Another day, another family member locked up for cleaning up after a killer. Kiran Kaur, 53, will spend the next three years behind bars after Southampton Crown Court sent her down on 17 July 2026. Her crime? She grabbed the 21-centimetre knife her son used to stab Henry Nowak five times and carted it home like it was dirty laundry.
Henry was 18. A student. Out for the night, minding his own business in Portswood. Vickrum Singh Digwa put a blade through his chest, back, legs and face. Then the excuses started. Self-defence, they said. Racial abuse, they claimed. The jury threw that out. But not before the lies had done their damage.
Those false claims of racism triggered protests and riots in Southampton. Real people got hurt. Lives disrupted. All because one family refused to face what their son had done. And the mother? Instead of demanding he tell the truth, she removed the murder weapon from the scene. Police only found it a week later after trawling CCTV.
Judge William Mousley KC put it plainly. A responsible parent would have challenged their son and asked him to do the right thing. Instead Kaur took the knife and put it at home with other weapons. The prosecution called her actions the highest order of criminality. They delayed justice. They protected the killer. They made a grieving family wait even longer for answers.
A responsible parent would have challenged their son and asked him to do the right thing.
Now Digwa sits with a life sentence, minimum 21 years. The Solicitor General thinks that's too soft and has sent it to the Court of Appeal. Good. Digwa is appealing his conviction anyway. His father and brother face their own weapons charges later this year. The whole clan seems to have treated knives like household items.
Here's what grates. We keep jailing the aftermath while ignoring the before. Parents who raise boys happy to carry blades. Families quick to scream racism the moment their lad faces consequences. Authorities so scared of being called bigots they let the false narrative run until riots break out. Then they act surprised when another young man lies bleeding on a Southampton street.
