You turn to us for voices you won't hear anywhere else.

Sign up for Democracy Now!'s Daily Digest to get our latest headlines and stories delivered to your inbox every day.

The Manhattan District Attorney’s Office Asks for More Time to Investigate the Famous Central Park Jogger Case: A Roundtable Discussion On Forced Confessions

Listen
Media Options
Listen

The Manhattan District Attorney’s office has asked for more time to investigate the famous Central Park Jogger case that rocked the city and inflamed racial tensions in New York and around the country more than a decade ago.

In April 1989, a young white jogger in Central Park was raped, beaten and left for dead. Five African-American and Latino teenagers were convicted. They served many years in jail; the last just got out of prison several weeks ago after thirteen years. At the time, the headlines screamed, 'Wolf Pack', 'Wilding,' 'Teenagers singing wilding songs in prison.'

[It may have been a deciding factor in the New York State Legislature’s decision to re-establish the state’s death penalty. Shortly after the attack Donald Trump took out full paid ads in all the New York papers calling to “Bring Back the Death Penalty” and referring to the young defendants.]

But in news that was barely reported just this last January, convicted rapist Matias Reyes unexpectedly confessed to the crime. He said he did it alone. Several months later, DNA tests showed that Reyes “proved beyond question” that he raped the jogger, according to a law enforcement official quoted in the New York Times.

Now, the Manhattan DA say sit needs more time to investigate whether Matias Reyes was the only assailant in the infamous Central Park Jogger case. The original defendants, five African American and Latino teenagers are calling for a reversal of the convictions.

The first hearing on the case was scheduled for September 9th has now been put off until October.

Guests:

  • Michael Warren, attorney for Central Park Jogger defendants.
  • Christopher Dunn, NYCLU Associate Legal Director.
  • Steve Drizin, a clinical associate professor at Northwestern University School of Law in Chicago and a staff attorney at the law school’s Center on Wrongful Convictions.

Tape:

  • Matias Reyes’ confession.

Related link:

Related Story

StoryOct 14, 2016Central Park Five’s Yusef Salaam: Donald Trump Needs to Be Fired from Running for President
The original content of this program is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution-Noncommercial-No Derivative Works 3.0 United States License. Please attribute legal copies of this work to democracynow.org. Some of the work(s) that this program incorporates, however, may be separately licensed. For further information or additional permissions, contact us.

Non-commercial news needs your support

We rely on contributions from our viewers and listeners to do our work.
Please do your part today.
Make a donation
Top