Home Secretary issues murdered boy plea

Schoolboy Damilola Taylor's death has shocked Britain

LONDON, England -- UK Home Secretary Jack Straw has made a direct appeal for help in tracking down the killers of a 10-year-old boy in a crime that has shocked Britain.

Mr Straw described Damilola Taylor's death as "an awful evil" after meeting staff, parents, and police during a visit to the school in Peckham, south London which the dead boy attended.

Damilola bled to death after being attacked by a group of 11 to 14-year-olds on his way home from Oliver Goldsmith Primary School on Monday.

He staggered 100 yards with blood pouring from a sliced artery in his leg after being stabbed.

Nearby workmen tried to save him but some passers-by ignored him as he lay dying on a stairwell near his council home.

Speaking outside the school, Mr Straw said: "We know young people and some adults and friends know exactly who killed Damilola Taylor.

"And what is necessary for relatives of Damilola is for these people to recognise their responsibility to this community and to Damilola's family and to provide information to the police."

Detectives are hunting three boys seen near the murder scene and forensic experts are running tests on a knife and a broken bottle.

A potentially crucial witness who may have seen the attack has since come forward. Forty detectives are working on the case.

Damilola's mother, Gloria, 49, has claimed his school did not take seriously complaints from her that he was being bullied in the days before his murder.

Schoolboy bleeds to death after attack
November 28, 2000

London Borough of Southwark
Home Office

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