PASSAGE OF THE DAY: "Asked in 2019 at the White House why he would not apologize in spite of the exonerations, Mr. Trump said, “They admitted their guilt.” The men have said that police officers coerced them into falsely confessing to the attack at the time."
STORY: "Members of ‘Central Park 5’ Say Trump Is Too Dangerous for Second Term," by Reporter Jeffery C. Mays, published by The New York Times. (Jeffery C. Mays is a Times reporter covering politics with a focus on New York City Hall.)
SUB-HEADING: "In a prime-time speech at the Democratic National Convention, four of the five men exonerated in the 1989 assault of a female jogger said Donald J. Trump’s public attacks were devastating."
PHOTO CAPTION: "The men – who now prefer to be called the Exonerated Five — recalled how Donald Trump spent $85,000 on a full-page ad in The New York Times calling for their execution.
GIST: "Not long after the rape and beating of a white female jogger in Central Park in 1989, Donald J. Trump took out full-page newspaper ads about the case, calling for the reinstatement of the death penalty.
The five Black and Latino teenagers accused in the attack — Korey Wise, Yusef Salaam, Raymond Santana, Kevin Richardson and Antron McCray, known as the Central Park Five — served years in prison before being cleared in 2002 by DNA evidence and the confession of another man.
But Mr. Trump has refused to apologize.
At the Democratic National Convention in Chicago on Thursday night, four of the five men — who now prefer to be called the Exonerated Five — said that what Mr. Trump did to them was devastating and proves that he is too callous and dangerous to serve a second term as president.
The men, excluding Mr. McCray, who was not present, offered vigorous endorsements of Vice President Kamala Harris and her running mate, the governor of Minnesota, Tim Walz.
Mr. Wise, who served more than 13 years in prison, the longest term among the group, told the convention crowd that the men’s youth had been stolen from them and they faced the screams of adults as they entered court each day because of Mr. Trump’s actions.
“He called us animals. He spent $85,000 on a full-page ad in The New York Times calling for our execution,” Mr. Wise said. “We were innocent kids, but we served a total of 41 years in prison.”
Mr. Salaam, who last year was elected to New York’s City Councilin a Harlem district, said that Mr. Trump “wanted us dead.”
“He has never changed. And he never will,” Mr. Salaam said. “That man thinks that hate is the animating force in America. It is not.”
Asked in 2019 at the White House why he would not apologize in spite of the exonerations, Mr. Trump said, “They admitted their guilt.” The men have said that police officers coerced them into falsely confessing to the attack at the time.
The convention, with speakers including Hollywood celebrities like Oprah Winfrey and John Legend and political celebrities like former President Barack Obama and Michelle Obama, has been an exercise in characterizing Mr. Trump as fraudulent, cruel and selfish. That the exonerated men appeared on the final night of the convention, just hours before Ms. Harris, a former prosecutor, was to formally accept the nomination, served to hammer that point home.
The Rev. Al Sharpton, who introduced the four men, sought to draw a contrast between Ms. Harris and Mr. Trump: “I see a candidate who has sought to reform and uphold the law, and a man who wrongly assumes his mug shot appeals to Black Americans.”
While Ms. Harris has “consistently committed to making government work for those of us who have been at a disadvantage,” he added, Mr. Trump has been consistent about “making himself richer and sowing division to get that done.”
The men’s appearance was also a high-profile example of Black men backing Ms. Harris. Some polls have shown a skepticism toward the Democratic Party among that group.
Ms. Harris is leading Mr. Trump 78 percent to 16 percent among registered Black voters, according to recent polls by The New York Times and Siena College.
“Kamala Harris has also worked to make things fairer,” Mr. Wise said. “I know she will do the same as president.”
The entire story can be read at:
https://www.nytimes.com/2024/08/22/nyregion/central-park-5-dnc-trump.html
PUBLISHER'S NOTE: I am monitoring this case/issue/resource. Keep your eye on the Charles Smith Blog for reports on developments. The Toronto Star, my previous employer for more than twenty incredible years, has put considerable effort into exposing the harm caused by Dr. Charles Smith and his protectors - and into pushing for reform of Ontario's forensic pediatric pathology system. The Star has a "topic" section which focuses on recent stories related to Dr. Charles Smith. It can be found at: http://www.thestar.com/topic/charlessmith. Information on "The Charles Smith Blog Award"- and its nomination process - can be found at: http://smithforensic.blogspot.com/2011/05/charles-smith-blog-award-nominations.html Please send any comments or information on other cases and issues of interest to the readers of this blog to: hlevy15@gmail.com. Harold Levy: Publisher: The Charles Smith Blog.
- SEE BREAKDOWN OF SOME OF THE ON-GOING INTERNATIONAL CASES (OUTSIDE OF THE CONTINENTAL USA) THAT I AM FOLLOWING ON THIS BLOG, AT THE LINK BELOW: HL:
https://www.blogger.com/blog/post/edit/120008354894645705/4704913685758792985
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FINAL WORD: (Applicable to all of our wrongful conviction cases): "Whenever there is a wrongful conviction, it exposes errors in our criminal legal system, and we hope that this case — and lessons from it — can prevent future injustices."
Lawyer Radha Natarajan:
Executive Director: New England Innocence Project;
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FINAL, FINAL WORD: "Since its inception, the Innocence Project has pushed the criminal legal system to confront and correct the laws and policies that cause and contribute to wrongful convictions. They never shied away from the hard cases — the ones involving eyewitness identifications, confessions, and bite marks. Instead, in the course of presenting scientific evidence of innocence, they've exposed the unreliability of evidence that was, for centuries, deemed untouchable." So true!
Christina Swarns: Executive Director: The Innocence Project;
