Dan Crisler – Omaha World-Herald – Aug 10, 2024

Yusef Salaam, one of the Central Park Exonerated Five, speaks Friday during the inaugural Nebraska Summit on Justice and Disparities at Creighton University.DAN CRISLER, OMAHA WORLD-HERALD

My cmnt: These guys were NOT exonerated, they were freed for political reasons. They most certainly were guilty of attacking the Central Park Jogger, holding her down while several other boys raped her, penetrated her with their fingers, beat her unconscious and left her for dead. It was a brutal gang rape and the Five were part of it. Yes, their DNA was not there – but they were.

My cmnt: Click this link for the whole, true story. Here’s an excerpt from the article:

In a six-week pre-trial hearing, the boys’ confessions were subjected to relentless assault by defense attorneys. The confessions were attacked again during both trials and on appeal. The trial judge, the two multi-ethnic juries and the appellate court judges found the confessions voluntary — and damning.

Salaam confessed to the rape after the detective questioning him said that fingerprints had been found on the jogger’s clothing, and if the prints were his, he was “going down for the rape.” Salaam confessed immediately. Why would he do that — unless he was worried the prints might be his?

Taken to the scene of the crime by a detective and a prosecutor the following morning, Wise said, “Damn, damn, that’s a lot of blood. … I knew she was bleeding, but I didn’t know how bad she was. It was really dark. I couldn’t see how much blood there was at night.” (She’d lost three-quarters of her blood.)

The police also had incriminating testimony from friends and acquaintances of the defendants.

— Dennis Commedo, one of the boys who was part of the larger group, told the police that, when he ran into Richardson in the park that night, he’d said, “We just raped somebody.”

— Wise told a friend’s sister, Melody Jackson, that he didn’t rape the jogger; he “only held her legs down while Kevin (Richardson) f—ed her.” Jackson volunteered this information to the police, thinking it would help Wise.

— Two of Wise’s friends said that, the next day, he told them, “You heard about that woman that was beat up and raped in the park last night. That was us!”

— Another boy arrested for the attacks, but not the rape, told the detectives on videotape that he overheard Santana and a friend laughing in the park about how they’d “made a woman bleed.”

The defendants also knew facts about the attack that only someone who had been there could possibly know. Two of the boys, Santana and Richardson, independently pointed out the exact location where the rape had occurred.

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In 1990, Yusef Salaam went to prison for a crime he didn’t commit.

Salaam was one of five Black and Hispanic teenagers convicted in the physical and sexual assault of a woman jogging in New York City’s Central Park in April 1989. The group would become known as the Central Park Five and later, after DNA testing showed a different man committed the crime, which generated a media firestorm, the group became known as the Exonerated Five.

Despite being eventually exonerated of the crime, Salaam served nearly seven years in prison for the attack. Today, he’s a New York City council member. He shared his story of overcoming injustice — an experience he described as the “American nightmare” — at the inaugural Nebraska Summit on Justice and Disparities held Friday at Creighton University.

Despite the injustice against him and the four others and the divisions that resulted from the affair, Salaam advocates for an opposite tactic for people to overcome injustice: One of unity.

“Our unity is more powerful than an atomic bomb,” he said.

That unity appeared to be on display when at least 200 people from different backgrounds discussed and brainstormed ways to address injustice as it related to the justice system’s effect on minorities. Hosted by the Iowa-Nebraska chapter of the NAACP, the justice summit drew area civil rights activists, court officials, law enforcement officials, government officials and others to find solutions to make for a more equitable justice system.

“What has been amazing is the interest across all sectors of society,” said Betty Andrews, president of the Iowa-Nebraska NAACP. “We are all on the same team as we are moving toward making changes.”

Summit workshops included addressing racial disparities in arrests and traffic stops in Omaha. Omaha Police Chief Todd Schmaderer presented statistics during a morning keynote address showing that traffic stops involving Black people, who make up 12.3% Omaha’s population, account for just over 27% of the total number of traffic stops so far this year.

While Schmaderer said law enforcement agencies in general have recorded similar statistical discrepancies, he added that reducing the traffic stop discrepancy will be a point of emphasis for study within the Police Department and community.

“I don’t want to live in everybody else’s paradigm,” he said.

Other workshops included improving support programs for those within the criminal justice system and crime victims and survivors; creating more diversity on juries to facilitate fairer verdicts; and changes for inmates made within the Nebraska Department of Corrections.

Given the high attendance of the workshop, which nearly filled a ballroom at Creighton’s Harper Center, Andrews expects the Summit on Justice and Disparities to be held again.

She said organizers hope to add more voices, including those representing other minority groups and other parts of Nebraska.

“There are so many things that we want to talk about, discuss and put into action,” Andrews said.

My cmnt: Nothing to do with the above article – just a great photo.

Tae’veon Coleman, 7, (left) waits to cast his line as the sun sets during a Community Lake day hosted by Big Gumdrop Outdoors at Oak Lake Park on Friday, Aug. 9, 2024, in Lincoln. Big Gumdrop Outdoors, is ,a nonprofit created by Elijah Riley, a Lincoln native and UNL student, to help kids connect with nature and play outside.KENNETH FERRIERA Journal Star