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I tried to minimise my presence when out in public. Walked soft. As I was attempting to do so, Newham’s black and Asian youths had started to fight back. This time I knew their names and I could see their faces.

Fight.

A group of elder Asian youths had taken to protecting younger children from racist attacks by accompanying them home from Little Ilford school. On 24 September 1982, three ‘scruffily dressed’ white men in bomber jackets and jeans jumped out of their car and started abusing this group of young and elder Asian youths, which led to a fight. Uniformed police were on the scene swiftly, resulting in eight Asian youths being badly beaten and taken to Forest Gate police station. It turned out that the ‘scruffily dressed’⁷ white men were plain-clothes policemen. The community mobilised swiftly around what became known as the Newham 8. This led to demonstrations largely frequented by Asian children and young people. The resulting national media coverage exposed Newham policing for what it had been at the time: meek in the face of racism and aggressive in its policing against black and Asian communities. The police had been placing the blame on the victims.