Swift apology welcome, but police have lessons to learn

imon San was a 40-year-old delivery driver working in Edinburgh’s Lochend Road. Last August, he was subjected to a vicious gang attack from which he died. The assault followed a series of other incidents which his family had reported to the police. One of the attackers, 16-year-old John Reid, admitted culpable homicide. He was sentenced to five years’ imprisonment by a judge who said that Reid and the others had acted “like a pack of animals”.

Mr San’s family had always maintained that his death was racially motivated. Indeed, the fatal assault was accompanied by racist abuse. Yet the police did not record and investigate the attack at the time as a racist incident. Yesterday, Lothian and Borders Police acknowledged that it should have done so. With it came a fulsome statement of apology after an internal inquiry found “significant failings” in its probe into the killing.

The statement rejected the cliched explanation of the victim being “in the wrong place at the wrong time”. Simon, it said, “was at his place of work in a city that was his home. He was playing his part as an active member of our community”.

The statement acknowledged that the police should have recognised the racist abuse and that they were sorry the victim’s family had “not received the service to which they are entitled” from the force.

So was this another example of institutional racism? Many may suspect so. But the police may have responded as they did for another reason. They may well have felt that the element of racial aggravation paled before the fact that they were engaged in a murder inquiry and that the punishment for an attack resulting in death is severe. Ironically, had Mr San escaped with injuries, it is probable that police would have pursued the issue of racial abuse with greater vigour.

But, as this was a murder investigation, the charge of culpable homicide was strong enough without an additional charge of racial aggravation.

However, such a justification for the police not acting on the family’s complaints is flawed in two key respects. First, such are the public sensitivities in cases involving alleged racial aggravation that the complaints should have been investigated. And second, if for some reason the more serious charge of culpable homicide had been unsuccessful, those involved in the assault would not have been held to account for the allegations of racist behaviour.

These points notwithstanding, the mea culpa from the police was full. It was unreserved. And it came quickly. The family has called for a Crown inquiry. But in the light of the police acknowledgment and apology, it is difficult to see what value would accrue from further investigation. The family has had its concerns addressed. It has rightfully won a victory. It should accept the apology. And the police should mark and learn an important lesson as a guide to future behaviour.