The Rent Is Too Damn High Party is a political party in New York that has nominated candidates for mayor of New York City in 2005 and 2009, and for governor and senator in 2010. Jimmy McMillan was the mayoral candidate both times as well as a candidate for governor. In 2005, he received more than 4,000 votes, and more than 40,000 in 2010. The party has three registered members in the state. McMillan himself is registered as a Republican (previously a Democrat) for the purposes of running in that party’s primary elections.
Platform
As its name implies, the central tenet of the Rent Is Too Damn High Party is that rent in the city of New York is too high for its residents, and it should be lowered to relieve financial stress, end poverty and increase employment.
One of the taglines for the party is “breakfast, lunch, and dinner”, indicating that the party seeks to end hunger and poverty in New York City. The party sought to win “without a single vote from upstate New York.” The party website included a picture of New York with a giant “X” marked over upstate. McMillan surmises that reducing rent would “create 3 to 6 million jobs,” freeing up capital to give businesses a chance to hire people. This would, in turn, increase tax revenue. The party is in favor of writing off all taxes owed to the state, cutting property taxes for homeowners, consolidating the rent boards in New York, seizing unoccupied apartment buildings, reforming the state court system, and providing tax credits for commuters and free college tuition. The party opposes any cuts in spending related to education and elderly care.
McMillan was not opposed to same-sex marriage in the 2010 gubernatorial debate, replying to a non-rent-related question on the matter by saying: “if you want to marry a shoe, I’ll marry you.” McMillan has specifically voiced opposition to sex reassignment performed without the consent of the intersex individual, stating on his website: “They are normal human beings [...] just born different.”
On the topic of religion and family, McMillan’s website states “we need more reliance on the moral laws brought by religion and not limit out goodwill to our neighbors and co-workers to what the law demands alone.” One of the party’s platforms involves “restoring family values,” specifically desiring to ensure that one parent can remain at home to watch children.
Previous elections
For the 2009 mayoral campaign, part of the party’s name consisting of the word “damn” was removed from the official ballot on account of the name being 17 letters, two more than legally permissible under state board of elections guidelines. McMillan objected to the change, stating that he purposely used the profane word “damn” for its shock value. In 2009, Salim Ejaz ran for the party for the position of City Controller, without an endorsement from McMillan.
The word “damn” was restored to the party’s ballot line in 2010 by shortening “too” to “2″. McMillan ran for governor on the line, while Joseph Huff ran for the U.S. Senate seat currently held by Kirsten Gillibrand.
The Rent Is Too Damn High Party’s Jimmy McMillan at the NY Governor Debate
Uploaded on Oct 18, 2010
October 18, 2010 — In a debate expected to be dominated by top New York governor candidates Andrew Cuomo and Carl Paladino, Jimmy McMillan of the Rent Is Too Damn High Party provided the fireworks. Watch his inspired views on karate, gay marriage, and, well, rent.
Jimmy McMillan Debate
Uploaded on Oct 18, 2010
Yawn, besides the occasional quip from the fomer prostitute, the NYS Gubernatorial debate was a snooze fest, save for the greatness that is Jimmy “Papa Smurf” McMillan of the “Rent is Too Damn High” Party. It’s mostly about rent to Jimmy, but it’s also about hunger. The audio sucked already, and the short echo near the end isn’t my fault! http://www.tommunisms.com For the shoe marriage clip, click this:http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=jEcIhB… and yeah, I made a quickie t-shirt…http://www.cafepress.com/tommunisms/7…
UPDATE:
Well, it seems Jimmy knows why the rent is too damn high: he blames the Jews:http://www.jewlicious.com/2005/10/whe…
Jimmy also says an orthodox Jewish cabal planned 9/11. It could be just the Agent Orange affecting his mind, but this does take away from his goofy charm.
His political mantra — ”the rent is too damn high” – resonated with many. Although his first fifteen minutes of fame eventually petered out, his slogan still has the juice to fuel his bid in New York’s 2013 mayoral election.
McMillan is back with the same catch phrase, this time delivered over a banging hip-hop track. As his rap anthem “Rent is Too Damn High” (produced by web site Animal NYC) states, he is “back on the scene” looking “lean and mean” — and is apparently just as popular as ever.
McMillan: An ‘American defender’
“I’m an American defender. I don’t make no apologies for serving my country,” the self-described Vietnam war veteran said when he stopped by theGrio’s newsroom last week, an acoustic guitar strapped to his chest.
He was greeted with the warm enthusiasm reserved folk heroes in these halls. As he sat down to perform an “unplugged” version of his single, McMillan described the attention he still receives when he walks city streets as “crazy.”
Does this make him the best person to run New York City among a wide field of experienced politicos? Maybe, maybe not. But he may have the name recognition necessary to make a big splash during his second brush with viral fame. McMillan’s video for “Rent is Too Damn High” has garnered more than 641,500 views on YouTube since it began circulating last week.
People definitely know who he is. And to hear Jimmy tell it, they also love him.
“I’m 66 years of age and I’ve been single for thirty years. Now I can get a girlfriend if I want one,” McMillan said of his local celebrity.
According to the martial arts teacher, women follow him asking, “can I have your autograph?” Men say, “can I take your picture?” Kids follow shouting, “let me touch your beard!”
And of course the question “whatchu gonna do to lower the rent!?” is often hurled at him, even late at night, the candidate for mayor said.
It’s about “changing the game”
But to him, running for the mayor of New York City is as much about disrupting the status quo of the political process as it is about holding public office.
“I’m not a politician. I’m here to change up” what McMillan called “the old attitude” and address “a bunch of lies that they’re telling.”
Some of those “lies,” he says, include landlords overcharging renters by raising rents too much relative to the renovations they may implement, which they are allowed to do by a limited percentage by law. McMillan also tasks politicians to stop focusing on creating low income housing, when it would be better to revise housing laws to improve existing stock and prevent people from being evicted.
While McMillan still asserts that the rent is too damn high, he also intends to use his 2013 run for mayor to awaken people to the fact that they have voting options — including, of course, the Rent is Too Damn High party.
Have Democrats and Republicans failed us?
McMillan believes that Democrats and Republicans have failed the American people after having had ample opportunity to improve the economy — and of course, housing costs.
“What I do in the city of New York is going to send a domino effect across the country,” McMillan told theGrio. “I’m here to represent the people.”
Look out for part two of our video interview with Jimmy McMillan later this week. Will his political agenda inspire a new perspective on the political system.
Saturday, April 20th was the first day of National Park Week – an annual tradition celebrating, enjoying and giving back to our country’s great natural and cultural landscapes. For the next five days, parks across the country will waive their entrance fees to provide free access to thousands of miles of trails and coastlines, as well as battlefields, archeological sites and waterways. With spring now in full swing, National Park Week is a great opportunityto dust off your bicycle or sneakers, grab some healthy snacks and a water bottle and get moving outside.
If you don’t have a national park in your city or town, chances are the National Park Service has played a role in increasing access to outdoor recreational opportunities in your community. Through the Land & Water Conservation Fund, the National Park Service has funded recreational facilities, such as playgrounds and trails, in 99 percent of counties across America.
Take advantage of mild temperatures and loads of free activities and plan a national park experience with your family this week.
If you are interested in:
Recreation -Find a national park near you and pick your adventure – hit the trails with your family and seek out free, ranger-guided tours and activities.
Education - Encourage your kids to explore and learn about their natural and cultural heritage. Throughout the week, many parks will offer free programming for National Junior Ranger Day. In certain parks, the Let’s Move Outside! Junior Ranger program boosts activity levels and promotes healthy lifestyles.
History & Culture - National Park Week provides an opportunity to appreciate the landmarks, monuments and historical landscapes that define our national identity. Take this chance to discover the sites in your city or state.
Young Scientists and Innovators Amaze President Obama at the White House Science Fair
Becky Fried
April 22, 2013
President Barack Obama talks with Evan Jackson, 10, Alec Jackson, 8, and Caleb Robinson, 8, from McDonough, Ga., while looking at exhibits at the White House Science Fair in the State Dining Room, April 22, 2013. The sports-loving grade-schoolers created a new product concept to keep athletes cool and helps players maintain safe body temperatures on the field. (Official White House Photo by Chuck Kennedy)
As the President said in 2009, when he announced the first-ever White House Science Fair, “If you win the NCAA championship, you come to the White House. Well, if you’re a young person and you’ve produced the best experiment or design, the best hardware or software, you ought to be recognized for that achievement, too.”
That’s why young inventors of everything from portable windmills to oil-producing algae, and from underwater robots to dehydration-preventing football gear were invited to share their wares at all corners of the White House — from the South Lawn to the State Dining Room — for today’s event. The cohort of kids included app-coders, rocket-builders, video-game designers, and city-planners—many of them, as the President pointed out, not yet old enough to drive. One team of innovators even helped the President hop onto a bike and test out their pedal-powered water filtration system.
We’ve got to do everything we can to make sure that we are giving these young people opportunity to pursue their studies and discover new ways of doing things. And we’ve got to make sure that we’re also leaving behind a world that is safer and cleaner and healthier than the one we found. That’s our obligation.
The steps announced today include the launch, this year, of a new AmeriCorps track focused on STEM Education; the launch, by ten leading education non-profits and U.S.. technology companies, of US2020—a campaign encourage companies to commit 20 percent of their STEM employees to 20 hours per year of mentoring or teaching by the year 2020; and an announcement of more than 1,000 summer learning events planned as part of the upcoming Summer of Making and Connecting program supported by the MacArthur Foundation; among others.
President Obama thanked parents, teachers, and mentors in the audience for their continuing roles in supporting students’ spirits of curiosity, creativity, and imagination. And, after repeatedly marveling at some of the amazing innovations represented at this year’s Science Fair (including a pancreatic cancer screening tool that is cheaper and more accurate than any on the market) — the President spoke to the students directly, saying simply, “we could not be prouder of all of you.”
The Central Park Jogger case involved the assault and rape of Trisha Meili, a female jogger in New York City’sCentral Park, on April 19, 1989. Five juvenile males—four black and one Hispanic—were tried and convicted for the crime. The convictions were vacated in 2002 when Matias Reyes, a convicted rapist and murderer serving a life sentence for other crimes, claimed to have committed the crime alone and DNA evidence confirmed his involvement in the rape.
Victim
Trisha Meili in 2005.
Trisha Meili (born June 24, 1960) was the victim often described in the media as the Central Park Jogger. Born and raised in Paramus, New Jersey and Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania, Meili was a Phi Beta Kappa economics major at Wellesley College, where she received a Bachelor of Arts. She later earned a Master of Arts from Yale University, and a Master of Business Administration from Yale School of Management. She worked at the Wall Street investment bank Salomon Brothers. Meili was referred to simply as the “Central Park Jogger” in most media accounts of the incident. However, local television stations did release her name in the days immediately following the attack, and two newspapers aimed at the African-American community, The City Sun and the Amsterdam News, and radio station WLIB continued to do so as the case progressed. In 2003, Meili confirmed her identity to the media, published a memoir entitled I Am the Central Park Jogger, and began a career as an inspirational speaker.
Assault
On April 19, 1989, the 28-year-old investment banker was violently assaulted while jogging in New York City‘s Central Park. She was raped and beaten almost to death. When found about four hours later, she was suffering from severe hypothermia and blood loss from multiple lacerations and internal bleeding, and her skull had been fractured so badly that her left eye was removed from the socket. The initial medical prognosis was that she would die or, at best, remain in a permanent coma due to her injuries. Remarkably, she largely recovered, with some lingering disabilities related to balance and loss of vision. As a result of the severe trauma, she had no memory of the attack or of any events up to an hour preceding the assault.
The crime, one of 3,254 rapes reported in New York City that year, was unique in the level of public outrage it provoked. New York GovernorMario Cuomo told the New York Post, “This is the ultimate shriek of alarm.”
Suspects
According to a police investigation, the culprits were gangs of teenagers who would assault strangers as part of an activity that became known as “wilding”. New York City detectives said the word was used by the suspects themselves to describe their actions to police. This account has been disputed by other journalists, who say that it originated in a police detective’s misunderstanding of the suspects’ use of the phrase “doing the wild thing”, lyrics from Tone Lōc‘s hit song “Wild Thing“. April 19 was known to have been a night when such a gang attack occurred, in which the suspects had entered the park in Harlem with over 30 acquaintances. Contrary to normal police procedure, which stipulates that the names of suspects under the age of sixteen are also to be withheld, the names of the juveniles arrested in this case were released to the press before any of them had been formally arraigned or indicted, including one 14-year-old who was ultimately not charged.
The mainstream media’s decision to print the names, photos, and addresses of the juvenile suspects while withholding Meili’s identity was cited by the editors of the City Sun and the Amsterdam News to explain their own continued use of Meili’s name in their coverage of the story. While many teenage suspects were identified (or identified themselves) as participants in the Central Park assaults that night — although not necessarily in the attack on Meili — only five, known later as the Central Park Five, were brought to trial.
All five were convicted in 1990. Four of the juveniles charged — Antron McCray, Kevin Richardson, Raymond Santana, and Kharey Wise — officially confessed to the crime, and each implicated the others. A fifth suspect, Yusef Salaam, made verbal admissions, but refused to sign a confession or make one on videotape. Salaam was, however, implicated by all of the other four and convicted. Salaam’s supporters and attorneys charged on appeal that he had been held by police without access to parents or guardians, but as the majority appellate court decision noted, that was because Salaam had initially lied to police in claiming to be 16, and had backed up his claim with a transit pass that indeed (falsely, as it turned out) said that he was 16. If a suspect has reached 16 years of age, his parents or guardians no longer have a right to accompany him during police questioning, or to refuse to permit him to answer any questions. When Salaam informed police of his true age, police permitted his mother to be present.
Confessions
Although the suspects (except Salaam) had confessed on videotape in the presence of a parent or guardian, they retracted their statements within weeks, claiming that they had been intimidated, lied to, and coerced into making false confessions. The detectives had indeed used ruses to convince the suspects to confess, with Salaam confessing to having been present only after he was told that fingerprints were found on the victim’s clothing. While the confessions themselves were videotaped, the hours of interrogation that preceded the confessions were not.
No DNA evidence tied the suspects to the crime, so the prosecution’s case rested almost entirely on the confessions. In fact, analysis indicated that the DNA collected at the crime scene did not match any of the suspects — and that the crime scene DNA had all come from a single, as yet unknown person.
One of the suspects’ supporters, Reverend Calvin O. Butts of the Abyssinian Baptist Church in Harlem, told the New York Times, “The first thing you do in the United States of America when a white woman is raped is round up a bunch of black youths, and I think that’s what happened here.”
Convictions vacated
In 2002, another man’s confession, plus DNA evidence confirming his crime, led the district attorney’s office to recommend vacating the convictions of the teenagers originally accused and sentenced to prison. In 2002, convicted rapist and murderer Matias Reyes, serving a life sentence for other crimes but not, at that point, associated by the police with the attack on Meili, declared that he had committed the assault when he was 17, and that he had acted alone.
The DNA evidence confirmed his participation in the crime and identified him as the sole contributor of the semen found in and on the victim “to a factor of one in 6,000,000,000 people”. Supporters of the five defendants again claimed their confessions had been coerced. An examination of the inconsistencies between their confessions led the prosecutor to question the veracity of the confessions. District AttorneyRobert M. Morgenthau‘s office wrote:
“A comparison of the statements reveals troubling discrepancies. … The accounts given by the five defendants differed from one another on the specific details of virtually every major aspect of the crime — who initiated the attack, who knocked the victim down, who undressed her, who struck her, who held her, who raped her, what weapons were used in the course of the assault, and when in the sequence of events the attack took place. … In many other respects the defendants’ statements were not corroborated by, consistent with, or explanatory of objective, independent evidence. And some of what they said was simply contrary to established fact.”
Based on Reyes’ confession, the DNA evidence, and the questionable confessions, Morgenthau recommended that the convictions be vacated. In light of the “extraordinary circumstances” of the case, the prosecutor recommended that the court vacate not only the convictions related to the assault and rape of Meili, but also those for the other crimes to which the defendants had confessed.
The rationale was that the defendants’ confessions to the other crimes were made at the same time, and in the same statements, as those related to the attack on Meili. Had the newly discovered evidence been available at the original trials, it might have made the juries question whether any part of the defendants’ confessions were trustworthy. Morgenthau’s recommendation to vacate the convictions was strongly opposed by Linda Fairstein, who had overseen the original prosecution but had since left the District Attorney’s office.
The five defendants’ convictions were vacated by New York Supreme Court Justice Charles J. Tejada on December 19, 2002. As Morgenthau recommended, Tejada’s order vacated the convictions for all the crimes of which the defendants had been convicted.
Despite the analysis conducted by the District Attorney’s office, New York City detectives maintained that the defendants had “most likely” been Reyes’ accomplices in the assault and rape of Meili. Members of the medical crew who treated her stated her injuries were not consistent with Reyes’ claim of how he acted alone. Police Commissioner Raymond Kelly complained that Morgenthau’s staff had denied his detectives access to “important evidence” needed to conduct a thorough investigation.
This claim notwithstanding, no indictments, convictions or disciplinary actions were ever taken against District Attorney’s office staff members. All of the defendants had completed their prison sentences at the time of Tejada’s order, which only had the effect of clearing their names. However one defendant, Santana, remained in jail, convicted of a later, unrelated crime, although his attorney said that his sentence in that case had been extended because of his conviction in the Meili attack. All five were removed from New York State’s sex offender registry.
Lawsuit against city by exonerated men
In 2003, Kevin Richardson, Raymond Santana Jr., and Antron McCray sued the city for malicious prosecution, racial discrimination and emotional distress. As of early 2013, the suit is yet to be settled. The city is refusing to settle the suits, citing the “confessions that withstood intense scrutiny, in full and fair pretrial hearings and at two lengthy public trials”.
Filmmakers Ken Burns, Sarah Burns, and David McMahon premiered The Central Park Five, a documentary film about the case, at the Cannes Film Festival in May 2012. In the film, the filmmakers compare the case to the 1931 rape case of the Scottsboro Boys, which eventually led to a Supreme Court ruling on the racial makeup of juries. The film was released in the United States in November 2012.
On September 12, 2012, attorneys for New York City subpoenaed the production company for access to the original footage in connection with its defense of the federal lawsuit brought by some of the convicted youths against the city. Celeste Koeleveld, the city’s executive assistant corporation counsel for public safety, justified the subpoena on the grounds that the film had, in the words of The New York Times, “crossed the line from journalism to advocacy” for the wrongly convicted men.
The Central Park Five is a 2012 documentary film about the Central Park Jogger case, directed by Ken Burns, Sarah Burns, and David McMahon. It was released in the US on November 23, 2012. Critic A. O. Scott of The New York Times said of the film, which he ranked as the fifth best documentary of 2012: “A notorious crime — the rape of a jogger in Central Park in 1989 — is revisited in this painful, angry, scrupulously reported story of race, injustice and media frenzy.”
^ Meili, Trisha (2003). I am the Central Park Jogger. Scribner.ISBN0-7432-4437-0.
^ Pitt, David E. (1989-04-22). “Jogger’s Attackers Terrorized at Least 9 in 2 Hours”. New York Times. “The youths who raped and savagely beat a young investment banker as she jogged in Central Park Wednesday night were part of a loosely organized gang of 32 schoolboys whose random, motiveless assaults terrorized at least eight other people over nearly two hours, senior police investigators said yesterday. Chief of Detectives Robert Colangelo, who said the attacks appeared unrelated to money, race, drugs or alcohol, said that some of the 20 youths brought in for questioning had told investigators that the crime spree was the product of a pastime called wilding.“
^ Cooper, Barry Michael (May 9, 1989) “The Central Park Rape” in The Village Voice.
^ Goldblatt, Mark (December 16, 2002). “Certainties and Unlikelihoods: The Central Park Jogger, 2002″. National Review. Retrieved 2007-08-21. “On the night of April 19, 1989, just after 9 o’clock, it is certain, absolutely certain, that Kevin Richardson, 14, Raymond Santana, 14, Yusef Salaam, 15, Antron McCray, 15, and Kharey Wise, 16, ran amok for a half hour across a quarter-mile stretch of Central Park—chasing after bicyclists, assaulting pedestrians, and (in two separate incidents) pummeling two men into unconsciousness with a metal pipe, stones, punches, and kicks to the head. The teens later confessed on videotape to these attacks—which they couldn’t have known about unless they had participated. As recently as this year, Richardson and Santana again acknowledged their roles in these crimes.”
^ Smith, Valerie (1998). Not Just Race, Not Just Gender: Black Feminist Readings. Routledge. pp. 16–17. ISBN0-415-90325-4.
^ ”Detective Cites Coercion of Teen”. Associated Press in Albany Times Union. 1990-07-24. p. B6. “Justice Thomas B. Galligan allowed the statements as evidence because Salaam gave police a student transit pass with a false birth date written in. The false birth date indicated Salaam was a year older that he was.”
^ abcSchanberg, Sydney (November 26, 2002). “A Journey Through the Tangled Case of the Central Park Jogger”. Village Voice. Retrieved 2007-08-21. “Every now and again, we get a look, usually no more than a glimpse, at how the justice system really works. What we see before the sanitizing curtain is drawn abruptly down is a process full of human fallibility and error, sometimes noble, more often unfair, rarely evil but frequently unequal, and through it all inevitably influenced by issues of race and class and economic status. In short, it’s a lot like other big, unwieldy institutions. Such a moment of clear sight emerges from the mess we know as the case of the Central Park jogger.”
^ Chris Smith (October 21, 2002). “Central Park Revisited”. New York Magazine. Retrieved February 13, 2013.
^ abc Saulny, Susan (2002-12-20). “Convictions and Charges Voided In ’89 Central Park Jogger Attack”. New York Times. Retrieved 2007-06-22. “Thirteen years after an investment banker jogging in Central Park was savagely beaten, raped and left for dead, a Manhattan judge threw out the convictions yesterday of the five young men who had confessed to attacking the woman on a night of violence that stunned the city and the nation. In one final, extraordinary ruling that took about five minutes, Justice Charles J. Tejada of State Supreme Court in Manhattan granted recent motions made by defense lawyers and Robert M. Morgenthau, the Manhattan District Attorney, to vacate all convictions against the young men in connection with the jogger attack and a spree of robberies and assaults in the park that night.”
^McFadden, Robert D. (2003-01-28). “Boys’ Guilt Likely in Rape of Jogger, Police Panel Says”. New York Times. “A panel commissioned by the New York City Police Department concluded yesterday that there was no misconduct in the 1989 investigation of the Central Park jogger case, and said that five Harlem men whose convictions were thrown out by a judge last month had most likely participated in the beating and rape of the jogger. The panel also disputed the claim of Matias Reyes, a convicted killer and serial rapist, that he alone had raped the jogger. It was his confession last year that led to a sweeping re-examination of the infamous case by prosecutors, and to a reversal of all the original convictions against the five defendants.”
In America, there is no justice. There is only “JustUs.”
Raymond Santana poses for a portrait in New York in March. Santana is a 38-year-old man who in 1989 was accused, along with four other teens, of raping and brutally beating a woman in Central Park. (The Associated Press)
New York is a safer, less fearful place than it was in 1990, when murders hit an all-time high, race relations were raw and the city felt under siege from drug dealers and gangs on “wilding” sprees. But one major piece of unfinished business from back then still hangs over the city and its legal system: the Central Park jogger case.
Five black and Hispanic boys were convicted that year in the rape and grisly beating of a white woman jogging in the park, and they went on to serve six to 13 years in prison before their convictions were thrown out in 2002 because of evidence linking someone else to the crime.
They sued police and prosecutors for $250 million. But the lawsuit has languished for a decade with no resolution in sight.
Now, a growing chorus of lawmakers is asking New York City to settle with the five men. And the pressure is likely to build in the coming weeks with the broadcast of a documentary on the case by filmmaker Ken Burns. It airs on PBS on Tuesday.
“All of us want this over, but it’s about someone taking responsibility for what they did to us,” said one of the five, Yusef Salaam, now 38. “The money can’t buy back our lives.”
The attack on 28-year-old investment banker Trisha Meili occurred on April 19, 1989. It was one of the most notorious crimes in New York City history and it mesmerized the nation, serving as a lurid symbol of the city’s racial and class divide and its rampant crime. It gave rise to the term “wilding” for urban mayhem by teenagers.
“Drugs. Guns. Gangs. New York City was just crime central at that time,” said former New York Detective Kirk Burkhalter, recalling an era so blood-soaked that the city had a record 2,245 homicides in 1990, compared with 414 last year. “You were scared to ride the trains after dark. It was such a different place.”
When Meili was found in the brush, more than 75 percent of her blood had drained from her body and her skull was smashed. She was in a coma for 12 days, left with permanent damage, and remembers nothing about the attack. The Associated Press does not usually name victims of sexual assault, but Meili later went public as a motivational speaker and wrote a book.
Raymond Santana and Kevin Richardson, both 14 at the time, Antron McCray and Salaam, 15, and Korey Wise, 16, were rounded up and arrested. After hours of interrogation, four of them recorded confessions on video, in some cases with the boys’ parents in the room. At the trials, their lawyers argued the confessions were coerced. At the time, DNA testing was not sophisticated enough to make or break the case.
In 2002, a re-examination of the case found that DNA on the victim’s sock pointed to Matias Reyes, a murderer and serial rapist who confessed that he alone attacked the jogger. Then-District Attorney Robert Morgenthau stopped short of declaring the Central Park Five innocent but withdrew all charges and did not seek a retrial. (The statute of limitations for charging Reyes had run out; he is serving a life sentence for other crimes.)
Roger Wareham, one of the lawyers for the five, said the DNA was the key.
“There was never any forensic evidence that tied them to this case,” he said. “In 1989, everybody might not have been forensic savvy, but now, after ‘Law and Order,’ everybody knows if there’s no DNA, they didn’t do it.”
But an overturned conviction does not automatically mean there was any wrongdoing by prosecutors or police. Legal experts say the case is taking a long time in part because of the money and reputations at stake. If it were to go to trial, lawyers would have to prove police and prosecutors acted improperly. A settlement could be reached without the city having to admit wrongdoing, but so far the city hasn’t offered.
And no trial date has been set.
“This is an embarrassing chapter in the city’s history, which is why I think why the city would be anxious to settle it,” said Richard Klein, a Touro Law School professor who recently hosted a panel on the documentary. “Even if you have a different mayor and a different DA, there are so many people who look so bad.”
Celeste Koeleveld, an attorney for New York, said the city did nothing wrong in prosecuting the case.
“Nothing unearthed since the trials, including Matias Reyes’ connection to the attack on the jogger, changes that fact,” Koeleveld said. “Indeed, it was well known at the time of the trials that an unidentified male’s DNA was present.”
The two-hour documentary, “The Central Park Five,” makes the case that the men were wrongly convicted. Burns, acclaimed for his documentaries on Civil War, baseball and Prohibition, put the project together with his daughter Sarah Burns and her husband.
Sarah Burns worked as a summer paralegal in the office of one of the lawyers handling the lawsuit and wrote a 2011 book on the case, “The Central Park Five: A Chronicle of a City Wilding.” The documentary was released last fall in some theaters.
“It was my daughter’s passion and my daughter’s outrage for this,” Ken Burns said. “I was in New York at the time that this crime took place and was shocked as everyone else. … And then I was aware when they were exonerated and I was angry that there was so little coverage. But it was Sarah who really ran with this.”
The film uses extensive interviews with the men and their families, and lawyers for the city went to court to demand outtakes for use in the civil case. A federal judge earlier this year refused the request. Burns said the city was just stalling, “hoping that the five will run out of patience.”
The city Law Department said the move didn’t hold up anything.
City Comptroller John Liu, who is running for mayor, and other state and city politicians, including members of the City Council, have all spoken out in the past six months, demanding City Hall settle.
“We are approaching 10 years,” U.S. Magistrate Judge Ronald L. Ellis, who is presiding over the case, said recently. “Somebody ought to get their day in court.”
The defendants’ lives since they got out of prison have not been easy. Wise was recently re-arrested. McCray moved away. Santana sold drugs and was sent back to prison but now, along with Richardson and Salaam, has become the public face of the case, speaking out against wrongful convictions and racial profiling.
“We are over being angry. Now it’s about helping others, raising our own families right,” said Santana, now 38.
On March 28th, supporters across the country are joining a National Day to Demand Action to end gun violence. Get involved right now by committing to call your Senators. Here’s how it works:
Complete the form to the right, including the time you want to make your call.
You’ll receive a text message reminder on the 28th with a number to call.
You’ll dial the toll-free number in the text message and hear some simple instructions and talking points before being connected to your Senators.
An overwhelming majority of Americans support reform, but to make sure that reform is meaningful we need Congress to pass the strongest possible legislation.
Commit to making a call on March 28th and tell your Senators you Demand Action.
Demand Action is a campaign of Mayors Against Illegal Guns — a national, bipartisan coalition of mayors working to make America’s communities safer by keeping illegal guns out of dangerous hands. Co-founded in 2006 by New York City Mayor Michael Bloomberg and Boston Mayor Thomas Menino, the coalition has grown from a committed group of 15 members to more than 900 mayors from 45 states, including Republicans, Democrats, and Independents, from major cities and small towns around the country. We have more than 1.4 million grassroots supporters, making us the largest gun violence prevention advocacy organization in the country.
Protecting the Second Amendment rights of law-abiding Americans goes hand-in-hand with keeping guns out of the hands of criminals, drug abusers, the seriously mentally ill and other dangerous people. Mayors Against Illegal Guns advocates for common-sense measures that will close deadly gaps in our gun laws and make sure law enforcement agencies have the tools they need to detect and deter gun trafficking. We have worked with more than 100 survivors and family members of gun violence victims in public campaigns to push for solutions from Washington.
For more information about Mayors Against Illegal Guns, please visit our website at www.MayorsAgainstIllegalGuns.org. You can contact Mayors Against Illegal Guns here.
ABOUT DEMAND ACTION
After the July 2012 mass shooting in Aurora, President Obama and Governor Romney made moving statements that echoed the sorrow we all felt. But we need more from our leaders than a moment of silence. We need a moment of action.
In the wake of the shooting at Sandy Hook Elementary School, we got that plan. President Obama’s task force on gun violence presented Congress with a list of priorities that would be instrumental to preventing gun violence, and the time is now for Congress to act on those proposals.
Mayors Against Illegal Guns has partnered with survivors of recent mass shootings — including Aurora, Tucson and Virginia Tech — and the families of the victims to launch this initiative. With the help of more than 1.4 million grassroots supporters, we’ll continue to demand that Congress take all necessary actions to prevent 33 Americans from being murdered with guns each and every day.
Mayor’s Against Illegal Guns is organizing a National Day to Demand Action on March 28th. Senators will be at home for the Easter/Passover recess, and they need to hear from us. We need to attend events, make calls, and come together to make sure our elected officials don’t give in to pressure from the NRA.
Background checks save lives and keep guns out of the hands of dangerous people. They are the single most import reform we can pass to stop 33 people from being murdered with guns every single day in this country.
Yesterday Vice President Biden, Mayor Bloomberg and family members of victims from the Newtown shooting held a press conference about gun reform. The Vice President shared some emotional words with the families and some strong words of praise for the work Mayors Against Illegal Guns has done to keep the pressure on Congress.
Biden Gun Control Speech: A Forceful and Often Emotional Appeal
Published on Feb 21, 2013
Vice President Joseph R. Biden Jr. delivered a forceful and often emotional appeal for stricter gun laws during a forum at Western Connecticut State University in Danbury.
It made me feel proud. But it also made me want to get out there and make sure we pass this bill. I hope you will join me.
We need 60 votes to make sure this bill moves forward, and your Senators are crucial to that total.
Will you join the National Day to Demand Action on March 28th? Pledge to call your Senators in support of common sense gun reform, including background checks:
It’s Been Just 90 Days Since Sandy Hook And 2,680 People Have Died From Handgun Violence In The United States Of America.
But guess what….elected congressmen are too busy filibustering drones used in military missions on foreign lands to be concerned with handgun and assault weapon deaths here on American streets.
ID laws for voting appear to be necessary to ensure proper voting rules are followed to the letter. ID laws and background checks for purchasing handguns and assault weapons are non existent. Our dumbass elected politicians in D.C. fear an American voting, or a drone, but not an American armed with handguns & assault weapons, walking into a mall, a theater, a temple or an elementary school and massacring innocent women & children.
Remember this in “NO”vember, on the 4th, 2014. VOTE.
Nearly four dozen people were arrested as scores of demonstrators gathered in Brooklyn for a third consecutive day to protest the NYPD department following the police-involved shooting of a 16-year-old boy over the weekend, authorities said.
Protesters in East Flatbush, Brooklyn, took to the streets Wednesday as frustration in the community continues to grow over the police shooting of 16-year-old Kimani Gray. Checkey Beckford reports.
The anger was palpable as a group of young people heckled police officers in helmets and later marched down a street.
The vigil’s organizers tried and failed to calm the young people, some of whom later threw bottles at police officers. One officer’s face was hit with a brick; he was treated for a laceration and released from Suny Downstate Hospital, police confirmed.
Forty-six people were arrested on disorderly conduct charges during Wednesday evening’s protest, including Gray’s sister, police told NBC 4 New York. Police said additional and varying charges are pending for many of those arrested. Specific charges against Gray’s sister were not immediately clear.
A spokesman for Gray’s parents said they would not speak publicly as long as there was violence, which he said has “clouded their message.”
“It’s a tough time for the community,” said the spokesman, Rev. Gilford Monrose. “But the family and myself do not condone the violence.”
The teen was with a group Saturday night, but left when he saw police in an unmarked car, police said. Authorities said he was acting suspicious and plain clothes officers approached him. According to police, Gray pointed a .38-caliber revolver at them, and they opened fire. He was pronounced dead at a hospital.
A gun was recovered at the scene.
Gray was black. The officers involved in the shooting were black and Hispanic. They have been placed on administrative duty.
A police officer may use deadly force when the officer has a reasonable fear of serious injury or death. Police Commissioner Raymond Kelly said the shooting appeared to be within those guidelines.
But supporters of Gray maintain he wasn’t armed.
“I want to see justice,” said Jamal Williams, 18, a friend who grew up with Gray in the same East Flatbush neighborhood. “I want to see these cops taken down.”
On Monday, at a vigil for the teen, dozens of people threw bottles and damaged some stores. Police released surveillance video of two of the convenience stores, where people are seen throwing fruit and stealing. In one, the cashier cowers in a corner as people loot the shop.
Rickford Burke, president of the New York Caribbean Institute and an organizer of Wednesday’s vigil, said he condemned the looting. He said the disorderly response came from a deep feeling of frustration in the community that police officers regularly harass and target young black men.
“The police department has proven to be racially inattentive to black communities and this one is no different,” he said.
A second cousin of the victim, Ray Charles, said he was devastated to learn of Gray’s death — and was still having trouble accepting the NYPD’s official version of events.
“My cousin was scared of guns,” said Charles, 35. “I honestly just want justice. They didn’t need to shoot him like that.” Charles did not protest Wednesday night but said he encouraged people to take to the streets.
“The real issue in Brooklyn is cops have been harassing us for a long time,” he said. “It needs to stop.”
Thank you Associated Press / NBC New York.
How Many People Have Been Killed by Guns Since Newtown? 2,680, That’s How many Have Died Since December 14th, 2012. Two Thousand, Six Hundred & Eighty.
Saturday's 411 From Barack's House: The Weekly Address, Barack's Blog Post, A Weekly Recap, The West Wing Week,... fb.me/24EDbWWyJStill A MilitantNegro 3 minutes ago
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