1985 Handsworth riots 1500 police officers drafted into the area, about 45 shops looted and burnt, and a trail of damage running into hundreds of thousands of pounds. As well as racial tension, unemployment was seen as a major factor in the riots; by the time of the riots, fewer than 5% of the black population to have left school that summer had found employment. The riots were the first of a series of similar riots across the country during the autumn of 1985, notably the Broadwater Farm riot in London which also resulted in a fatality (the murder of policeman Keith Blakelock).
The Hard Stop Marcus Knox-Hooke and Kurtis Henville, against the backdrop of their home on Broadwater Farm — an estate that notoriously was the scene of a 1985 riot triggered by tensions between the police and local black people — the film follows the journey of the two young black men over 24 months, until the 2012 verdict that found Duggan to have been "lawfully killed". Marcus Knox-Hooke was accused of being the instigator of the 2011 riots and, though that charge was dropped, he was sentenced to 32 months' imprisonment following a prosecution for other offences. Producer Dionne Walker has said: "We