The Central Park Five
by Sarah Burns
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Acknowledgment: Random House provided a copy of The Central Park Five for this review.
Location(s) referenced in The Central Park Five: New York City
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The Central Park Five by Sarah Burns
Publisher: Knopf
Format: Hardcover
ISBN-10: 0-307-26614-1
ISBN-13: 978-0-307-26614-9
Publication Date: May 2011
List Price: $25.95
Synopsis (from the publisher): On April 20, 1989, the body of a woman is discovered in Central Park, her skull so badly smashed that nearly 80 percent of her blood has spilled onto the ground. Within days, five black and Latino teenagers confess to her rape and beating. In a city where urban crime is at a high and violence is frequent, the ensuing media frenzy and hysterical public reaction is extraordinary. The young men are tried as adults and convicted of rape, despite the fact that the teens quickly recant their inconsistent and inaccurate confessions and that no DNA tests or eyewitness accounts tie any of them to the victim. They serve their complete sentences before another man, serial rapist Matias Reyes, confesses to the crime and is connected to it by DNA testing.
Intertwining the stories of these five young men, the police officers, the district attorneys, the victim, and Matias Reyes, Sarah Burns unravels the forces that made both the crime and its prosecution possible. Most dramatically, she gives us a portrait of a city already beset by violence and deepening rifts between races and classes, whose law enforcement, government, social institutions, and media were undermining the very rights of the individuals they were designed to safeguard and protect.