Murder of Rolan Adams

Those who knew Rolan described him as a good student, dedicated football player, and talented musician. At the time of his death at age 15, Rolan was preparing to take his pre-university exams, had been scouted by a professional football club, West Ham United, and was working on recording original music he wrote.{{Cite web |title="In the Matter of the Undercover Policing Inquiry before Sir John Mitting" |url=https://www.ucpi.org.uk/wp-content/uploads/2020/11/20201025-Opening_Statement-Saunders_DPG_CP_clients-RMQC.pdf. |website=ucpi.org}} Rolan's family moved to Abbey Wood, an area in Southeast London, five years prior to his death. At the time of the crime, Rolan was responsible for taking care of his younger brother, Nathan, and his younger sister, Lauren, while his parents were at work.

File:2017 Thamesmead aerial view 01.jpg, the area where Rolan Adams was murdered]]

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Thamesmead, where Rolan was murdered, was predominately populated by white families with some Asian and Caribbean families scattered throughout. The immigration of black people to England increased in the late 1940s and 1950s, leading to racial tensions in the following decades. In the areas around Thamesmead, certain housing policies favored white people and created a hostile environment for people of color.{{Cite journal |last=Jacobs |first=Keith |date=1999 |title=Institutional Housing Practices and Racism: the Brook Estate, Eltham |url=http://dx.doi.org/10.1093/hwj/1999.48.198 |journal=History Workshop Journal |volume=48 |issue=1 |pages=198–201 |doi=10.1093/hwj/1999.48.198 |pmid=21387849 |issn=1477-4569|url-access=subscription }} Reported racially motivated violence in Southeast London was increasing in the 1990s,{{Cite journal |last=Badger |first=D. |date=2002-12-01 |title=Reparation and Victim-focused Social Work, Brian Williams (ed.), London, Jessica Kingsley, 2001, pp 192, 1 84310 023 1, pound15.95 |url=http://dx.doi.org/10.1093/bjsw/32.8.1130 |journal=British Journal of Social Work |volume=32 |issue=8 |pages=1130–1131 |doi=10.1093/bjsw/32.8.1130 |issn=0045-3102|url-access=subscription }} and Thamesmead itself had started to develop a reputation for being "racially charged." This was also in part due to the headquarters of the far-right British Nationalist Party being in nearby Welling. The extremist party had a reputation for fascist or racist ideologies.{{Cite book |date=2013-07-03 |editor-last=Copsey |editor-first=Nigel |editor2-last=Macklin |editor2-first=Graham |title=British National Party |url=http://dx.doi.org/10.4324/9780203830192 |doi=10.4324/9780203830192|isbn=9781136820625 }} Adolescent gangs with these beliefs developed in areas throughout Southeast London. These often dangerous groups grew between the 1980s and 1990s. One main gang called the Goldfish was also known as the NTO, the Nutty Turn Out, and then later evolved into the Nazi Turn-Outs.{{Citation |title=Greenwich and its racial murders |date=2005-06-23 |url=http://dx.doi.org/10.1017/cbo9780511489198.003 |work=White Backlash and the Politics of Multiculturalism |pages=35–55 |publisher=Cambridge University Press |doi=10.1017/cbo9780511489198.003 |isbn=9780521817684 |access-date=2022-11-15|url-access=subscription }} This group is attributed as being Rolan's assailants.

On Friday 21 February 1991, Rolan Adams and his brother Nathan, fifteen and fourteen years old respectively, were unknowingly being followed as they walked from Thamesmead's multicultural Hawksmoor Youth Centre. They had finished playing table tennis and were going to a bus stop to get to their home in Abbey Wood, Southeast London. Upon arrival at the bus stop, they were surrounded by a large group of 12-15 older white youths, members of the NTOs, who had been drinking at the Wildfowler Pub. While Rolan and Nathan were being harassed and racially abused, one gang member, nineteen-year-old Mark Thornborrow, stabbed Rolan in the neck with a butterfly knife. In an attempt to flee, Rolan started to run while yelling at Nathan to do the same. The two got separated. The gang members were chasing and yelling profanities and racial slurs at them, including "'niggers'". Nathan managed to escape, but Rolan collapsed and died soon afterwards. When Nathan returned to the bus stop, he saw his brother dead.

From the start of the trial, there was hesitation to admit that the crime was racially motivated. The police and the CPS (Crown Prosecution Service) instead determined that the crime was a battle over gang territory. Nathan and Rolan were not seen as victims but identified as guilty parties by the police, because of the racist stereotype that "Black boys cannot be innocent."{{better source needed|date=September 2024}} As a result of this harmful generalisation, Nathan was treated poorly by the authorities. Although he was also attacked, none of the gang members was prosecuted for assaulting him. Eight of the youths who participated in the murder were arrested on charges of violent disorder.{{Cite journal |last=West |first=E. James |date=2019-09-02 |title=Roil Britannia! Al Sharpton, the British Press, and the 1991 Murder of Rolan Adams |url=https://doi.org/10.1080/02619288.2020.1781623 |journal=Immigrants & Minorities |volume=37 |issue=3 |pages=184–210 |doi=10.1080/02619288.2020.1781623 |s2cid=225067189 |issn=0261-9288|url-access=subscription }} Only Mark Thornborrow stood trial, was charged, and convicted of murder. The sentencing judge, Kenneth Richardson,{{Cite journal |title=statewatch-vol4-no4-julyaug-1994-20-pp |url=http://dx.doi.org/10.1163/2210-7975_hrd-4679-0016 |access-date=2022-11-22 |website=Human Rights Documents online|doi=10.1163/2210-7975_hrd-4679-0016 |url-access=subscription }} eventually concluded that the murder was racially motivated and sentenced Thornborrow accordingly.

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Rolan's family stated that local officials and authorities displayed a lack of support following his murder. They received threatening phone calls from people gloating about Rolan's death and a letter with the message, "glad a nigger is dead." The harassment of the Adams and their friends and family was getting extreme, and there was an absence of any police protection. Eventually, the local authorities and the local Commission for Racial Equality advised them that they were in danger. That night, three months following the murder, they left their home.{{Cite book |last=Ali |first=Hakim |title=African and Caribbean People in Britain: A History |publisher=Penguin Books Limited |year=2022 |location=London}} The Adams family also claimed to have been under surveillance by the police. Richard, Audrey, and Nathan Adams were all later involved with the Undercover Policing Inquiry. This effort against the High Court of England aimed to bring to light and seek justice for the fact that the British police were spying on victims of crime and their families. Audrey Adams, in one interview, described their experience and the way they were treated as "horrific."{{Cite web |date=2021-03-19 |title=Rolan Adams' family says police should not be given more powers |url=https://www.channel4.com/news/rolan-adams-family-says-police-should-not-be-given-more-powers |access-date=2022-11-29 |website=Channel 4 News |language=en-GB}}

As a result of the injustices they experienced, Rolan's mother and father, Richard and Audrey, and extended family and friends, created the Rolan Adams Family Campaign to ensure justice. This grew over the years and extended support to other victims of racist violence and racism. Moreover, it contributed to shutting down the British National Party's headquarters in Welling. Police were hostile to the campaign, and stopped friends and family from visiting the Adams for months. Despite opposition and in an effort to keep Rolan's memory alive, a tradition of holding a candlelit vigil where Rolan was murdered on the anniversary of his death was established by his family. Individuals would pray silently and lay wreaths in Rolan's memory. However, this ended in 2001 when the mourners were harassed. Spectators sounded their car horns, and one individual threw a McDonald's milkshake at them as they were standing silently.

The black American activist Reverend Al Sharpton came to London to hold a meeting in support of the Adams family. However, the BNP used the situation to their advantage, marched through Thamesmead, and attacked the meeting. Sharpton's efforts were met with mixed responses from local black rights activists, but brought more media attention to Rolan's murder.

The UK Parliament responded later to the murder by bringing up a motion on his behalf on February 16, 1993. This was an effort to send condolences to his family and to start a discussion concerning a memorial to victims of racial violence. No amendments were officially submitted as a result.{{Cite web |title="Early Day Motions Rolan Adams" |url=https://edm.parliament.uk/early-day-motion/6509/rolan-adams. |website=edm.parliament.uk}}

Other racially motivated murders of youth in southeast London during this period drew comparisons from the public to Rolan's murder. In July 1992, Rohit Duggal, a 16-year-old British Asian boy, was stabbed to death outside a kebab shop on Well Hall Road by a white youth; the attack was believed to be racially motivated and triggered protests in the area against the British National Party.{{cite news |last1=Schoon |first1=Nicholas |last2=Walker |first2=Nick |title=Police appeal for calm after racist murder: Third teenager killed in London borough |url=https://www.independent.co.uk/news/uk/police-appeal-for-calm-after-racist-murder-third-teenager-killed-in-london-borough-1456991.html |access-date=6 April 2025 |publisher=The Independent |date=22 April 1993}}{{cite web |last1=Greenwich Mural Workshop |title=Remember Rohit Duggal |url=https://collections.vam.ac.uk/item/O1260320/remember-rohit-duggal-poster-greenwich-mural-workshop/ |website=V&A Explore the Collections |publisher=Victoria & Albert Museum |access-date=6 April 2025}} The death of another black youth, Stephen Lawrence, happened on 22 April 1993. He and his friend, Duwayne Brooks, were together that afternoon and were headed home. They arrived at the bus stop in Well Hall Road at about 10:30 pm. Stephen went to check to see if the bus was coming, and he was in a position where he was standing in the middle of the entrance of Dickson Road. Duwayne was standing between Dickson Road and the roundabout when he saw a group of five or six white youths. He asked Stephen if he saw the bus coming. One of the white youths heard something Duwayne said and shouted, "what, what nigger?" The group then proceeded to run towards Duwayne and Stephen. At this time, either one or more of the white youths stabbed Stephen twice. Durwayne called out to Stephen to run and follow him. He ran towards Shooters Hill and Stephen managed to get on his feet and run over one hundred yards to the point where he collapsed. Stephen had stab wounds on both sides of his body, on the chest and arm, to a depth of about five inches. Both stab wounds had severed axillary arteries.{{Cite web |date=February 1999 |title=The Stephen Lawrence Inquiry |url=https://assets.publishing.service.gov.uk/government/uploads/system/uploads/attachment_data/file/277111/4262.pdf |website=assets.publishing.service.gov}} His death had several similarities to Rolan's but was more widely publicized.{{Cite journal |last1=Holohan |first1=Siobhan |last2=Featherstone |first2=Mark |date=2003 |title=Multiculturalism, Institutional Law, and Imaginary Justice |url=http://link.springer.com/10.1023/A:1023005007087 |journal=Law and Critique |volume=14 |issue=1 |pages=1–27 |doi=10.1023/A:1023005007087|s2cid=140268946 |url-access=subscription }}

{{Reflist}}

{{Murders in the United Kingdom in the 1990s}}

{{DEFAULTSORT:Adams, Rolan}}

Category:1975 births

Category:1991 murders in the United Kingdom

Category:Incidents of violence against boys

Category:Racially motivated violence against black people in Europe

Category:Racially motivated violence in England

Category:Anti-black racism in England

Category:1990s murders in London

Category:History of the Royal Borough of Greenwich

Category:Crime in the Royal Borough of Greenwich