Dave Guest. On 21 April 2001, a mugging and attack upon 76-year-old white World War II veteran Walter Chamberlain by three Asian youths was amongst the first major provocations which led to the riots. Chamberlain was approached as he walked to his home after watching a local amateur rugby league match. He was mugged and badly beaten, receiving fractured bones in the face amongst other injuries. His battered face appeared on the front of the Manchester Evening News, and the story spread to all the major national newspapers. In the Daily Mirror, his face appeared under the headline "Beaten for being white: OAP, 76, attacked in Asian no-go area". Media pundits began to speculate on the apparent transformation of young Asian males - from the stereotype of hard-working boys, who respected their parents, to the new stereotype of angry, violent thugs. An Asian male (a Mr. Fokrul Islam) was ultimately charged for the crime of racially aggravated grievous bodily harm on 1 October 2001, some time after the riots. Chamberlain and his family, in an attempt to try to calm tensions in the borough, stated at the time that the mugging was just that, and not at all racially motivated. "It was a violent assault on an elderly man", said Chamberlain's son Steven. "As a family we don't think it was a race issue at all." Following a long period of ethnic-tensions, and the attack upon Chamberlain, the far-right National Front political party applied to the council on 26 April for permission to march and demonstrate in Oldham on 5 May. Permission was denied, with a three-month ban on public procession in Oldham put in place, aimed at keeping order and preventing a further increase in ethnic-tensions. Several racist skirmishes occurred in the town, including visiting football supporters from Stoke City F.C., who deliberately walked through multi-racial areas of the town before and after the match. Attacks followed, initially from Stoke City fans, and then more serious retaliatory attacks and petrol bomb throwing from local male Bangladeshi groups. Following this, on 5 May 2001, there was a day of mounting tension and run-ins between racist and anti-racist groups in the town. Up to fifty National Front supporters, mainly from Birmingham and London arrived in the town, clashing with members of the Anti-Nazi League and local Asian groups. Five hundred police were deployed, and the events received extensive media coverage. In