"Black people are still dying on the streets and in the back of police vans. My feelings about the future remain the same as they were when my son was murdered. Black youngsters will never be safe on the streets. The police on the ground are the same as they were when my son was killed . . . Nothing has changed," writes Rachel Donnelly.
These were words the Metropolitan Police service did not want to hear yesterday as the mother of Stephen Lawrence, Mrs Doreen Lawrence, spoke following the publication of Sir William Macpherson's report.
Stumbling slightly over her words, Mrs Lawrence told a press conference at the Home Office in London that far from being the "watershed" report she had expected, the judicial inquiry only scratched the surface of the problem of racism in Britain.
It was not for her, she said, to call on the Metropolitan Police Commissioner, Sir Paul Condon, to resign. It was a matter for his conscience: "It is for him to examine his own self and to see whether or not he will have the support of all the community. If he feels that his conscience allows him to stay, then that is up to him."
Sitting alongside her husband, Mr Neville Lawrence, and their solicitor, Mr Imran Khan, she criticised Sir Paul for not acknowledging that their son's murder had destroyed their lives: "He has talked about how much the inquiry hurt his officers. There is no mention about how this must have ruined our lives."
"This society has stood by and allowed my son's killers to make a mockery of the law and now it seems like this society is going to stand by again and let this report go ahead. What I want to know is how my son bled to death while police officers stood by and watched."
The Mirror last night offered a reward of £50,000 for information leading to the conviction of any of the five men suspected of killing Lawrence.