The Savage City (55 page)

Reporters and photographers feast on Whitmore:
Shapiro,
Whitmore,
pp. 63–64.

Whitmore appearance before Judge Comerford:
Interview with George Whitmore (April 3, 2009); interview with Jerome Leftow (February 17, 2009); interview with Selwyn Raab (April 22, 2009); Lefkowitz and Gross,
The Victims,
pp. 343–348. For a detailed profile of Judge James J. Comerford, see Trillin, Calvin, “American Chronicles: Democracy in Action,”
The New Yorker,
March 21, 1988;
The Marcus-Nelson Murders,
Universal Studios/CBS Television movie. The scene of the Whitmore character before the arraignment judge in
The Marcus-Nelson Murders
is taken from actual transcripts of George Whitmore's appearance before Judge Comerford.

4. “GET THOSE NIGGERS”

Bin Wahad reads newspaper accounts of Whitmore case:
Interview with Dhoruba Bin Wahad (September 16, 2008).

Newspaper headlines:
Kanter, Nathan, and Henry Lee, “Confession: Stumbled into Killing Two,”
Daily News,
April 26, 1964; Federici, William, and Lester Abelman, “Cops Had Questions, Say Only He Had the Answers,”
Daily News,
April 26, 1964;
Journal American;
Buckley, Thomas, “Youth Is Accused in Wylie Slaying,”
New York Times,
April 26, 1964.

Bin Wahad upbringing in the Bronx
: Interview with Dhoruba Bin Wahad (September 16, 2008).

“Back then, before heroin”:
Ibid.

Operation 42:
Freeman, Ira Henry, “Police Plan Nips Delinquency,”
New York Times,
August 15, 1956.

Youth gangs in NYC:
Bennett, Charles G., “$50,000 Allocated to Fight Teen-Age Gangs in Bronx,”
New York Times,
May 13, 1955; Schumach, Murray, “Police Seek Curb on Youth Crime in a 5-Year Plan,”
New York Times,
June 2, 1955; Knowles, Clayton, “Police Head Bars Pacts with Gangs,”
New York Times,
August 16, 1956; Kihss, Peter, “4 Negro Areas Get Extra Police Units,”
New York Times,
July 16, 1959.

“The cops who used to patrol”:
Interview with Dhoruba Bin Wahad (September 16, 2008).

“A race riot could cause more destruction”:
Kihss,
New York Times,
July 16, 1959.

Jitterbugging and zip guns:
“19 in Teen Gangs Seized in Bronx,”
New York Times,
November 10, 1957. A fictional but realistic depiction of early 1960s Bronx gang life can be found in
The Wanderers
(1973), the debut novel by Richard Price.

“I lived not far from Yankee Stadium”:
Interview with Dhoruba Bin Wahad (September 16, 2008).

Bin Wahad family background:
Ibid.; Bin Wahad, Dhoruba, “The Future Past; A Biostory” (unpublished manuscript).

Morris and McKinley housing projects
: Jackson, Kenneth T. (ed.),
Encyclopedia of New York,
pp. 568–569.

Bin Wahad experiences in U.S. Army:
Interview with Dhoruba Bin Wahad (September 16, 2008).

Bin Wahad shooting incident and arrest:
Ibid.; Richard Moore criminal rap sheet in FBI COINTELPRO file.

“The racism that existed in the prison system”:
Interview with Dhoruba Bin Wahad (September 16, 2008).

Description of the Box:
Ibid.

Writings of J. A. Rogers:
For a cogent analysis of the work of J. A. Rogers, see Sandoval, Valerie, “The Brand of History: A Historiographic Account of the Work of J. A. Rogers,”
SCRBC Journal
4 (Spring 1978).

“We declare our right on this earth”:
Breitman, George (ed.),
Malcolm X Speaks,
p. 175.

Whitmore at Bellevue Hospital:
Interview with George Whitmore (April 3, 2009); interview with Jerome Leftow (February 17, 2009); Shapiro,
Whitmore,
pp. 80–85; Lefkowitz and Gross,
The Victims,
pp. 358–363; Raab,
Justice in the Back Room,
pp. 126–129.

“I have never been in trouble in my life”:
Lefkowitz and Gross,
The Victims,
p. 359.

“I asked Whitmore, ‘Were you beaten?'”:
Interview with Jerome Leftow (February 17, 2009); Lefkowitz and Gross,
The Victims,
p. 349.

Psychiatric assessment: “He is without guile”:
Lefkowitz and Gross,
The Victims,
p. 360; Shapiro,
Whitmore,
p. 90; Raab,
Justice in the Back Room,
p. 127.

Use of “truth serum”:
Interview with Jerome Leftow (February 17, 2009); Lefkowitz and Gross,
The Victims,
pp. 361–362.

“It broke every rule of self-incrimination”:
Interview with Jerome Leftow (February 17, 2009).

Civil Rights Act of 1964:
Branch,
Pillar of Fire,
pp. 358–359, 387–388.

“This past, the Negro's past”:
Baldwin, James,
The Fire Next Time,
p. 125.

The riots of July 1964:
The most detailed account of the riots in Harlem and Brooklyn is in
Race Riots: New York 1964
by Fred C. Shapiro and James W. Sullivan; Montgomery, Paul L., and Francis X. Clines, “Thousands Riot in Harlem Area; Scores Are Hurt; Negroes Loot Stores, Taunt Whites—Police Shoot in Air to Control Crowd,”
New York Times
, July 22, 1964; interview with Robert Leuci (February 12, 2009); interview with Joseph “Jazz” Hayden (December 19, 2008); Leuci, Robert,
All the Centurions,
pp. 59–63; Lardner and Reppetto,
NYPD,
pp. 253–255; “Who Pays for Riots,”
Time,
August 7, 1964; “Gilligan on Duty, Precinct Secret,”
New York Times,
November 12, 1964.

William Epton:
A well-known Harlem activist who espoused a kind of street-corner communism, Epton would eventually be arrested, charged, and convicted for inciting the '64 riots and conspiring “to overthrow the New York State government.” His lawyer claimed that he was being made into a scapegoat. Johnston, Richard J. H., “Jury Selected in Trial of Epton Resulting from Riots in Harlem,”
New York Times,
November 27, 1965; Johnston, Richard J. H., “Plan for Revolt Is Laid to Epton,”
New York Times,
December 1, 1965; Johnston, Richard J. H., “Epton Convicted on Riot Charges,”
New York Times,
December 21, 1965; Roth, Jack, “Epton Gets Year in Anarchy Case; Harlem Leader Defends Views,”
New York Times,
January 28, 1966.

“The noise was incredible”:
Interview with Robert Leuci (February 12, 2009); Leuci,
All the Centurions,
p. 61.

Tactical Patrol Force (TPF):
Interview with Robert Leuci (February 12, 2009); Leuci,
All the Centurions,
pp. 67–68; Lardner and Reppetto,
NYPD,
pp. 254–255, 275; Lardner,
Crusader,
pp. 173–174, 181.

“There were no social services in these neighborhoods”:
Interview with Robert Leuci (February 12, 2009).

“They hated us”:
Ibid.

“I walked in on a lot of beatings”:
Ibid.

Incident on 125th Street with Leuci and two Nation of Islam people:
Ibid.

“A young man, barefoot, muscular”:
Leuci,
All the Centurions,
p. 62.

Mayor Wagner on television:
Shapiro and Sullivan,
Race Riots: New York 1964,
p. 158.

“Sure, we make mistakes…You do in a war”:
Benson, Barbara, “Why Harlem Riots; Indignities and Sadism at Hands of Police Charged,”
New York Times,
July 22, 1964; Samuels, Gertrude, “Who Shall Judge a Policeman?:
Out of Negro Riots Have Come Persistent Charges of Police Brutality,”
New York Times Magazine,
August 2, 1964.

“I know there was more than one dead”:
Interview with Robert Leuci (February 12, 2009).

5. GETTING FLOPPED

Leftow's preparations for trial:
Interview with Jerome Leftow (February 17, 2009).

Revelation that photo was not Janice Wylie:
Ibid.; interview with Selwyn Raab (April 22, 2009); Lefkowitz and Gross,
The Victims,
pp. 375–377; Shapiro,
Whitmore,
pp. 86–88; Raab,
Justice in the Back Room,
pp. 170–173; Zion, Sidney E., “The Suspect Confesses—But Who Believes Him?”
New York Times Magazine,
May 16, 1965; Shapiro, “Annals of Jurisprudence: The Whitmore Confession,”
The New Yorker,
February 8, 1969.

Whitmore alibi:
Interview with George Whitmore (April 3, 2009); Lefkowitz and Gross,
The Victims,
pp. 377–378; Shapiro,
Whitmore,
p. 95; Raab,
Justice in the Back Room,
pp. 171–172.

ADA Glass meeting with Det. Bulger:
Cunningham, Barry, with Mike Pearl,
Mr. District Attorney,
pp. 95–98; Lefkowitz and Gross,
The Victims,
p. 368; Raab,
Justice in the Back Room,
p. 193; Shapiro,
Whitmore,
pp. 174–175.

“If George were only being charged”:
Interview with Jerome Leftow (February 17, 2009).

Leftow meeting with ADA Koste and ADA Herman:
Interview with Jerome Leftow (February 17, 2009).

“I guess you could say I was raised prejudiced”:
Shecter with Phillips,
On the Pad,
p. 126.

“I was about three or four years old”:
Ibid.

Police use of the term
mau mau
: Burnham, James, “From a Cold War Notebook,”
National Review,
October 29, 1964; McDonald, Brian,
My Father's Gun,
p. 16; interview with Brian McDonald (February 4, 2010); interview with Robert Leuci (February 12, 2009).

Malcolm X on the Mau Mau Rebellion in Kenya:
Breitman (ed.),
Malcolm X Speaks,
pp. 106–107.

Police as protectors against marauding Negro hordes:
The role of police as protectors against arriving waves of poor blacks from the South and impoverished Puerto Rican immigrants was touched upon by nearly every ex-cop I interviewed for this book. Most cops viewed the issue in terms of lawlessness and degradation of community standards. To blacks and Puerto Ricans, it seemed as though the police were racists. The police doubtless saw themselves as fulfilling their traditional role as protectors of property, in this case real
estate interests and property owners. Interview with Robert Leuci (February 12, 2009); interview with Brian McDonald; interview with Sonny Grosso (April 13, 2009); interview with Randy Jurgensen (February 12, 2010); interview with Robert Daley (January 21, 2010); interview with Eddie Ellis (May 15, 2009); interview with Joseph “Jazz” Hayden (December 19, 2008).

Phillips and Kenny Keller:
Shecter with Phillips,
On the Pad,
p. 105.

“[Madden] had all kinds of tricks up his sleeve”:
Shecter with Phillips,
On the Pad,
p. 106.

Phillips as “conditions man”:
Ibid.

Attitude of Phillips's wife:
Shecter with Phillips,
On the Pad,
p. 171.

“We're working on a big swindle”:
Shecter with Phillips,
On the Pad,
p. 154.

“It's about eight o'clock in the morning”:
Ibid.

“Fun City”:
The term “Fun City” was a public relations ploy devised to bolster the image of New York City. The term was embraced by, and became prevalent, during the early years of the Lindsay administration. As the city became more crime-ridden and decayed throughout the 1960s, the term was sometimes used derisively. Cannatto,
The Ungovernable City,
p. 146;
Fun City Revisited: The Lindsay Years,
PBS documentary.

Phillips gets “flopped”:
Ibid.; Knapp Commission Hearings testimony; Schultz, Ray, “Anatomy of a Murder Trial: The People v. William Phillips,”
New York Times Magazine,
December 17, 1972; Daley, Robert,
Target Blue,
p. 402.

“I was completely demoralized”:
Shecter with Phillips,
On the Pad,
p. 174.

Harlem as source of plunder for corrupt police:
Interview with Robert Leuci (February 12, 2009); interview with Edwin Torres (April 13, 2009); interview with Joseph “Jazz” Hayden (December 19, 2008); interview with Eddie Ellis (May 15, 2009); Shecter with Phillips,
On the Pad,
pp. 87, 176–186.

“The first thing to do in a new precinct”:
Shecter with Phillips,
On the Pad,
p. 177.

“I got fucked all over the precinct”:
Ibid.

Officer Egbert Brown:
Ibid.

6. ON THE BUTTON

“I knew I hadn't done nothin' wrong”:
Interview with George Whitmore (April 3, 2009).

Leftow preparations for Borrero trial:
Interview with Jerome Leftow (February 17, 2009).

Borrero trial:
Interview with George Whitmore (April 4, 2009); interview with Jerome Leftow (February 17, 2009); interview with Selwyn Raab (April 22, 2009); Lefkowitz and Gross,
The Victims,
pp. 418–440; Shapiro,
Whitmore,
pp. 90–92, 94–103; Raab,
Justice in the Back Room,
pp. 131–144; Shapiro, “Annals of Jursiprudence: The Whitmore Confession,”
The New Yorker,
February 8, 1969;
The Marcus-Nelson Murders,
Universal Studios/CBS Television movie.