Starmer condemns Farage and protest violence as UK police review race guidance after Nowak murder

The murder and the police response

Henry Nowak, an 18-year-old student, was stabbed to death on 3 December 2025 while returning from a party in Southampton, on the south coast of England. His killer, 23-year-old Vickrum Digwa, was sentenced on Monday to life imprisonment with a minimum term of 21 years. Digwa had lied to police at the scene, claiming he was the victim of a racist attack and had acted in self-defence. Officers believed his account and handcuffed Nowak as he lay dying, reading him his arrest notice before later calling an ambulance and performing CPR. Court pathologists found that Nowak would have died of his injuries at the scene regardless of the emergency response.

The footage of the police intervention, released after the sentencing, has dominated British headlines and sparked a political storm about how police treat different ethnicities. Nowak's family called his treatment by police "inhumane and degrading", but his father said in a statement outside court that his death should not be "used to create further division, hatred or tension".

Violent protests in Southampton

On Tuesday night, a protest outside the police headquarters in Southampton descended into violence. Around 100 demonstrators tore down garden fences, threw bricks, flares, bottles, chairs, and bins at officers, and pushed a burning container against police lines. Eleven officers and a police dog were injured. Police responded by spraying demonstrators and striking them with riot shields. Two people were arrested. Protesters chanted "I can't breathe" — Nowak's last words — and demanded that police kneel, echoing the death of George Floyd at the hands of US police.

Home Secretary Shabana Mahmood called the violence "completely unacceptable", saying there could be "no justification for hijacking this tragedy to stir up violence and disorder". A further protest is planned outside parliament in London at midday on Wednesday.

Political fallout and Farage's intervention

Nigel Farage, the leader of the anti-immigration Reform UK party, said the case showed how police gave preferential treatment to ethnic minorities and that people should respond with "pure cold rage". During Prime Minister's Questions on Wednesday, Farage repeated his claim of a "two-tier justice system", citing anti-racism guidance issued to police. Starmer called Farage's judgement "unforgivable" and accused him of responding to a grieving family by "appealing for rage".

No matter the pain we feel, there is no justification for further violence and disorder.

The Independent reported that Farage's focus on the case is closely tied to the upcoming Makerfield by-election, a constituency in the Wigan area that is 96.7 percent white working class and voted heavily for Leave. Reform activists are actively raising the Nowak case with voters on the doorstep. Polling expert Lord Hayward told The Independent that Labour MPs were right to be nervous, saying the by-election "is going to be very tight" and that the Nowak case "will certainly have an impact".

Police review and the 'two-tier' debate

Mahmood welcomed a move by police chiefs to review the language of guidance given to officers. The National Police Chiefs' Council said they were reviewing the Police Race Action Plan, which advises officers not to be "colour blind" and was drawn up in response to well-documented incidents of racism in policing. The government denied the existence of a "two-tier" system, a topic widely discussed on social media. Mahmood said everyone was equal before the law and urged people to wait for the outcome of an investigation by the Independent Office of Police Conduct into how the incident was handled.

Elon Musk, the US billionaire and vocal critic of Britain's government and diversity policies, has posted repeatedly about the case, writing on Tuesday: "Did you know that official police policy requires them to be racist against Whites?"

Broader reactions

Festus Akinbusoye, a former police and crime commissioner for Bedfordshire and one of the first Black people elected to the role, argued in The Independent that Farage is using the killing to advance a narrative about "two-tier policing" rather than engaging with the specific facts of the case. Readers of The Independent backed warnings about political exploitation, with some focusing on operational failures — reliance on the attacker's account and delays in recognising the victim's condition — rather than systemic bias.