The mother of a Nottingham stabbing victim has questioned why her son’s killing was not officially treated as a racially motivated attack.
Emma Webber said it was time to “consider the unpalatable” when discussing policing and race in Britain, nearly three years after her son Barnaby Webber was fatally stabbed by a black man.
Valdo Calocane killed three white victims and tried to murder three others in Nottingham on 13 June 2023, leaving them seriously injured. He had been diagnosed with paranoid schizophrenia and is now detained under an indefinite hospital order in a high-security facility.
The case has largely centred on his mental health history, including treatment by Nottinghamshire Healthcare NHS Foundation Trust in the years leading up to the attacks.
However, amid renewed debate following the killing of university student Henry Nowak, Mrs Webber drew comparisons between the two cases and questioned how race is discussed in crime reporting and public debate.
She suggested that if the roles were reversed, with a white attacker and black victims, race would have been a far more prominent part of the conversation.
Speaking to The Telegraph, she said: “What we do need to do is be brave and have those really difficult discussions in this country.”
She added that Calocane being a black man who killed white victims “was never part of the conversation,” arguing that it would have been treated differently if the situation were reversed.
The broader debate around Henry Nowak’s death has also intensified scrutiny of policing and diversity policies within forces. The case involved officers responding to a report made by the suspect’s brother, which later proved false, before the fatal stabbing.
Questions have since been raised about police procedures, training programmes, and spending on equality and inclusion initiatives, with critics and supporters divided over their impact and effectiveness.
