ET on ABC. The verdict? Weather: Sunny but not humid, with a high near 70. I grabbed her to drag her inside to the bushes. How could that be coercive? The Central Park Five, a film from award-winning filmmaker Ken Burns, tells the story of the five black and Latino teenagers from Harlem who were wrongly convicted of raping a white woman in New . Burns' broader point about the residual risk of rushing to judgment, even in our postracial society, is worth bearing in mind as we are awash in news of violence. That a sociopath named Matias Reyes confessed in 2002 to the rape of Ms. Meili, and that the district attorney consequently vacated the charges against the five after they had served their sentences, has led some of these reporters and filmmakers to assume the prosecution had no basis on which to charge the five suspects in 1989. Meilis rape and attack was so severe, she lost 75 percent of her blood, suffering a severe skull fracture among other injuries. For non-personal use or to order multiple copies, please contact A new drug called crack was leaving whole communities decimated, while in other parts of the city, the lavish, money-making culture of Wall Street was booming. In a recent round table discussion about their shifting roles in the culture, Mr. McCray reflected that until the Central Park Five documentary was released a decade later, in 2012, The train wasnt moving at all.. Reyes was never prosecuted for the crimes the Five were accused of as the statute of limitations had passed. They were disgusted.". Ultimately, the hysteria surrounding the Central Park Jogger case gave rise to new language about black-youth crime, and to new laws that caused more children to stand trial as adults than at any other time in American history. One woman, after hearing his spiel recently, pulled him close and said, Shut up and amaze me.. There is extreme swelling of the brain caused by the blows to the head. "No money could bring that time back. This story of pitiless teenagers taking turns with a woman, then caving in her skull was big enough, terrible enough, to electrify a city grown numb to its own badness. ThisI never did this before," Wise said in his confession tape. When the five former teens convicted in the case were finally exonerated, many community leaders decried the miscarriage of justice that sent the Central Park Five to prison. As DuVernays strongest work to date, When They See Us should inspire people to recognize that crime-control policies and the racist ideas behind them must change. He always acted alone. Richardson and Santana, both part of the alleged wolf pack, were arrested for unlawful assembly on April 19, before police learned of the joggers attack. Both stories were wrong. It was an unedifying barrage, kazoos from all corners. . I wished to God I had just hung the jury on that. Regulation failed to prevent bank failures, but the Treasury secretary wants more regulation. "This was my first rape. Read about our approach to external linking. Reporters and filmmakers have explored this story countless times from numerous perspectives, almost always focusing on five attackers and one female jogger. [West Side Rag], Bronx officials and organizers hold a ceremonial pride flag raising at Bronx Borough Hall to begin Pride Month. But the DNA era has revealed that false confessions are behind many wrongful convictions. [Want more news from New York and around the region? Unlike the accurate accounts they gave to police of those events, their confessions to the assault on the jogger were wrong about where, when and how it happened. Archival footage of Mayor Koch and Governor Cuomo demonstrates the self-congratulatory We got 'em! attitude meant to instill confidence among New Yorkers. Her skull has been fractured, and her eye will later have to be put back in its place. Check out our full coverage.]. Eight others were attacked, including two men who were beaten so savagely that they required hospitalization for head injuries. "I was alone that night. Demonstrators, you know people just shouting, you know, Rapist! You animal! You dont deserve to be alive, he said several years ago. Donald Trump and the Central Park Five: the racially charged rise of a In 2003, the Central Park Five filed a civil lawsuit against New York City for malicious prosecution, racial discrimination and emotional distress. As a subscriber, you have 10 gift articles to give each month. "We had all these kids now in custody, and they were all starting to talk and give stories about what happened," Sheehan said. "The victim looked like his head got dunked in a bucket of blood, he was beaten so badly," Reynolds said. The enemies were white., Adding fuel to the fire, weeks after the attack, in May 1989, real estate developer (and future U.S. president)Donald Trump took out full-page ads in The New York Times, the New York Daily News, the New York Post and New York Newsday with the headline, "Bring Back The Death Penalty. Under Sweets, I discovered this item: crepes filled with chvre, covered in powdered sugar and drenched with blueberries in syrup. About | The Central Park Five | Ken Burns | PBS But I have never seen somebody, like, destroyed.". As New York Times reporter Jim Dwyer pointed out, New York was a social moat dividing two cities: Truth, reality, and justice were not part of it.. "According to the law of New York, by saying, 'I didn't do the rape. Watch the full story on "20/20" Friday, May 24, at 9 p.m. Four of the five teens, all from Harlem,confessed on videotapefollowing hours of interrogation. One spring day in 1989, the world awoke to news of a crime so soul-witheringly awful that it shocked even those who knew the New York City of that often ghastly era. "It raises the possibility that theyre actually innocent.". What were the five teenagers doing in the park that night? It humanizes the Central Park Five, permitting a view of their individual lives and experiences in a manner that often was absent amid sensational media coverage. Around 9 pm, a group of about 30 teenage boys entered Central Park from 110th Street and 5th Avenue. And that's, thats been my biggest regret for 30 years.". All articles are regularly reviewed and updated by the HISTORY.com team. McCray, Richardson, Santana and Salaam got five to 10 years in prison as juveniles. This research investigates reporting surrounding the Central Park attack and how the media's response altered over the past 25 years. 5 p.m. [Free], See the Season 3 premiere of The Handmaids Tale two days before its available online, as part of the Split Screens festival at the IFC Center in Manhattan. And the works of filmmakers like Ms. DuVernay, Mr. Burns and Henry Louis Gates Jr. have shown that the racial tropes of our past were not abandoned in ancient boneyards, but were poured into the concrete that modern America was built on. Saturday's first game will start at 12:10 p.m. Meili now works with survivors of brain injuries, sexual assault, and other kinds of trauma, to help them gain the strength to move forward in their lives. If there was this damage. The red-bereted Guardian Angels group chanted for the five boys to be tried as adults. They bear a strong resemblance to real life. Ethan Herisse as Yusef Salaam in When They See Us (left) and the real Yusef Salaam now, Antron McCray (left) and Yusef Salaam (third from left) leave court in 1990, Alexandra Templer as Trisha Meili in the Netflix drama When They See Us, which is based on the story of the Central Park Five, New York city was very different to what it is like now, Reece Noi plays Matias Reyes in When They See Us, Protestors outside Manhattan's Criminal Court in New York City in 2002, Protesters march in front of city court in New York in 2002, Yusef Salaam, Kevin Richardson, Raymond Santana, Antron McCray and Korey Wise in 2019, Writer/director Ava DuVernay and Jharrel Jerome, who plays Korey Wise, on the set of When They See Us. In 2002 a convicted serial rapist and murderer already serving time, confessed to the Meili attack. There was intense public pressure to solve the case and, indeed, the police quickly arrested . No money could bring the life that was missing or the time that was taken away.". 9:30 p.m. [$10]. I was just blaming whoever. The five defendants in the Central Park jogger case, behind the table, in court in New York, February 23, 1990. "They spent a lot of their lives in jail, in . Salaam said: "I look at Donald Trump, and I understand him as a representation of a symptom of America. In the series, the interrogation scenes are presented as a whirlpool of badgering, menace and cajoling. Prosecutors had a few problems, though. To view this content choose accept and continue. "They wanted to get this case off the books. Quick answer: psychological and psychiatric factors, with results later regretted. The defendants were also found guilty in the court of public opinion. "I thought, I know I have no memory, but I wanted people to know the condition that I had been left in," she told ABC News' "20/20.". Opened in New York City on November 23, 2012. Central Park 'Exonerated 5' Member Yusef Salaam Reflects On - NPR The Central Park Five film explores the story of the miscarriage of justice that engulfed Antron McCray, Kevin Richardson, Yusef Salaam, Raymond Santana and Korey Wise, the black and Latino .