{"id":619466,"date":"2026-06-03T20:00:22","date_gmt":"2026-06-03T20:00:22","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/619466\/"},"modified":"2026-06-03T20:00:22","modified_gmt":"2026-06-03T20:00:22","slug":"handcuffed-students-death-sparks-uproar-in-uk-as-far-right-accused-of-inflaming-tensions","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/619466\/","title":{"rendered":"Handcuffed student\u2019s death sparks uproar in UK, as far right accused of inflaming tensions"},"content":{"rendered":"

Summary<\/p>\n

The death of an 18-year-old student handcuffed by police as he lay dying from stab wounds has sparked national outrage in Britain.
\n Far-right leaders are accused of exploiting Henry Nowak’s murder to stoke racial tensions ahead of a crucial by-election.
\n The victim’s father pleaded for his son’s death not to be used to create division or hatred.<\/p>\n

\n AI-generated summary was reviewed by a CNN editor.<\/p>\n

\n The death of a White student<\/a> who was handcuffed by police after he had been stabbed is provoking a national outcry in Britain<\/a>, with officers under fire for their conduct and far-right leaders accused of using the teen\u2019s murder to stoke racist violence for political gain.\n <\/p>\n

\n Earlier, on Tuesday evening, that outcry spilled into clashes when hundreds of demonstrators gathered outside a police station in the southern English coastal city of Southampton, where they were stirred up by far-right activists and clashed with riot police, throwing bricks and other projectiles, injuring 11 officers<\/a>.\n <\/p>\n

\"Protestors<\/p>\n

\n They also chanted \u201cHenry, Henry,\u201d referring to 18-year-old White student Henry Nowak, who police handcuffed as he lay dying from stab wounds inflicted by Vickrum Digwa. The 23-year-old Sikh man had falsely alleged to officers that he had been the victim of a racist attack. In upsetting bodycam footage released by Hampshire Police, Nowak pleaded with officers saying, \u201cI can\u2019t breathe\u201d and \u201cI\u2019ve been stabbed.\u201d An officer replied, \u201cI don\u2019t think you have, mate.\u201d\n <\/p>\n

\n Digwa was sentenced to life in prison on Monday, concluding a case that the far-right has co-opted for its false narrative that British institutions, including the police, are biased against White Britons. Such a narrative collapses under scrutiny: White defendants, on average, serve a lower custodial sentence than other ethnicities, Black prisoners serve a greater proportion of their original sentence than other ethnic groups, while Black, Asian, mixed and other ethnic groups were more likely to be stopped and searched in London last year, according to government statistics.\n <\/p>\n

\"Hampshire<\/p>\n

\"Hampshire<\/p>\n

\n But years of anemic economic growth, Britain\u2019s long history of racism and collapsing support for the country\u2019s center-left Labour government, which was elected almost two years ago promising sweeping change it has not yet delivered, have created fertile ground for such ideas to take root.\n <\/p>\n

\n And, against the backdrop of a crucial upcoming by-election where Nigel Farage\u2019s Reform has a chance to defeat Labour leadership hopeful Andy Burnham, the hard-right populist party is wary of being outflanked by even more right-wing groups.\n <\/p>\n

\n \u201cExploiting this tragedy to create grievance and division would be wrong in any circumstances, but to do it when the family are expressly saying \u2018please don\u2019t\u2019 is unforgivable,\u201d British Prime Minister Keir Starmer said Wednesday. He directed his anger specifically toward Farage, who said the public should respond to the incident with \u201cpure cold rage.\u201d\n <\/p>\n

\n Even as Sikh community leaders condemned Digwa\u2019s crime and Nowak\u2019s father Mark stood outside the court on Monday to say he did not want his son\u2019s death \u201cto be used to create further division, hatred or tension,\u201d far-right and hard-right figures fomented such division.\n <\/p>\n

\n Nowak called the police treatment of his son \u201cshocking,\u201d and urged the government to \u201ctreat knife crime as the national emergency it is.\u201d\n <\/p>\n

\n \u201cThis is not a case about Sikhism. This is not a case about racism. This is a case about murder,\u201d he said, according to UK news agency PA Media. \u201cPeople should not be able to walk openly through the streets of Britain carrying a 21cm blade.\u201d\n <\/p>\n

\"Henry<\/p>\n

\n Nowak, a freshman finance student, was traveling home from a night out with his friends when he was killed on December 3 2025. Digwa stabbed him five times, causing significant internal bleeding from a chest wound, local police said in a statement<\/a>.\n <\/p>\n

\n Digwa then claimed in bodycam footage released by police that Nowak had grabbed his turban and subjected him to racist abuse. Nowak died at the scene, and a pathologist found that nothing could have saved his life, even if officers hadn\u2019t handcuffed him, the police statement added.\n <\/p>\n

\n Several right-wing figures capitalized on these events. Farage, whose Reform party currently leads opinion polls, posted on X that the way the police responded indicates \u201cthe fear of being called racist was greater than dealing with Henry Novak\u2019s murder.\u201d\n <\/p>\n

\n His party almost immediately unveiled a new proposed policy that would ban the anti-racist practices British police have adopted over the last few years after reviews found<\/a> some forces perpetuated a racist internal culture.\n <\/p>\n

\"Demonstrators<\/p>\n

\n Such interventions were rebutted by Dal Babu, a former chief superintendent of London\u2019s Metropolitan Police. \u201cI don\u2019t accept the assertion that\u2019s been made by far-right, anti-immigrant politicians,\u201d he told CNN.\n <\/p>\n

\n \u201cWe have with some politicians almost a two-tier citizenship issue here, where they express huge concerns when a person of color commits a crime against a White person, that they don\u2019t do when a White person commits a crime against a person of color. These are all British citizens, they just happen to be a different skin color,\u201d he said.\n <\/p>\n

\n At the same time, Babu acknowledged Nowak should never have been handcuffed, and police should have separated the two parties to establish the events. An independent investigation into the police\u2019s conduct is underway, with Starmer telling members of parliament Wednesday that \u201cthere are serious questions to answer, including how accusations of racism informed police thinking.\u201d\n <\/p>\n

\"Grab<\/p>\n

\n But that has not quelled the far-right\u2019s violence. One police officer, who wasn\u2019t involved in the case, was misidentified online and forced to relocate after receiving death threats, Home Secretary Shabana Mahmood said Tuesday.\n <\/p>\n

\n Britain\u2019s far-right has a history of hijacking incidents like this to use as fuel for their own narratives. Last year, activists capitalized on a flurry of Elon Musk posts on X to highlight historic abuse, primarily carried out by groups of men of mainly Pakistani heritage, in the northern English town of Oldham<\/a>. Musk too has weighed in on Nowak\u2019s murder, echoing Farage\u2019s assertion that racism is perceived as \u201cthe greatest offense that can be committed, even worse than rape or murder!\u201d\n <\/p>\n

\n Britain\u2019s Sikh community is already seeking to calm the tensions. \u201cAt a time when emotions are understandably raw, we urge people not to allow the actions of one murderer to divide communities or fuel hostility towards innocent people,\u201d a statement from 11 Sikh Labour lawmakers said.\n <\/p>\n

\n \u201cThe Sikh community shares the grief, shock and anger felt across the country. We mourn Henry Nowak, stand with his family, and support truth, justice and accountability.\u201d\n <\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"Summary The death of an 18-year-old student handcuffed by police as he lay dying from stab wounds has…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":619467,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[3],"tags":[59,57,58,50,56,54,55],"class_list":["post-619466","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-united-kingdom","tag-gb","tag-great-britain","tag-greatbritain","tag-news","tag-uk","tag-united-kingdom","tag-unitedkingdom"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/619466","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=619466"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/619466\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/619467"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=619466"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=619466"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=619466"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}