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Started By
Message
re: Thoughts on Central Park Five and West Memphis Three?
Posted on 9/27/24 at 6:57 pm to Tigerroar73
Posted on 9/27/24 at 6:57 pm to Tigerroar73
West Memphis 3 are innocent
0
Posted on 9/27/24 at 7:02 pm to Tigerroar73
quote:
Central Park Five and West Memphis Three
Not as good as Beverly Hills Cop 2.
Posted on 9/27/24 at 7:11 pm to Tigerroar73
Devon Tracey covered this well.
Posted on 9/27/24 at 7:12 pm to Tigerroar73
Jena 6
Posted on 9/27/24 at 7:53 pm to Tigerroar73
'I so wish the case hadn't been settled': 1989 Central Park jogger believes more than 1 person attacked her. New York City settled with the Central Park Five for $41 million….
In 2014, Mayor Bill de Blasio and New York City finally settled with the Central Park Five, a group of teenagers who were convicted and later exonerated in connection with the rape and brutal assault on a jogger.
But the settlement remains a decision that Trisha Meili -- the jogger in that horrific attack -- says the city should not have made. And the police and prosecutors involved in the case agree.
"I so wish the case hadn't been settled," Meili told ABC News' "20/20" in January. "I wish that it had gone to court because there's a lot of information that's now being released that I'm seeing for the first time…"
A group of teens take over Central Park
On the night of April 19, 1989, she worked until 8 p.m. and then headed to her home on the East Side. Moments after she had returned home, she was back outside, running toward Central Park.
But at the same time that she was headed out for her run, police were scrambling to respond to calls about 30 to 40 teens who were harassing people in the park.
"People were punched in the face and pulled off their bicycles and robbed of their watches. I mean, it was kind of a crazy series of incidents that took place in the park," recalled former newspaper columnist Ken Auletta.
A little before midnight, her body was found by two men, in a ravine about 50 feet from the 102nd Street cross path.
"Trish Meili [was] not conscious, barely, barely alive," said Linda Fairstein, who was chief of the district attorney's office at the time.
Meili, who had been raped and brutally beaten, was taken to a hospital. She had no memory of what happened.
"She had blunt trauma," said surgeon Dr. Bob Kurtz, who treated Meili. "They didn’t know if she would survive. She looked like a little waif in the bed. No one knew who she was yet."
Plastic surgeon Dr. Jane Haher told ABC News' "20/20" that she's never forgotten that day.
"I have seen traumatized patients many, many times. But I have never seen somebody, like, destroyed," Haher said. "Her body was just so swollen -- unrecognizable, really."
The police question five teens
While Meili was in the hospital, with doctors unsure if she would live or die, New York authorities were charging five teenagers who had been held in connection with the Central Park assaults with her attack. The teens -- Kevin Richardson, Yusef Salaam, Raymond Santana, Korey Wise and Antron McCray -- eventually became known as the "Central Park Five."
Prosecutors had no DNA and little evidence that matched the teenagers to the crime, the attack, or the scene. But each teenager -- except for Salaam -- had made statements or open confessions about Meili’s attack, implicating themselves or each other.
Meili was in a coma for about a week in the hospital before she finally opened her eyes. Meili said she watched some of the videotapes of the teens' statements and confessions.
"It is very, very hard watching someone describe how people beat me, how people were trying to stop my screaming by beating my face," she said.
When the first trial began in August 1990 against Salaam, Santana and McCray, Meili agreed to testify. "I remember I was very nervous," she said. "I thought, 'I know I have no memory but I wanted people to know the condition that I had been in.'"
After 10 days of deliberations, Salaam, Santana and McCray, all 16 years old at the time, were convicted of rape, assault and robbery in the attack on Meili. After a separate trial, in December 1990, Wise was found guilty of sexual abuse, first degree assault and riot. Richardson was also found guilty on all charges.
McCray, Richardson, Santana and Salaam got five to 10 years in prison as juveniles. Wise was sentenced to five to 15 as an adult.
A serial rapist comes forward
With the trials over, Meili -- believing her attackers were behind bars -- ran the New York City Marathon in 1995.
In 2002, 13 years after the Central Park attack and with four of the Central Park Five out of prison, convicted serial rapist Matias Reyes came forward and said he was Meili's sole attacker.
The Central Park Five's convictions are vacated
"I always knew that there was at least one more person involved because there was unidentified DNA," Meili said. "So when I heard the news that there was an additional person found whose DNA matched, that wasn't a tremendous surprise. But when he said that he and he alone had done it, that's when some of the turmoil started, wondering 'Well, how can that be?'"
Meili and doctors Kurtz and Haher said there was medical evidence to support the charge that more than one person was responsible for her attack. Her injuries were different from what Reyes claimed as the sole attacker, Meili said.
"There were hand prints pressed into her skin that looked red in outline," Kurtz said. Haher said the hand prints were of different sizes as well.
In 2002, District Attorney Robert Morgenthau withdrew all charges against the Central Park Five, and their convictions were vacated. Wise, who was still in prison at the time, was released early. The group sued in 2003 and after a decade-long standstill, the lawsuit was settled for $41 million.
"The five of them went to Central Park to beat up people and they ended up with millions of dollars and they’re heroes and civil rights icons," Reynolds said. "It’s appalling."
In 2014, Mayor Bill de Blasio and New York City finally settled with the Central Park Five, a group of teenagers who were convicted and later exonerated in connection with the rape and brutal assault on a jogger.
But the settlement remains a decision that Trisha Meili -- the jogger in that horrific attack -- says the city should not have made. And the police and prosecutors involved in the case agree.
"I so wish the case hadn't been settled," Meili told ABC News' "20/20" in January. "I wish that it had gone to court because there's a lot of information that's now being released that I'm seeing for the first time…"
A group of teens take over Central Park
On the night of April 19, 1989, she worked until 8 p.m. and then headed to her home on the East Side. Moments after she had returned home, she was back outside, running toward Central Park.
But at the same time that she was headed out for her run, police were scrambling to respond to calls about 30 to 40 teens who were harassing people in the park.
"People were punched in the face and pulled off their bicycles and robbed of their watches. I mean, it was kind of a crazy series of incidents that took place in the park," recalled former newspaper columnist Ken Auletta.
A little before midnight, her body was found by two men, in a ravine about 50 feet from the 102nd Street cross path.
"Trish Meili [was] not conscious, barely, barely alive," said Linda Fairstein, who was chief of the district attorney's office at the time.
Meili, who had been raped and brutally beaten, was taken to a hospital. She had no memory of what happened.
"She had blunt trauma," said surgeon Dr. Bob Kurtz, who treated Meili. "They didn’t know if she would survive. She looked like a little waif in the bed. No one knew who she was yet."
Plastic surgeon Dr. Jane Haher told ABC News' "20/20" that she's never forgotten that day.
"I have seen traumatized patients many, many times. But I have never seen somebody, like, destroyed," Haher said. "Her body was just so swollen -- unrecognizable, really."
The police question five teens
While Meili was in the hospital, with doctors unsure if she would live or die, New York authorities were charging five teenagers who had been held in connection with the Central Park assaults with her attack. The teens -- Kevin Richardson, Yusef Salaam, Raymond Santana, Korey Wise and Antron McCray -- eventually became known as the "Central Park Five."
Prosecutors had no DNA and little evidence that matched the teenagers to the crime, the attack, or the scene. But each teenager -- except for Salaam -- had made statements or open confessions about Meili’s attack, implicating themselves or each other.
Meili was in a coma for about a week in the hospital before she finally opened her eyes. Meili said she watched some of the videotapes of the teens' statements and confessions.
"It is very, very hard watching someone describe how people beat me, how people were trying to stop my screaming by beating my face," she said.
When the first trial began in August 1990 against Salaam, Santana and McCray, Meili agreed to testify. "I remember I was very nervous," she said. "I thought, 'I know I have no memory but I wanted people to know the condition that I had been in.'"
After 10 days of deliberations, Salaam, Santana and McCray, all 16 years old at the time, were convicted of rape, assault and robbery in the attack on Meili. After a separate trial, in December 1990, Wise was found guilty of sexual abuse, first degree assault and riot. Richardson was also found guilty on all charges.
McCray, Richardson, Santana and Salaam got five to 10 years in prison as juveniles. Wise was sentenced to five to 15 as an adult.
A serial rapist comes forward
With the trials over, Meili -- believing her attackers were behind bars -- ran the New York City Marathon in 1995.
In 2002, 13 years after the Central Park attack and with four of the Central Park Five out of prison, convicted serial rapist Matias Reyes came forward and said he was Meili's sole attacker.
The Central Park Five's convictions are vacated
"I always knew that there was at least one more person involved because there was unidentified DNA," Meili said. "So when I heard the news that there was an additional person found whose DNA matched, that wasn't a tremendous surprise. But when he said that he and he alone had done it, that's when some of the turmoil started, wondering 'Well, how can that be?'"
Meili and doctors Kurtz and Haher said there was medical evidence to support the charge that more than one person was responsible for her attack. Her injuries were different from what Reyes claimed as the sole attacker, Meili said.
"There were hand prints pressed into her skin that looked red in outline," Kurtz said. Haher said the hand prints were of different sizes as well.
In 2002, District Attorney Robert Morgenthau withdrew all charges against the Central Park Five, and their convictions were vacated. Wise, who was still in prison at the time, was released early. The group sued in 2003 and after a decade-long standstill, the lawsuit was settled for $41 million.
"The five of them went to Central Park to beat up people and they ended up with millions of dollars and they’re heroes and civil rights icons," Reynolds said. "It’s appalling."
This post was edited on 9/27/24 at 7:55 pm
Posted on 9/27/24 at 7:53 pm to 3nOut
quote:
I don’t know that they raped and attacked that woman but they all broke numerous laws that night and definitely saw her and did not help.
4 out of 5 of the so-called Central Park 5 admitted to the sexual assault of the so-called Central Park jogger and were convicted based on those confessions. After being detained for questioning on suspicion of committing violent rampages (aka “wilding”) in Central Park, several teenagers implicated themselves and each other of a brutal sexual assault before police even were aware a rape had occurred.
These confessions were captured on video tape and are chilling:
quote:
The video footage of McCray, Richardson, Santana, and Wise was damning indeed. Some excerpts:
Antron McCray: “We charged her. We got her on the ground. Everybody started hitting her and stuff. She was on the ground. Everybody stomping and everything. Then we got, each — I grabbed one arm, some other kid grabbed one arm, and we grabbed her legs and stuff. Then we all took turns getting on her, getting on top of her.”
Kevin Richardson: “Raymond [Santana] had her arms, and Steve [Lopez, who accepted a plea bargain rather than face trial] had her legs. He spread it out. And Antron [McCray] got on top, took her panties off.”
Raymond Santana: “He was smacking her. He was saying, ‘Shut up, bitch!’ Just smacking her…. I was grabbing the lady’s tits.”
Kharey Wise: “This was my first rape.”
Again, police were not even aware that a rape had occurred since these confessions were given while the victim was in a coma on life-support. It was only in the years after their convictions that they claimed their confessions had been coerced.
The convictions were only overturned after a serial rapist claimed he committed the rape alone. Yet the victim always has maintained she was sexually assaulted by multiple assailants.
And evidence disputes the claim that only one person committed the violent attack. The doctors who treated the victim indeed testified that the physical trauma on her body was consistent with an attack by multiple assistants.
Posted on 9/27/24 at 8:18 pm to Tigerroar73
The Central Park thing was the cops arrested a bunch of people that were mugging people in the park.
5 of them admitted to the beating and rape of a jogger.
It came out later some other guy did it.
But these fricks were still out mugging people in Central Park. That’s why they were arrested in the first place.
5 of them admitted to the beating and rape of a jogger.
It came out later some other guy did it.
But these fricks were still out mugging people in Central Park. That’s why they were arrested in the first place.
Posted on 9/27/24 at 8:22 pm to jrodLSUke
Wait. You think the W Memphis three are guilty? The tard that confessed actually was out of town for a wrestling match. Bruh I think the main dude is D bag. But not guilty of this crime.
Posted on 9/27/24 at 8:51 pm to 3nOut
quote:
I don’t know that they raped and attacked that woman but they all broke numerous laws that night and definitely saw her and did not help.
They are guilty as hell.
Posted on 9/27/24 at 10:07 pm to Toomer Deplorable
quote:
Thoughts on Central Park Five and West Memphis Three?
I wonder if the victim could sue these guys during the window Trump got sued under
Posted on 9/27/24 at 10:08 pm to Tigerroar73
The very guilty 8.
Posted on 9/27/24 at 10:30 pm to jdd48
RE: the WM3
There was definitely judicial misconduct here but I also believe they were guilty.
quote:
One of the most blatant cases of judicial misconduct in modern times.
There was definitely judicial misconduct here but I also believe they were guilty.
This post was edited on 9/27/24 at 10:38 pm
Posted on 9/27/24 at 10:42 pm to Tigerroar73
Regarding West Memphis 3, I believe they were stupid and initially did not truly understand the seriousness of the situation they were facing. And I believe they are innocent. Whether I am right or wrong, my thoughts don't really matter. God will be the final judge.
Posted on 9/27/24 at 11:17 pm to jdd48
quote:wait until you hear about this guy Juan Merchan
One of the most blatant cases of judicial misconduct in modern times.
Posted on 9/27/24 at 11:43 pm to Rebel
The only one who showed remorse.
Posted on 9/27/24 at 11:59 pm to Toomer Deplorable
quote:
The convictions were only overturned after a serial rapist claimed he committed the rape alone.
The serial rapist was in the same prison and I think even perhaps the same cell block as some of the Central Park 5. It wasn’t a confession that sprang forth ex nihilo.
Posted on 9/28/24 at 12:00 am to dgnx6
quote:
It came out later some other guy did it.
No. It didn’t.
Posted on 9/28/24 at 1:08 am to Toomer Deplorable
quote:
The convictions were only overturned after a serial rapist claimed he committed the rape alone. Yet the victim always has maintained she was sexually assaulted by multiple assailants.
What was the theory on the serial rapist's confession? Was he caught already and just threw it out there for more street cred or something?
Posted on 9/28/24 at 1:51 pm to the808bass
quote:
The serial rapist was in the same prison and I think even perhaps the same cell block as some of the Central Park 5. It wasn’t a confession that sprang forth ex nihilo.
HISTORY VS. HOLLYWOOD: WHEN THEY SEE US.…
Did Matias Reyes commit the assault and rape of Trisha Meili alone?
This is what serial rapist Matias Reyes stated in his 2002 confession. Though some questionable evidence existed, no solid evidence was found that directly placed any of the Central Park 5 where Trisha Meili's battered body was found. Like in the miniseries, the ground markings at the scene showed that one person, not a group, had dragged Meili from the path to the underbrush. If it was one person, we know it had to be Reyes because his DNA matched the DNA found on both Meili and her sock.
Reyes had committed a string of rapes, attempted rapes, and one rape-murder around the time of his 1989 attack on Trisha Meili in Central Park. In fact, he had raped another woman in the park just two days before he raped Meili. In total, he raped more than five women and raped and murdered Lourdes Gonzalez, who was pregnant at the time. After forcing his way into Gonzalez's apartment, he stabbed her nine times in the chest and stomach, and once in the face, as her three children listened from outside the bedroom door (Newsweek).
One issue with Reyes' confession is that he is a violent psychopath and a pathological liar (a defense psychiatrist concluded that Reyes was not capable of telling the truth). Justice Galligan, who presided over Reyes' 1991 murder/rape trial, was quoted as saying, "[I]f Reyes is a credible witness, then credibility has a new meaning" (Daily News).
Does DNA evidence prove that the Central Park 5 didn't assault Trisha Meili?
No.
13 years after arrests of the Central Park 5, the media proclaimed in 2002 that they had been exonerated because of DNA evidence linking Puerto Rico-born Matias Reyes to the jogger case. The problem is that DNA evidence wasn't what convicted the teens in the first place, so it couldn't exonerate them. It was always known that the small sample of semen recovered from the jogger's cervix and the larger sample recovered from her sock didn't match the Central Park 5.
The investigators always believed that there was another attacker still on the loose. The DNA simply proved that Reyes was that person. The issue after Reyes confessed to the crime was whether he was telling the truth about being the sole attacker.
Though DNA tied Reyes to the rape, it doesn't rule out the possibility that others had assaulted Meili before he found her and dragged her into the woods. The surgeon who led the team who treated Meili, Dr. Bob Kurtz, said that Meili's severe head wounds were not solely the result of being struck with a tree branch, as Reyes claimed he used.
A much sharper object made some of the wounds, which Reyes never said he used. In an effort to not cause any more controversy for the city, District Attorney Robert Morgenthau prevented the police from interrogating Reyes and instead recommended that the convictions of the Central Park 5 be vacated.
….Meili says that the medical evidence supports that there was more than one attacker and the doctors who treated her agree. In 2002, Surgeon Bob Kurtz said that in examining the massive injuries all over her body, it would have been close to impossible for one person to do all of that (Daily News). Kurtz also said that "there were hand prints pressed into her skin [including on her thighs and lower legs] that looked red in outline," and plastic surgeon Jane Haher noted that the hand prints were of different sizes, which indicated that more than one person had held on to her and caused the injuries to her body (ABC News).
These statements raise significant doubt around the notion that Reyes committed the assault by himself. However, this could also mean that the mob of teens assaulted/sexually assaulted Meili and left her injured, after which Matias Reyes moved in, dragged her into the underbrush, assaulted her further and committed the rape.
Did Korey Wise and Matias Reyes really fight over the TV at Rikers Island?
….Korey Wise and Matias Reyes did get into a fight that came to blows when they were both incarcerated at Rikers Island in 1990. The miniseries portrays it as Wise getting mad at Reyes for turning down the volume on the TV. In real life, both Wise and Reyes said that they argued over what to watch on TV that night. -The Daily Beast
However, a more plausible possibility put forth by the arresting officer in the Central Park case, Eric Reynolds, is that the fight at Rikers was over the fact that Korey Wise was upset that he was taking the fall for the rape and Matias Reyes had gotten away with it. This actually makes sense given that in Wise's initial statements to detectives, he placed Reyes at the scene of the rape when he said that "Rudy" had taken the female jogger's Walkman and fanny pack.
Due to the fact that Wise is hard of hearing, it is believed that he mistakenly thought Reyes' name was Rudy. It would have been impossible for detectives to coerce such a statement from Wise because they didn't even know about Matias Reyes' involvement at the time, nor did they know that the female jogger had a Walkman and a fanny pack.
This means that Wise and Reyes would have known who each other were at the time of the fight at Rikers, including each other's involvement in the attack on the Central Park jogger. This scenario makes far more sense. Yet, When They See Us wants us to believe that out of the roughly 18,000 inmates at Rikers Island at the time, there was a random argument over a TV between two strangers, both of whom just happened to be connected to the female jogger. The chance of that happening is approximately 1 in 18,000 or 0.00005555555% (Police Off the Cuff.)
Matias Reyes claimed after he crossed paths with Korey Wise for a second time in the prison system. He said that he could sense Wise's pain and he decided to confess because he had found Jesus Christ. This is the reasoning the miniseries goes with, but some researchers believe that Matias Reyes' confession was mostly self-serving. Others flat-out reject Reyes' come-to-Jesus moment, saying that it's ridiculous given that he was a serial rapist and murderer whose own defense attorney called him "a pure psychopath," in addition to the fact that he sexually assaulted his own mother and tried to rape a woman in a church.
….A more likely theory is that Reyes came forward after being moved to the prison's general population, because once there he was threatened by Wise and his prison gang (it was reported Wise had been a member of the Bloods gang and the Nation of Islam). Wise threatened him into confessing that he was Trisha Meili's sole attacker. Reyes knew that he could not be punished for the crime because the statute of limitations for rape in New York City was then seven years. He knew that he could come forward without doing any more time.
The Armstrong Report cites two inmates who said that Reyes had in fact been threatened by Wise, but it doesn't offer much to verify the claim. For the most part, this only makes sense if Wise had already known that Reyes had raped Trisha Meili, which seems likely given statements made by Wise to the police after his arrest (as explained earlier). The report states that Reyes may have come forward so that he could get transferred to a different prison, away from Wise, which did happen after he confessed. Further supporting Reyes' fear of Wise is the fact that he demanded protection at the time he came forward.
Posted on 9/28/24 at 2:28 pm to Tigerroar73
I initially thought the WM3 may be innocent, but seeing all the leftist celebs defending them made me think otherwise.
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