The Crown Heights riots.

[Pushtak21]

I was like....6.5 when that happened. Can someone please tell me what occured in August of 1991 in Crowne heights between the blacks and the jews that left a mark on the jewish community in NYC?

[Mediocrates]

What would you like to know? There was a black child who was killed in a traffic accident when an ambulance run by an Chassidic foundation ran into him. The EMS people tried to save him but were prevented from getting to the scene by a mob that was trying to pull the ambulance driver out. When the child died the community erupted into wider riots. Later that day a young Chassidic student was stabbed to death by a black male. That defendant was tried a few times in different courts until he was convicted of civil rights violations and sent to prison for 10 years. The family of the Chassidic student also sued the hospital where he died in the ER because a severe stab wound to his chest was either ignored or not treated. He bled out internally.

[Pushtak21]

Was this an accident or did the guy who drove the car responsible, since he did see the kid!?

[KettleWhistle]

Does it matter?

[Mediocrates]

Was this an accident or did the guy who drove the car responsible, since he did see the kid!?


It was an accident. That is undisputed. What triggered the riot was what I described. These things don't happen in a vacuum. There was a long term animosity between the groups for a long time. Nothing violent but they really never liked each other.

[Pushtak21]

So it was typical black rage that made the riots occur. The same thing that occured in Cincinati? St. Petersburg and LA around the same time frame?

[redcake]

No. The phrase "typical Black rage" sounds a bit misguided.

The blacks of Crown Heights in question are predominantly recent immigrants from the West Indies for one thing..

A big problem was how Dinkins, NY's Black mayor at the time, handled things. He posed at press conferences with the Grane Rebbe, and then tied the hands of the police to react when the tensions started to build. The riots were fused by Al Sharpton, and leaders from the Nation of Islam who attempted to use the situation as a rallying point. The JDL claimed they would put armed gaurds on street corners, but it was all a publicity bluff. Jewish organizations were all over the press, but responded as if Blacks and Jews did in fact have some history of tension between the two groups, which legitamized the story. Suddenly pamphlets such as "The secret relationship between Blacks and Jews" were circulating. Black leaders went on TV and incited things by accusing Jews of running the slave trade, and owning plantations. There was a lot of poor reporting of the story. Nobody mentioned the long history Jews and Blacks had shared together....Black residents were attacking Jews with slurs, and references to the Holocaust.... it was also an abnormally hot summer, which puts a lot of people out on the streets.... etc. etc.

There was nothing typical about it.

[Mediocrates]

It didn't help that juries kept finding Lemrick Nelson innocent of murdering Yankel Rosenbaum time and time again. He eventually was convicted of violating his victims federal civil rights. And this has served to reinforce the the belief that if a black man murders an Chassidic Jew in NY, the prosecutor better have a video tape of the murderer on the steps of city hall with 20,000 witnesses present if he wants a conviction......./just sayin....