From: jake@bony1.bony.com (Jake Livni)
Subject: Re: Say it ain't so
Organization: The Department of Redundancy Department
Date: Fri, 6 Nov 92 17:14:16 GMT

In article <1992Nov4.080110.13323@Princeton.EDU> niepornt@phoenix.Princeton.EDU (David Marc Nieporent) writes:

>That wasn't what I heard about this case.  Any of it.

Let's see...

>The jury simply didn't believe what the police said.  (For those of you
>who aren't aware of NY politics, the police do NOT have much credibility
>right now.  The fact that they were rioting last month, busy shouting
>racist slurs at the mayor, over the idea of civilian oversight of the 
>police department probably doesn't help.)

For those of you who are not aware of NYC politics right now, Mayor
Dinkins doesn't have much credibility among white New Yorkers, nor
with the Police Department.  The noisy police demonstration a month
ago followed the shooting death of a drug dealer by a policeman, after
which the Mayor rushed to the drug dealer's family to comfort their
loss, while criticizing the police.  Mayor Dinkins is making the
already difficult job of law enforcement in NYC even more difficult.  

>The police said they found the murder weapon, which was bloodied with
>the victim's blood, in Nelson's pocket.  But Nelson's clothes had NO
>blood on them.  (Police have been known to plant evidence on occasion,
>you know.)

I don't trust the police for everything, either, but that doesn't
automatically mean that they can never tell the truth.  Juries are
being prodded by the words and actions of Mayor Dinkins to distrust
the police mightily.  I don't think that there is anything the police
said in this case which was accepted by the jury; they discarded all
the evidence in court.

>The victim identified the guy based mostly on his red shirt.  But there
>were several other people who testified they were also wearing red shirts.

This is incorrect.  Yankel Rosenbaum had probably never met Lemrick
Nelson until a few minutes earlier.  It's no wonder, then, that
Rosenbaum didn't call out "That's him!  Lemrick Nelson!" but instead
identified the one in the red shirt.  This does not appear to be the
only means of recognition by the victim, but merely a means of
pointing him out.  Witnesses scanning a police line-up would say the
same thing.  

>The police CLAIMED he confessed at the police station.  But there was no
>written or taped confession anywhere.  And he denied that he did.

In last Sunday's rally, former Mayor Ed Koch reminded us that we have
an adversarial justice system.  Both lawyers are trying to win the
case; the pursuit of justice is not really the issue with lawyers.

Thus, when Nelson's lawyer found out that there was no record of the
alleged confession, he most likely would have instructed his client to
deny making it.  It worked.  It often does.

>>A judge told me this week that he knew the outcome long ago, that
>>"there isn't a jury in Brooklyn that would convict this guy".  The
>>jury didn't suffer doubt.  They suffered prejudiced blindness.
>
>Or the police did, which is the other possibility.  Many people felt
>that the cops needed someone to arrest quickly to quiet down the Jewish
>community, so they just picked Nelson and creatively fit the evidence to
>him.

Nelson was nabbed within minutes of the stabbing.  This was only hours
after Gavin Cato's death in a car accident.  Rosenbaum, who was in the
library that day, didn't even know about the car accident.  The only
people rioting at that time (or afterwards, for that matter) were
Blacks from that neighborhood and from other neighborhoods.

Thus, there was no need to "quiet down the Jewish community" because
the Jewish community was not being violent.  Nelson was picked up and
idnetified by Yankel Rosenbaum even before he was taken away by
ambulance; he died a few hours later.

Your charge that Nelson was arrested to appease the Jewish community
is based on invented facts.  What is your agenda?

What's more, Mayor Dinkins and his Chief of Police at the time, Lee
Brown, instructed the police to allow the mob in Crown Heights to
"vent their rage" for 72 hours.  While Jews in Crown Heights huddled
inside, a riot outside continued as people looted stores and ran
through the streets.

To add even more insult to injury, Nelson was the only one of the mob
of about 20 that was arrested.  By comparison, when a Black person is
attacked by a white mob, everyone in the mob is arrested and charged.
Why hasn't the Black community been urged to "give up" the others, as
white communities have been urged in similar circumstances?  The
miscarriage of justice in this case is stunning.

-- 
Jake Livni  jake@bony1.bony.com              10 years from now, George Bush will
American-Occupied New York                   have replaced Jimmy Carter as the
My opinions only - employer has no opinions. standard of a failed President.
Newsgroups: soc.culture.jewish