Vickrum Digwa, an Indian-origin 23-year-old man living in the United Kingdom, has been sentenced to life with a minimum of 21 years in prison earlier this week, after stabbing 18-year-old Henry Nowak to death. The British police, with the permission of Nowak’s family, released a body camera footage from December showing the officers putting handcuffs on the teenager while he repeatedly tells them, “I can’t breathe”. The video showed him lying injured on a pavement on a residential street in the southern England coastal city of Southampton.
The viral footage showed the law enforcement officers dismissing Nowak when he said he was stabbed.
“You’ve been stabbed? Wherabouts?” said one of the officers “Don’t think you have, mate.”
The clip also showed Digwa standing a few steps away after he had reported to the police that he was subjected to a racist attack by Nowak.
Life sentence for Digwa
A UK court earlier this week ruled that Digwa was lying about the racist attack.
Nowak, who was a first-year student at the University of Southampton, was apparently out with friends when he was stabbed. As police arrived at the scene after Digwa’s complaint of a racist assault, they found Nowak held up by someone who said he had a mouthful of blood.
Digwa also told the police he was injured as he pointed to his eyelids, which he alleged was swollen. He claimed Nowak knocked off his turban and pulled his hair.
Officers laid Nowak on his side and searched for stab wounds after handcuffing him. The last words Nowak apparently heard were one of the officers saying he was arrested for assault and reading him his rights.
According to law enforcement, once the police discovered his injuries, they uncuffed him and started CPR.
The Southampton Crown Court convicted Digwa of murder with Judge William Mousley telling him that he didn’t believe Nowak was racist towards him.
“You are the only person to make that claim, and it is completely at odds with his previous character,” said the judge.
Mark Nowak, Henry’s father, said that the case was not about racism or religion, and that he wanted his death to lead to safer streets and not be used to create “further division, hatred or tension”.
Digwa’s mother, 53-year-old Kiran Kaur, was also convicted with the charge of assisting an offender after trying to hide the murder weapon. Her sentencing will be on July 17.
Protests in UK
Several citizens attended a demonstration outside a Southampton police station on Tuesday, reacting to Nowak’s arrest and subsequent death, with many chanting “I can’t breathe”.
Many stormed the area where the 18-year-old was killed and clashed with riot police, pelting them with chairs, rocks, and flares.
Prime Minister Keir Starmer said he was sickened by the video and said the police had to provide answers about how “accusations of racism informed the decision-making in this case”.
Leader of the anti-immigration Reform UK Party Nigel Farage urged people to respond to the incident with “pure cold rage”, calling for an end to “anti-white prejudice” and the promotion of the idea “that white lives matter just as much as Black lives”.
Home Secretary Shabana Mahmood rejected the claims that there were different policing standards for different communities and appealed to members of Parliament to not “allow this murder to turn communities against one another”.
