*A member of the Exonerated 5 has delivered a powerful and perfect one word response following the indictment of Donald Trump, who in 1989 called for New York State to adopt the death penalty after the Black and Brown teens were wrongly accused of assaulting and raping a white woman in Central Park.
“Karma,” was the response issued by the campaign of Yusef Salaam, now running to represent central Harlem on the New York City Council.
Before the trial had taken place, Trump took out full-page ads in four New York newspapers calling for the return of the death penalty, adding that the accused “should be forced to suffer,” even before the trial had taken place.
In 2002, Matias Reyes confessed to the rape and attack of the Central Park jogger, and it was confirmed by forensic methods that were unavailable in 1989. The five teenagers, including Salaam, later said they were coerced into giving confessions for the crime despite initially professing their innocence.
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Asked at the White House in 2019 if he should offer the Exonerated 5 an apology, Trump declined, saying: “You have people on both sides of that. They admitted their guilt.”
Trump was indicted by a Manhattan grand jury on Thursday in connection with hush-money payments to adult film star Stormy Daniels, making him the first former president to be criminally charged. He reportedly faces more than 30 counts related to business fraud in the indictment, which remains under seal. He’s expected to be arraigned in Manhattan criminal court on Tuesday.
Rev. Al Sharpton, who protested in support of the teens outside the courthouse during their trials, pointed out the irony involved in the location of Trump’s legal proceedings.
“It’s not lost on those of us who were there in 1989 that Donald Trump will likely walk into the same courthouse where the Exonerated 5 were falsely convicted for a crime they did not commit,” he said in a statement to Business Insider. “Let’s not forget that it was Donald Trump who took out full-page ads calling for these five Black and Brown young men to get the death penalty. This is the same man who’s now calling for violence when he has to go through the same system. The same man will have to stand up in a courtroom and see firsthand what the criminal justice system is like.”
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