The Exonerated Five and the Aftermath of Their Trial
The source of media that I chose to examine was Oprah Winfrey Presents: When They See Us Now. In this interview, Oprah talks to the men behind the Central Park Five case. The Central Park Five are five men who were falsely accused of the rape and assault of a jogger in Central Park and were prosecuted for it. These five men, who are known as the Central Park five, were eventually exonerated. In 2019, Netflix released a miniseries called When They See Us which explored the lives of the five men who were falsely accused and prosecuted in a high-profile case. Along with the miniseries, Netflix released an interview with the men who the series is based on and the actors that portrayed them.
In 1989, Patricia Meili was found in Central Park barely alive after being beaten and sexually assaulted while on a jog. The Central Park five, Raymond Santana Jr., Kevin Richardson, Antron McCray, Yusef Salaam, and Korey Wise, were also in the park that night and were implicated in the case. At the time, these boys were just seventh and eighth graders. Despite having zero physical evidence linking any of them to the crime, meaning no DNA or fingerprints, the Manhattan District Attorney was adamant on pursuing these boys. Allegedly, the detectives that were handling the case were pressured by Linda Fairstein, head of the Manhattan District Attorney’s Sex Crime Unit, to coerce the five boys into signing confessions.
The five boys went on to be sentenced between five to fifteen years in prison and juvenile detention centers for crimes that they did not commit. In 2002, thirteen years later, Matias Reyes confessed to the crime and was linked to crime with DNA evidence. This proved the five men’s innocence and New York City vacated their convictions and exonerated them.
One of the first point in the interview that really stood out to me was when an actor from the series, Michael K. Williams, was explaining how he had grown up hearing about the case. When the case was in the news, he recalled being afraid of the being lumped in with the young men who had confessed to the crime. Williams went as far as to change the way he dressed out of this fear. This just goes to show the level of trauma that cases like this can affect not just those involved, but those who hear about it as well. This case and many others like this were traumatizing to young black men who saw themselves in the young men who were prosecuted. Through no fault of his own, Williams was afraid that he would be judged for the color of his skin or even for the clothes that he wore. This is the work of implicit bias in action. While some people might be outright prejudice, this would be a good example of how implicit bias can affect people. As explained by a former police officer, “we internalize repeated messages from our family, our friends, our neighbors, our community, and the stereotypes and images we see on television, and in movies, magazines, and other media” (Horace, M., & Harris, R., 2019).
Later in the interview, Oprah asked the Exonerated Five how they think the system has changed over the years in regard to racism. Kevin Richardson responded that not much has changed. The most important thing that has changed is that with social media and entertainment we are able to make stories like theirs accessible and start conversations. While Richardson is optimistic for the future, he recognizes that black men are still being disproportionately affected by the criminal justice system. However, the fact that racism in the criminal justice system has become the forefront of the conversation when talking about the system is a very important first step into seeing the changes in the system.
The series and the interview touch on something that many who critique the criminal justice system fail to recognize which is the fact that while cops contribute to inequalities within the system, they are not the most powerful. The series and interview focus on the prosecutor, Linda Fairstein, quite a bit. Angela Davis explains why there was such a heavy focus of Fairstein in our text, “police officers have the power to arrest and bring individuals to the courthouse door. But prosecutors decide whether they enter the door and what happens to them if and when they do. Through their charging and plea-bargaining powers, prosecutors control the criminal justice system and frequently predetermine the outcome of criminal cases” (Davis, 2018).
Towards the end of the interview, Oprah asked the men what their reaction were when they had heard that Matias Reyes had confessed to the crime that they were convicted of. Everyone had said how grateful they were, but Yusef Salaam’s did not quite have the same reaction. Salaam had been so let down by the system when he had heard the news, he thought that the prosecutor and media was going to turn the case into the Central Park Six, instead of clearing their names. It is hard to imagine being so burned by the system that hearing that news elicits fear rather than relief.
While the miniseries is a great series, especially to those who are unfamiliar with the case. I chose to examine the interview because it provides a unique insight to what the young men were going through during the investigation and during aftermath of their exoneration. Overall, this was a really heavy but an incredibly insightful interview that I think anyone interested in the criminal justice system or this case should watch. The interviews with the men who were convicted highlight the faults in the system and how they impacted them and continue to impact them to this day. These men really helped contextualize the material that we learned in class and how not only the system, but also the media can impact people of color.
References
Davis, A. J. (2018). Policing the Black man: Arrest, prosecution, and imprisonment. New York,
NY: Vintage Books, a division of Penguin Random House LLC.
Horace, M., & Harris, R. (2019). The black and the blue: A cop reveals the crimes, racism, and
injustice in America’s law enforcement. Hachette Books.