The police have finally admitted that it is likely a policeman "struck the fatal blow" which killed anti-racism activist Blair Peach at an anti-National Front protest in Southall in 1979 (Report, 26 April). This admission alone doesn't give his family justice.
The Metropolitan police insist no officer faces any further action as a consequence of their admission. Murder when it's carried out by a policeman is clearly not taken as seriously as when perpetrated by a civilian. Nevertheless it is to the credit of Blair's loved ones that they have made the police admit they have blood on their hands.
According to Inquest, there have been 954 deaths in police custody in England and Wales since 1990.
Not a single policeman has been charged, much less prosecuted, for any of these deaths. Yet the loved ones of those who died in police custody should take heart from what those closest to Blair Peach have achieved.
The police can be made to admit to their brutality. Even if it takes them 31 shameful years to do it.
Sasha Simic
London
• Metropolitan police commissioner Paul Stephenson considers that, 31 years on from Blair Peach's killing, the Met is a "completely different" force. During those 31 years, Harry Stanley, Jean Charles de Menezes and Ian Tomlinson (among others) have joined Blair Peach in becoming victims of lethal violence at the hands of the Met police. The officers responsible for all of these killings have not been held properly to account. The truth is that very little has changed either in the Met police's attitude to those innocents it kills either negligently or with prejudice, or in the unwillingness of the state properly to pursue the killers and ensure justice for the victims and their bereaved families.
As a law-abiding citizen, I support the police as necessary to maintain law and order, but equally I expect the police to respect and be subject to the same standards and laws as the rest of us when they kill either as a result of negligence or prejudice. That is the difference that I want to see in how the Met behaves and is overseen, not some nebulous assurance from the commissioner that everything is completely different than it was 31 years ago, when patently this is not the case.
Fergal Quinn
London
• One paragraph in particular of Commander John Cass's report made my blood run cold: "Without condoning the death I refer to Archbold 38th edition para 2528: 'In case of riot or rebellious assembly the officers endeavouring to disperse the riot are justified in killing them at common law if the riot cannot otherwise be suppressed'."
Is this paragraph in Archbold Criminal Pleading, Evidence and Practice, or a variant of it, still in existence? If so, surely it is a matter of urgency to have it removed from the text – it offers a frighteningly broad legal shield to police who kill protesters.
Tim Leach
Ongar, Essex
• Afua Hirsch's article (Comment, 27 April) highlighted the increased use of "joint enterprise" to prosecute groups of teenagers for murder. Given that there is no statute of limitations for murder or manslaughter, I am looking forward to all the members of the Special Patrol Group associated with Blair Peach's death all being charged with murder as part of a joint enterprise.
Andy Smith
Kingston upon Thames, Surrey
• On 15 June 1974 a student, Kevin Gately, was found dead in the street outside the Conway Hall in London. This was the scene of a protest against the National Front meeting taking place inside and raised considerable debate about the right to free speech. I have never forgotten this man's death but inexplicably it failed to generate the same sympathy and anger as Blair Peach's equally tragic death. Now the murder of Blair has at last been acknowledged, may we look forward to a similar enquiry into the death – murder even – of Kevin?
Jeff Cloves
Stroud, Gloucestershire