Hardened north London gangster and drug dealer, or loving family man who would never seek confrontation? Two different portraits were painted of Mark Duggan, the 29-year-old Tottenham man whose death sparked the weekend's London riots.
Close family members, gathered in their garden in Tottenham amid a pile of bouquets left in memory of the dead 29-year-old, refused to speak to journalists, blaming the media for "twisting the truth" and telling "all these lies" about Duggan. "He was a good man. He was a family man," one relative told The Guardian.
Duggan's fiancee, Semone Wilson, has admitted Duggan was known to the police and said he had spent some time on remand, but denied he was ever imprisoned. Mark, whom she had known for 12 years, was "a good Dad" who "idolised his kids", she said. The couple were hoping to marry soon and move out of Tottenham to "start a new life together" with their three children, Kemani, aged ten, Kajaun, seven, and 18-month-old Kahliya. A fourth child, a daughter, was stillborn.
Speaking to Channel 4 News, Wilson said her partner was not a gangster and would run from trouble rather than shoot at police. "If he did have a gun – which I don't know – Mark would run. Mark is a runner. He would run rather than firing and that's coming from the bottom of my heart," she said. "They are portraying Mark as a gangster. Mark is not a gangster. He's not known to any gangsters or any gangs. He's not like that."
A relative, Shaun Hall, told reporters it was "utter rubbish" that Duggan would ever dream of opening fire on policemen: "My brother's not that sort of person," he said. "He's not stupid to shoot at the police, that's ridiculous."
But Duggan's Facebook page, under his alias Starrish Mark, pictures him in a T-shirt bearing the words Star Gang, and reports suggest he may have had links to that group and allied north London gangs such as the Broadwater Farm Posse and Tottenham Mandem.
The Voice, Britain's leading black newspaper, has claimed that both Duggan and his best friend, 23-year-old rapper Kelvin Easton, known as Smegz, "had links to the Star Gang", one of several criminal groups in north London whose turf wars have caused at least three deaths over the past few years.
Easton, described by the londonstreetgangs website as an "elder" of a group collectively called the Farm Mandem, was stabbed to death with a broken champagne bottle at the Boheme nightclub in Mile End, east London, in March 2011. The murder remains unsolved.
Duggan was born on September 15 1981 and attended St David's and St Katherine's, now Greig City Academy, in Hornsey. At the time of his death last Thursday he was under investigation by officers from Trident, the Metropolitan police unit responsible for gun crime within the black community.
Duggan's Facebook page carries more than a dozen photographs of him and a large number of messages left by friends. Several shots show him in gangster poses; in others he is dressed all in black, or shown gesturing from behind the wheel of a yellow sportscar with headlights blazing. Beneath that photo Duggan posted the message: "I aint even countin money no more, if it aint right it jus aint right, it does'nt even matter 2 me no more."
Other unconfirmed reports have alleged he was a known drugs dealer. Some of the messages posted by friends on his Facebook pages could suggest possible gang involvement, referring to Duggan variously as a "soldier", a "true star boy" and a "five star general". One of the messages left among the bouquets outside Duggan's family home yesterday referred to "Gang N17 Farm", the name of one of the Star gang's allies.
But others appear full of love, and sorrow. "I love you like cooked food," reads one comment; "1 thing they can't take is da love I have 4 u two" says another, beneath a picture of Duggan and Easton. "R.I.P. da bruddas – gone but not forgotten," is a common remark, as well as "cant believe this" and "my heart goes out 2 ur wife&kids n the rest of ur family."
On another memorial website, Easton's mother Julie – who was godmother to Duggan – left this message: "Mark sweetheart i know that you are in safe hands now. Kelvin please tell Mark 2 always shine down on [his mother and brothers], semone and the kids, just like u do for me. im gonna try my very best Kelvin 2 look after them all ... but my god this is so hard. 1st they take my son away from me and now they have taken my god son who is also my sons best friend. r.i.p Mark darling may god bless u and Kelvin and keep u both safe. now ive lost 2 sons. please no more i beg u r.i.p my sons."
