Qualla: Murder of Yvonne Fletcher

Murder of Yvonne Fletcher: Introduction

Tue, 19 May 2026 00:00:00 GMT

Photo credit Paasikivi, CC BY-SA 4.0. She had told her parents at the age of three that she wanted to be a police officer, and she had done it the hard way. Yvonne Joyce Fletcher, born 15 June 1958 in the Wiltshire village of Semley, was 5 ft 2 in tall - shorter than the 5 ft 4 in minimum the Metropolitan Police required. She was rejected by several forces, and considered applying to the Royal Hong Kong Police Force. In March 1977 the Met accepted her anyway, onto its twenty-week training course. She was twenty-five years old on 17 April 1984 when she was sent with around thirty other officers to St James's Square to monitor a demonstration outside the Libyan embassy. Her colleagues at Bow Street called her Super Fletch. She was engaged to be married to a fellow constable, Michael Liddle, who was on duty with her that day. She was struck by a single bullet fired from a first-floor window of the embassy at about ten past ten that morning. She died shortly afterwards in Westminster Hospital.

Image: Paasikivi | CC BY-SA 4.0

Murder of Yvonne Fletcher: The People's Bureau

Tue, 19 May 2026 00:00:00 GMT

Photo credit Paasikivi, CC BY-SA 4.0. Since 1979 there had been no Libyan ambassador in London. A 'Revolutionary Committee' was in nominal charge of the embassy at 5 St James's Square, which had been renamed the 'People's Bureau' in line with Muammar Gaddafi's political experiment, the Jamahiriya. By the early 1980s,...

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Murder of Yvonne Fletcher: Seventeenth of April

Tue, 19 May 2026 00:00:00 GMT

Photo credit Paasikivi, CC BY-SA 4.0. On 16 April 1984 two students were publicly hanged at the University of Tripoli for their opposition to Gaddafi. In response, members of the Libyan National Salvation Front - exiles in Britain - planned a demonstration outside the People's Bureau for the next morning. Overnight o...

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Murder of Yvonne Fletcher: Eleven Days

Tue, 19 May 2026 00:00:00 GMT

Photo credit Paasikivi, CC BY-SA 4.0. Armed police surrounded the embassy. Diplomatic protection under the 1961 Vienna Convention, incorporated into UK law in the Diplomatic Privileges Act 1964, meant the gunmen could not be arrested inside. After eleven days of negotiation, the thirty people inside the building were...

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Murder of Yvonne Fletcher: The Long Investigation

Tue, 19 May 2026 00:00:00 GMT

Photo credit Paasikivi, CC BY-SA 4.0. In July 1999, after a long warming of relations, the Libyan government formally accepted general responsibility for the actions of those inside the bureau, paid £250,000 in compensation to Fletcher's family, and agreed to cooperate with the murder inquiry. In 1986 the murder had ...

Image: Paasikivi | CC BY-SA 4.0

Murder of Yvonne Fletcher: St James's Square

Tue, 19 May 2026 00:00:00 GMT

Photo credit Cajadaj, CC0. The film director Michael Winner wrote to The Times eight days after the shooting, suggesting a memorial in the square 'to commemorate not only the horrific death of this brave young girl, but also be a constant reminder to her killers of the feelings of the British people.' Dona...

Image: Cajadaj | CC0