Central Park Jogger Rape Trials: 1990

To abide by the U.S. Supreme Court's 1965 Aranda rule, which forbids testimony in which one codefendant implicates another, three trials were planned to separate youths who had implicated each other in videotaped or written confessions. These incriminating statements quickly defined the case for the defense. After unsuccessfully trying to bar the confessions for nearly a year, defense attorneys continued to challenge their legal and ethical legitimacy throughout the trials.

When defendants Antron McCray, Yusef Salaam, and Raymond Santana, Jr., came to trial in June 1990, they faced prosecutor Elizabeth Lederer, who began by methodically reconstructing the night of violence. Seven victims of earlier harassment, robberies, and beatings in the park testified, although none implicated the three defendants. Doctors who treated the jogger testified that she had lost 75 percent of her blood by the time she was discovered. Her skull had been hammered so violently that the normally wrinkled surface of her brain had been beaten flat. Yet lack of physical evidence remained the weakest part of the prosecution's case. Blood and semen tests of the jogger were inconclusive.

In spite of the seriousness of her injuries, the scarred victim had recovered enough strength to appear in court. She testified briefly about the lingering aftereffects of the beating, but she could remember nothing about the assault itself.

The atmosphere changed when video monitors appeared in the courtroom. Jurors watched a half-hour videotape in which the prosecutor read McCray his Miranda rights as his parents looked on. On the tape, McCray then described how he and the gang had "charged" the jogger and beaten her to the ground. Someone, he said, hit her with a length of pipe before the gang took turns raping her. McCray admitted dropping his pants and climbing on top of the jogger but denied raping her. "I didn't do nothing to her," he said.

In his signed and videotaped confessions, Santana admitted assaulting other joggers in the park and implicated two youths who were scheduled to be tried later for rape. He confessed that he had held the jogger while Kevin Richardson raped her and Steven Lopez hit her in the head with a brick to stop her screams.

While police denied intimidating the suspects or promising them anything in return for the crucial confessions, detective Thomas McKenna testified that he had tricked a written confession out of Salaam, who denied even being in the park. When the detective falsely told Salaam that his fingerprints were found on the jogger's synthetic running tights, Salaam changed his story.

"Yes, I was there but I didn't rape her," Salaam said.

"How could you possibly do something like this?" the detective asked.

"It was just something to do," Salaam replied. "It was fun." Salaam admitted hitting the jogger twice with a metal pipe and grabbing her breasts, but he said that four others raped the woman, including Richardson and Wise.

McKenna said that Salaam's statement ended when his mother arrived and told police that her son was only 15. Minors were entitled to have a parent or guardian present during questioning, but when police took Salaam into custody, he claimed he was 16 and produced a transit authority pass to prove it. Defense witnesses claimed that the police knew Salaam was a minor and interrogated him anyway. Judge Thomas Galligan allowed the prosecution to introduce Salaam's unsigned statement and instructed jurors to decide for themselves if it was obtained fairly.