Colin Roach was a 21-year-old black British man who died from a gunshot wound inside the entrance of Stoke Newington police station, in the London Borough of Hackney, on 12 January 1983. Amid allegations of a police cover-up, the case became a cause célèbre for civil rights campaigners and black community groups in the United Kingdom. Prior to Roach's death, Hackney Black People's Association had been calling for a public inquiry into policing in the area, alleging that there existed a culture of police brutality, wrongful detention of black people, racial harassment, and racially motivated "stopping and searching." Ernie Roberts, the MP for Hackney North and Stoke Newington, said that there had been "a complete breakdown of faith and credibility in the police" in the area and the Commissi