't match the clothes
that had been stored there.

Finding that tiny fragment of blood
joined to a fibre of interest

was huge.

Almost something that
you couldn't imagine would happen

other than in a drama.

Blood had never been found before,
so it was a great eureka moment.

NARRATOR: It was the first blood
evidence to be found in the case.

And it had been found
in a bag...

containing the jacket
from the suspect...

Gary Dobson.

NARRATOR: Forensic expert
Dr Angela Gallop and her team

were working on the re-investigation

into the 1993 murder
of teenager Stephen Lawrence.

Painstaking searches
of two of the suspects' clothes

had found fibres
from one of Stephen's tops,

suggesting the men
may have been present at the attack.

Then, while searching
for more fibres

in packaging containing evidence,

the scientists found something
even more intriguing.

We came across a flake of blood,

running through which
were two textile fibres.

Ancl looking at these two fibres,
they were both of blue acrylic.

We immediately went and compared
them with Stephen's clothing

and discovered that they matched the
fibres constituting his cardigan,

he was wearing
a blue acrylic cardigan at the time.

Ancl this flake of blood,

the packaging this had come from
was from Gary Dobson's jacket.

NARRATOR: The blood flake
was sent for a DNA test.

While waiting for the result,

the team continued its search
of the clothes.

Finding a flake of blood like that
in packaging,

we would expect to find the
blood stain from which it originated

on the jacket itself.

Ancl so we went back to the jacket,

which had already been examined
several times

by the original scientists, by us,
probably more than once.

So we knew whatever the remains
of this blood flake looked like,

it would be tiny.

So, I started to examine
Dobson's jacket

in much more detail
under the microscope.

And the tayimgs that we'd taken

gave us the areas
to target very specifically.

Ancl so this was a bit of job to do,
and particularly, in this case,

because this jacket was grey
coloured, and the grey came about

because there were sort of
two individual constituent fibres.

There were black fibres
and white fibres,

and so together, to the naked eye,
they looked grey,

but actually, under the microscope,
they looked black or white.

Ancl so searching this jacket

was an absolute nightmare
under the microscope

because your eyes
were constantly adjusting

between the black fibres
and the white fibres.

And so, it was...
quite a tiring process to do.

This is painstaking, this is new,

they were not going to leave
any fibre unlooked at.

And so, it was described to me
as a process that would take weeks

going through every single stitch
of a jacket

to see whether
there was any blood on it.

It showed the thoroughness
with which the forensic team worked.

NARRATOR: But the team's patience...

paid off.

I found a very tiny...
What looked like a bloodstain

on the back of the collar
of Dobson's jacket.

That spot of blood was miniscule,

and it could easily
have been missed.

But the fact that the forensic team
put that amount of time,

and the resources were put in,

indicates the strength and depth
of that team and their commitment

in making sure that
that evidence saw the light of day.

NARRATOR: If it was a bloodstain
from the murder,

why was it on the inside back collar
of the suspect's jacket?

It seemed an unusual place.

But Angela had studied
the way blood is transferred

during a violent assault
with a knife.

Being inside the back of the neck
of the jacket

was not particularly surprising,

because that is the sort of place

that if you're going to get blood
or tiny blood droplets

flicked off a knife
that's been used to stab someone,

it may very often
go down the back of clothing

because as the hand comes back
from the first injury,

and it reaches the end
of its trajectory,

there can be a little judder
before it's brought forward again

for another... another blow.

Ancl that's the point
at which tiny droplets of blood

can come off the knife blade

and then go onto the back
of the perpetrators' clothing.

NARRATOR: As April and Angela waited
for the DNA result on the blood,

their colleague,
forensic hair expert Deb Hopwood,

was hard at work
in another laboratory.

I was presented with
what we call the retained material,

and these were in the form
of tape lifts

that were taken during the
original examination of the items.

Tape lifts taken during
the re-examination

and also debris that
had been collected along the way

from these examinations.

We examined over 600 hairs

in relation to the retained material
from Stephen's clothing.

On the Norris and Dobson,

we were looking at
about 1,500 hairs,

so it was a massive undertaking.

We noticed on Stephen's clothing

that there were
quite a lot of short, cut hairs

of the type that you get
when you've had a recent haircut.

Ancl so we were quite interested
to see

whether any of these could have
been transferred to the suspects.

When I looked at the retained
materials from David Norris,

there were two short fragments
of very deeply pigmented hair

that appeared to me

to be more like they could be
Asian or Afro-Caribbean in origin.

Here, we potentially had
some very significant evidence.

NARRATOR: Although tiny,
one of these two hair fragments

appeared to hold a forensic secret.

One of them
was approximately 2mm in length,

and the other was 1 mm.

And when I examined the 1 mm fragment

under high power microscopy

it appeared to have
a tiny amount of blood

on the cut end.

But the blood and the hair fragment
were just too tiny

to do anything further with.

NARRATOR: So Deb concentrated
on the 2mm fragment of hair.

It could be large enough
to identify who it belonged to.

But the fact that it was a piece
of hair left over after a haircut,

meant there was a problem.

Because these hairs had been cut,

there was no root
or any additional root material

that we might generate
a DNA profile from.

And our only realistic hope

of getting any further information
out of these hairs

was to forward them
for mitochondrial sequencing.

NARRATOR: Mitochondrial DNA links
only to a person's mother's side

but would still be
important evidence.

The hair was sent
to the United States

to be analysed
in a specialist laboratory.

While the team waited
for the result,

April Robson received a message.

The blood she had found
on Gary Dobson's collar

had been tested...

and the result was back.

I remember quite vividly

when the reporting scientist
came into the room

and asked me to follow him
into a quiet room,

and he told me at that stage

that the DNA profile had come back
as Stephen's.

I just remember
quite a chilling feeling,

erm... because, although we thought
it could have been from Stephen,

actually getting that,
obtaining that DNA result

was extremely powerful.

I remember we had to check it,
double-check it,

and probably triple-checked it

before we actually told
the Senior Investigating Officer

about the result.

We passed on the message
about the blood

to the Metropolitan Police,
and in particular, to Clive Driscoll

who was the Senior Investigator.

At a very poignant moment,
he just happened to be

in a memorial service
to Stephen at the time.

NARRATOR: The result was confirmed

as the family marked the
15th anniversary of Stephen's death

with a church memorial service.

Clive Driscoll was looking at
a photo of Stephen on the altar

when his phone rang.

I was actually looking down
the aisle at Stephen,

when I was told
that we'd just found Stephen's blood

on Gary Dobson's jacket.

The evidence of blood DNA is the
best evidence you can get, really.

The finding of the blood
on Gary Dobson's jacket

was a really critical moment
in the whole re-investigation

cos here, for the first time
in all these years,

we had got blood
that could have come from Stephen.

So, Stephen injured
and Gary Dobson there at the time.

NARRATOR: There was now
fibre evidence

against Gary Dobson
and David Norris...

and Stephen's blood
on Dobson's jacket.

But there was more to come.

Hair expert Deb Hopwood
received a phone call

from the laboratory in America

which had been investigating
the tiny piece of cut hair

she had found on Norris' clothes.

The hair...

was a match for Stephen's DNA.

And I have to say
that was quite a moment

after almost three years' work

to find such a crucial piece
of evidence.

I think the team went home happy
that day.

So, now we have textile fibres

linking both Dobson and Norris
to the attack.

We've also got some blood on Dobson,

erm... which could have come
from Stephen,

and we've got a hair on Norris

which could have come
from Stephen as well.

That showed that they were there
at the time Stephen was attacked,

and Stephen was murdered.

NARRATOR: The arrests of Norris
and Dobson

turned up the pressure
on the forensic team

to ensure their evidence
was watertight.

They also had a hurdle
to overcome...

Gary Dobson had already been
acquitted of the murder

back in 1996.

Unless they could persuade a court,

he would not be allowed to stand
trial for the same of fence again.

NARRATOR: Dr Angela Gallop
and her forensic team

had gathered evidence
in the cold case investigation

into the racist murder
of Stephen Lawrence,

and two men had been arrested.

Things are never as simple
as you imagine.

You think that's the end of it,
but it isn't quite.

NARRATOR: One of the men,
Gary Dobson,

had already been acquitted
of the murder back in 1996.

He was protected by the law
of double jeopardy,

which had stood for centuries.

Double jeopardy is a legal principle

which says that once
you've been acquitted of a charge

you can never be charged
with it again.

So, the state gets one shot
at it -

you get prosecuted,

if you're acquitted,
that's the end of it.

NARRATOR: But over the years, the
case had had an impact on society

and played a major role
in changing the law.

In 1997, a national newspaper,
the Daily Mail,

had taken the unprecedented step
of using its front page

to accuse five men, including Dobson
and Norris, of being the murderers.

It was already high profile,
but the Daily Mail, I would argue,

running that front page
took it onto a whole new level

in terms of the profile of the case.

NARRATOR: The MacPherson Inquiry
found that the police

had been institutionally racist

at the time of the original
murder investigation.

It also recommended a change
in the law of double jeopardy.

Macpherson's report put forward that

in order for the court
to allow prosecution to go ahead

it must be satisfied that there is
new and compelling evidence,

ie, that it could lead to
the conviction.

We were very aware of all that
as we were amassing our evidence,

when it reached the point where
I think the police and the lawyers

were also happy that it represented
new and compelling evidence.

Then that was the time
that they considered

that they would have to get
the acquittal overturned

to prepare for this new trial.

NARRATOR: The new forensic evidence
against Dobson

was put before the Court of Appeal
and the judges agreed

that his acquittal
should be overturned.

There WAS enough evidence for him
to be tried again

for Stephen's murder.

Here's the law, a principle of law
that's been around for centuries,

not decades and months,
that's been completely overturned.

NARRATOR: But bringing David Norris
and Gary Dobson to justice

would depend on the accuracy
of the forensics.

REPORTER: 'The two men accused
of killing Stephen Lawrence

'were brought to the Old Bailey...'

NARRATOR: Angela's team
faced a massive task

to ensure they were ready

for one of the highest-profile
criminal trials in history.

You might think that in
this particular case

that we just had a few items
of clothing from the suspect

and the clothing that Stephen
was wearing on the night in question

and that was what we had to look at.

But actually, there was an enormous
amount of material to look at.

We had 500 tubes of DNA extract.

There were 250 pots of debris
that we'd brushed off

or picked off, or in some way
collected from all of the items

that we maker! at.
And we transferred those

onto 700 tapings.

So an enormous amount of work
was clone in this particular case.

I had to go in on a daily basis
for many months

to check all 4,500 fibres.

It can take at least an hour
to ensure that each fibre matches

or it doesn't match.

It's a long slog.

This one was probably

the highest-profile case
in the country at the time,

so naturally
you want to do a good job

and you want to make sure
you've covered every avenue.

NARRATOR: It was hard work,
but it paid off.

The forensic evidence was at
the heart of the six-week trial.

And in January 2012,

a jury found Dobson and Norris
guilty of Stephen's murder.

My memory is turning round
and seeing two lovely people,

Baroness Lawrence now
and Dr Lawrence, crying.

Ancl I can remember
just feeling for them,

because this had been years,
hadn't it? You know, for them.

It's the beginning, I think,
of starting a new life,

because we've been in limbo
for so long.

So today is where we can look
to start moving on

and just, I don't know, try and get,
take control of my life once more.

I can't ever feel elation

because I haven't
brought Stephen back, have I?

I haven't brought Stephen back,
that's what they would want.

You know,
it was a feeling more of sadness

for Baroness Lawrence
and Neville Lawrence

because how much they'd suffered.

NARRATOR: David Norris and Gary
Dobson received life sentences

for the murder of Stephen Lawrence.

But the other members of the gang
who set upon Stephen that night...

remain free.

Yes, there was a sense of, well,
what about the others?

But none of us were,
certainly Doreen wasn't,

complaining about that.

Ancl I think the way
that Clive Driscoll put it,

"Two down, the rest to go."

So it wasn't about just leaving it.

In terms of getting justice
for Stephen and his family,

this forensic evidence
was absolutely crucial,

absolutely crucial.

Without the forensic evidence,

there would not have been
a prosecution in this case,

a conviction in this case.

You can't put too much emphasis
on that.

Ancl so what Angela did
in getting that material,

putting it in a way
that was presentable to the jury,

finding it in the first place,

using the new techniques
to obtain it,

that's what led to the prosecution.
That's what gave Doreen justice.

The hope I take forward
from this case is that

we're just treated equally

and equal resources
are given to each case

and they're all investigated
on their merits.

Angela Gallop and Clive Driscoll
were quite a dynamic duo,

pretty unique, to be honest.

Ancl to be fair, I think Angela
had a pretty damn good team

of scientists around her.

Here's Young Stephen.

1974.

I always refer to him
as "Young Stephen".

And they say, "Well, he'd be
40-odd now, wouldn't he?"

I suppose he would be now, yeah.

That's how much life
he's actually lost.

We didn't give up.

We kept looking
even if everybody else had failed.

We had to work
to our highest ability

to try to bring some justice
for this bereaved family

and to be a part of the team
that was able to do that

was just quite incredible.

We lost a nice young man
from our society and for me,

I thank the Lawrence family
ancl thank Stephen's name

for the advancements
and how we've become better.

Ancl we could be better still,
but I think that his legacy

will be that we became better.

Over the years, I have been very
impressed by the Lawrence family

and how they've made
every single effort

to persuade and cajole and basically
do everything they could,

everything in their power
to make sure that the case

was properly investigated,
at the end of the clay.

Ancl so it was a lot of work,
but then in the end,

a lot of evidence
and most importantly,

it resulted in at least some sort
of closure for Stephen's family

and some justice
for Stephen himself.

So I think it was a really important
piece of work we did.

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