Tony Bevins Award

Journalist Paul Lewis has won this year's Bevins Prize for outstanding investigative journalism – the Rat Up a Drain Pipe award – for his stories about the death of Ian Tomlinson during the G20 protests in London last April.

In their citation, the judges said: "Paul uncovered the truth by persistently questioning and challenging the police account, by following up on the family, and assiduously garnering eyewitness evidence, until finally he obtained incontrovertible video evidence from a bystander who filmed the incident. In achieving this Paul used every method now available to a modern journalist, online and in print, to keep pushing and nudging at the story until he established what had really happened.

"His work led to internal and independent police inquiry, extensive and international public comment, and has changed the way police behave in potential riot situations, and how they receive and investigate complaints. All in all, his story was a triumph for the assertion of civil liberty, as well as a revelation about policing conduct."

Much of his coverage of G20 and the subsequent inquiries is here.

The Rat Up a Drainpipe trophy is awarded in memory of Tony Bevins, the first political editor of The Independent, who died in 2001. Bevins was famous for causing mischief in both the political and journalism world, and this is where the award takes its name.

Tony Bevins, who has died of pneumonia aged 58, was the most free-spirited political journalist of his time. During 33 years in the lobbies of Westminster he dug out more scoops and exposed more hidden truth about government than most of his peers could imagine possible. He was a one-off, unbound by false respect or comforting convention - qualities that ensured he was adored by close friends and colleagues, and maddened those he antagonised.

Read the full Obituary here: March 26^th 2001:

Tony started his career on the Liverpool Post, moving in time to become political correspondent of The Times. In 1986 he became the first political editor, of the Independent.