Henry Nowak's Family Describe Pain of Seeing Police Video
The family of Henry Nowak say the footage of police handcuffing him as he lay dying made the trauma of his death worse. Their account, given to ITV, comes as a review into the murder prepares to look at what authorities missed.
Two blows in one year
Henry's father Mark, stepmother Katie, mother Lucy and sister Olivia spoke to ITV for the documentary Dear Henry: Our Fight For Justice. "In the last year, our world has changed twice," Katie said. The first time was the night they were told he had died. The second was when they watched the video.
Henry was 18, from Chafford Hundred in Essex, and a first-year accountancy and finance student at the University of Southampton. He was stabbed five times on 3 December 2025 while walking home from a night out with friends from his football team. Police needed a further 24 hours to identify the body and reach the family.
What the footage shows
His killer, Vickrum Digwa, falsely told police that Henry had racially abused him. Officers put handcuffs on the student although he kept saying he had been stabbed. In the video, Henry can be heard saying he has been stabbed. An officer replies: "Don't think you have, mate."
Once the footage emerged, the case provoked broad outrage among politicians.
The night officers came
Katie remembers a police car on the driveway and an officer holding his hat in his hand. She knew at once that something terrible had happened. Mark fell to his knees when he heard.
Lucy was visited at the same time. Officers knocked on her door at one o'clock in the morning, she said.
Olivia now keeps some of Henry's T-shirts on his bed. They still smell of him, she said, and they give her comfort. Lucy said she can no longer enter his bedroom and has hung coats over the door so she does not have to look at it.
Review and court outcome
Home Secretary Shabana Mahmood has announced an independent review into the murder, led by former lord chancellor Alex Chalk. It will look at whether opportunities to intervene were missed. Chalk pointed to questions over whether agencies had not acted on complaints about Digwa's violent and erratic behaviour. He said it will also cover the treatment of the Nowak family by public authorities.
The watchdog is also examining whether race, religion or prejudice played a part in officers' decisions, and expects to conclude early next year. Digwa's mother, Kiran Kaur, received a three-year jail term for assisting an offender, having taken away the knife her son used.
The ITV documentary airs on Thursday 5 November at 21:00 GMT on ITV, ITVX and the ITV News YouTube channel.
Our view
The family's account moves the focus from the killing itself to what happened in the hours afterwards. Chalk's review covers both earlier complaints about Digwa and the treatment of the family, so its findings could address two separate failures. —
Source: BBC News