Two years after Amadou was killed, a local artist named Hulbert Waldroup was commissioned to create a mural honoring him on the street where he lived in the Bronx. But that’s not the mural you’ll see if you drive by today.
In this episode, Sara Braun and Dani Morera Trettin uncover the story behind the original mural, its controversial unveiling, and why eventually, a new mural replaced it 16 years later.
In 1999, four white police officers killed Amadou Diallo and were charged with murder. A year later, a jury found them not guilty. The trial took place in Albany — even though the killing happened in the Bronx. 24 years later, we wanted to know why the jury voted not guilty. Does justice mean something different depending on where you are?
In the 1980s and 90s, controversial City Councilperson Antonio Pagan was loved and hated by the Lower East Side. And while his political career was short-lived, his complicated legacy lives on. 35 years later, we want to know: was Antonio Pagan to blame for one of the worst police riots in New York City’s history?
Daniel Rakowitz would often wander around Tompkins Square park holding a Bible and carrying a live rooster. Everyone in the neighborhood knew him, or knew of him. In 1989 – Daniel would go on trial for the brutal and complicated murder of Monika Beerle. Turns out, he’d told people he was going to kill her. So, why didn’t anyone listen? This episode is “The Butcher of Tompkins Square Park.”
Over 400 police officers clashed with 200 civilians on the streets of the Lower East Side, in the late hours of August 6, 1988. Ralph Grasso, a retired NYPD officer, take us back to one of the most notorious nights in New York city history, the Tompkins Square park riot. Months after the riot, Ralph himself was in deep trouble. In this episode, we hear an NYPD’s perspective of what happened the night policing and crowd control methods changed forever. It was a year where hand held video cameras were used, where hours of footage captured behaviour that left a stain on the NYPD for a long time to come.