1999: *SIKH KILLING IN SCOTLAND SPARKS RACISM CHARGES
Edinburgh, March 22 - The family of a Sikh waiter stabbed to death by three whites in
Scotland launched a public appeal today to bring his killers to justice amid fresh charges
of racism in Britain's justice system. The case of Surjit Chhokar, whose killers remain
free, has sparked a feud between Scotland's top legal figures and elicited comparisons
with another recent high-profile race case, the murder of Stephen Lawrence, a young black.
The Chhokar case comes less than a month after a damning government report that accused
Britain's police of 'institutional racism'. Chhokar was murdered by three whites last
November on a street in the central Scottish town of Wishaw. Police held three suspects,
but charged only one, and he was freed earlier this month in a trial after blaming the
other two suspects for the murder. The suspect who was charged in the Chhokar killing, 30
years old Ronnie Coulter, was convicted of assault by a jury, but allowed to go free
because he had already spent four months in jail awaiting trial. Scotland's top judge,
Lord McCluskey, who served as the Chhokar case's trial judge, publicly attacked the
prosecution's handling of the case : "A man was murdered in a public street by one or
more persons who have been discussed at this trial. For reasons I cannot begin to
understand, only one of these persons was placed in the dock... that is a matter which,
for me, as a judge of considerable experience, passes my understanding
altogether...".
[ *Courtesy : Reuters, The Indian Express, March 23, 1999 ]