Back when I was a public defender, the overwhelming majority of innocent people who went to the hard hotel didn't come out early.
Very few of them had been convicted on a basis for which DNA evidence later could be used to exonerate.
Even in this case, a credible confession by an actual perpetrator probably would not have been enough by itself.
I am sure there was a big splash in the NYT behind Fairstein's great work.
Someone can look up the multiple articles and tell us about them now.
Kind of like a Kitty Genovese egg on your face moment.
Here's one:
NYT:
"Youths Rape and Beat Central Park Jogger", By Craig Wolff, April, 21, 1989.
Rush to judgment.(They had just been arrested. Victim unconscious.)
Based on the published NYT account, the police had basically made what I came to use and to call a lynch mob identification of this group of youths as the perpetrators, based on their having accosted others, who had reported it, along their way around the park about the time of the assault on the jogger, and had rounded them up.
The NYT confirmed the lynch mob identification of the police as correct, even before they were formally charged, it seems.
Do better run countries just have better journalists?
The verdict of history.
Terms search: lynch mob identification
No comments:
Post a Comment