Unequal Verdicts: The Central Park Jogger Trials [Hardcover]

Timothy Sullivan (Author)

Book Description

Publication Date: November 1992

An examination of one of the biggest rape cases in decades reconstructs the attack on the Central Park jogger; presents interviews with gang members, police, witnesses, and other victims; and discusses the trial. 25,000 first printing.

Editorial Reviews

From Publishers Weekly

On April 19, 1989, a young, white, female investment banker --her name has been withheld throughout the case-- jogging in Manhattan's Central Park was raped and severely beaten by a group of African American and Hispanic teenagers. Shortly before the assault, this gang also attacked others who were using the park for so-called "wilding." In his absorbing book, Sullivan, news editor for the Courtroom Television Network, skillfully sorts through diverse details of the investigations and trials. Relying also on transcripts and interviews with lawyers and jurors, he demonstrates how prosecutors developed their case from circumstantial evidence, how numerous errors were made by defense attorneys and why one of the more implicated defendants received a relatively light sentence. Less satisfying is the fact that the author fails to discuss the role of the press and issues of gender, race and class raised by the case. are virtually ignored. Film rights optioned to Edgar Scherick Productions for HBO; Literary Guild alternate.
Copyright 1992 Reed Business Information, Inc.

From Library Journal

Sullivan's lively style gives immediacy again to the Central Park jogger case--not surprisingly, as he is news editor of Court TV and a former editor of Manhattan Lawyer . He covers the arrest through sentencing of ten teenage boys in two trials, which took place in New York from spring 1989 through spring 1991. Sullivan's narrative is always absorbing, despite the jumble of details about the criminal justice system, attorneys, police, and juries whom he interviewed. The first book on the Central Park "wilding" cases, it is significant for what it does not do: it does not continue the histrionics of previous reportage; it does not speculate on the historical truths and myths of gender and race relations; and it does not portray the case as a symbol of urban violence, New York City's brutalization, or larger social issues. One of Sullivan's aims is apparently to present enough background to put to rest contentions of an unfair trial. Recommended for general readers and young people.
- Janice Dunham, John Jay Coll. Lib., New York
Copyright 1992 Reed Business Information, Inc.

Product Details

• Hardcover: 335 pages
• Publisher: Simon & Schuster; First edition. edition (November 1992)
• Language: English
• ISBN-10: 067174237X
• ISBN-13: 978-0671742379
• Product Dimensions: 9.4 x 5.9 x 1.2 inches
• Shipping Weight: 1.2 pounds
• Average Customer Review: 3.0 out of 5 stars  See all reviews (2 customer reviews)
• Amazon Best Sellers Rank: #2,517,911 in Books (See Top 100 in Books)

More About the Author

Discover books, learn about writers, read author blogs, and more.

Customer Reviews

Most Helpful Customer Reviews

5.0 out of 5 stars AN INTERESTING ACCOUNT OF THE "CENTRAL PARK JOGGER" INCIDENT AND ITS AFTERMATH, January 21, 2011

By 

Steven H. Propp (Sacramento, CA USA) - See all my reviews
(TOP 500 REVIEWER)    (REAL NAME)   

This review is from: Unequal Verdicts: The Central Park Jogger Trials (Hardcover)

Timothy Sullivan is a freelance writer in New York, and a former correspondent and producer for Court TV, who supervised the network's coverage of the trials of Scott Peterson, Michael Jackson, and O.J. Simpson. (Incidentally, the jogger has published her own story: see I Am the Central Park Jogger: A Story of Hope and Possibility.) Ultimately, after five young men were convicted of the crime, the convictions were vacated in 2002 when another man claimed to have committed the crime alone, and DNA evidence confirmed his involvement in the rape.

Sullivan writes in the "Acknowledgements" section of this 1992 book, "This is a book about a handful of trial lawyers and how they dealt with one of the most explosive criminal cases ever to hit the New York courts."

Here are some quotations from the book:

"As the early days went by, the role of race in the crime and its aftermath began to take on more prominence in the coverage. In a city in which race relations had been recently strained by racist killings of blacks in Howard Beach, Queens, and Bensonhurst, Brooklyn, the issue was debated from nearly every perspective." (Pg. 56)
"But a great many African-American and Latino citizens were automatically suspicious of confessions obtained by police from minority teenagers. That distrust of the police was widespread and based on a long history of undisputed oppression and police brutality. Now the results of the DNA tests revealed that there was no conclusive physical evidence against the suspects." (Pg. 90)
"The defense lawyers immediately seized upon this finding to mount a new assault on the state's case. Clearly, they said, the REAL rapist got away. These kids were scapegoats, forced by the cops to confess to a crime they didn't commit." (Pg. 103)
"Harlem itself was split by the case... (Most) were appalled by the violence... But Harlemites also resented what they perceived as the media's trashing of the whole community and the placing of blame on an entire generation of black youth." (Pg. 104)
"Vernon Mason and Colin Moore, who spoke with conviction about a miscarriage of justice having put their innocent, young clients in jail approximately eighteen months ago, still have not filed their promised appeals." (Pg. 316)

9 of 21 people found the following review helpful:

1.0 out of 5 stars Whoops!, December 7, 2002

By 

Walter Ellis (New York, United States) - See all my reviews
(REAL NAME)   

This review is from: Unequal Verdicts: The Central Park Jogger Trials (Hardcover)

Timothy Sullivan is the executive producer of Court TV and still brings news of many big trials to our screens. In Unequal Verdicts, his bestseller from 1992, dealing with the Central Park Jogger case, he ends his final chapter with a description of how "a group of angry boys between the ages of 13 and 17 had used [a bar], along with a rock, a brick and their bare hands, to pound the promise out of [the victim's] future." But let's not forget his final word on the subject: "And on the streets ... lots of people wonder whether her boyfriend did it." Could Sullivan have got it more wrong? He appears never even to have heard of Matias Reyes, the actual rapist, who was in the middle of a murder and rape spree in the same area at the time. And that final, gratuitous swipe at the Jogger's perfectly innocent boyfriend! Can we really believe a word this man tells us about guilt and innocence?