Nowak murder: police accused of ‘anti-white bias’ five times more likely to stop black people

Hampshire force whose officers responded to the murder of 18-year-old has a higher than average racial disparity

The police force accused of anti-white racism after officers’ response to the murder of Henry Nowak is over five times more likely to subject black people to a stop and search than white people, according to the latest figures.

The racial disparity in the Hampshire force is higher than the average for England and Wales, and has worsened in recent years.

Hampshire police have been subjected to claims of “two-tier justice” and anti-white bias after the murder of Nowak last December in Southampton by Vickrum Digwa, who falsely told officers he had been racially abused.

Digwa had stabbed the 18-year-old repeatedly, but officers arriving at the scene treated the student slumped on the ground as a suspect. He was handcuffed and arrested, despite telling officers he had been stabbed and could not breathe.

For the last year data was available, Hampshire’s officers were 5.1 times more likely to stop and search someone black than a white person. The average disproportionality rate in England and Wales was 3.8 times.

Stop and search is a controversial power, with most resulting in no detection of criminality. The fact officers are more likely to use the power against a black person has led to claims of racial bias.

In 2025-26, officers in the southern England force carried out 15,000 stops, with 60% leading to no further action or advice. The force claimed 6,000 of its stops led to a “positive outcome”, but did not define what that meant.

The racial disparity has increased in recent years in Hampshire, with black people 4.8 times more likely to be stopped than a white person in 2024-5, up from 4.1 times in 2023-4. The force has also increased its use of stop and search, up from 12,000 two years earlier.

In 2021-22, black people in Hampshire were almost eight times more likely to be stopped than white people.

When asked about two-tier policing on Thursday, the director of the Crown Prosecution Service, Stephen Parkinson, said: “There is disproportionality in the criminal justice system. There’s an evidential basis for that. We have published research by Leeds University examining prosecution decisions. We updated that the end of last year.

“It does demonstrate conclusively that there is disproportionality, by which I mean that there’s a greater likelihood of being prosecuted if you come from an ethnic group that is not white British.

“Your starting point was two-tier justice, and I think recent publicity has been along the lines of: are people