I CAN CALL MY BOYS..

Yob threatened black man on street where teenager was knifed

- TOM PETTIFOR

A THUG newly named as the sixth suspect in the Stephen Lawrence murder launched another racist attack in the same street just three years ago.

Chillingly, Matthew White told a black man who confronted him as he attempted to shoplift in Eltham, South-East London in 2020, that he would be "Stephen Lawrenced".

Standing in Well Hall Road, White added to the shopworker: "Remember where you are, remember what happened to Stephen Lawrence. I can call my boys, they can come down and they can deal with you."

The victim said White mentioned Stephen Lawrence, murdered in 1993, in almost every threat, at least eight or nine times, and even said he was killed at the nearby bus stop.

White later admitted to assault. A month after that attack, the Met stopped investigating Stephen's murder. A year later, White died in a bedsit aged 50. His body lay there for several days before it was discovered.

He was said to have been suicidal and had suffered an earlier overdose. Longstanding clues linking White to Stephen's murder emerged in a BBC1 documentary shown last night.

Stephen Lawrence: The Sixth Suspect also reported that White's stepfather Jack Severs told a detective in 1993 that the then 22-year-old had admitted to him that he was present.

But Mr Severs's name was not recorded correctly and he was not approached by police for 20 years.

Mr Severs, who died in 2020, was spoken to for the first time in 2013. Shocked at how long it took for police to get in touch, he remarked sarcastically to Det Chief Insp Clive Driscoll: "You're rushing this job."

Mr Severs said that in the days after Stephen's murder, his stepson acted like it was an everyday occurrence and said Stephen "had deserved it".