On November 17, 2015, officials denied 80-year-old Winston Moseley’s 18th parole request, reminding him of the horrific way he murdered 28-year-old Kitty Genovese in 1964. They also chastised him for “minimizing the gravity of his behavior.” The public hadn’t forgotten what Moseley had done to Genovese that night in New York City, even if he had. Hers was a brutal murder that stayed in the public’s mind, not just for the horrific way Moseley had killed Genovese, but also because of the lack of care shown by over three dozen neighbors. The tale spiraled into American crime mythology as soon as the New York Times reported it and has staunchly remained there ever since, seeping into high school psychology curriculums as a classic example of bystander effect. But is it true?
Two weeks after the murder of Kitty Genovese in Kew Gardens, Martin Gansberg broke the story in his article 37 Who Saw Murder Didn’t Call the Police. According to the piece, at around 3:20 a.m. one night in March 1964, the 28-year-old bartender was walking from her car to her home when Winston Moseley ran up, grabbed her and stabbed her twice in the back. She screamed, and a startled neighbor turned on his lights and shouted down for the man to leave the woman alone. The figure backed away from Genovese and returned to his car.
But once the neighbor’s light turned back off, Moseley returned, hunted down a wounded Genovese and stabbed her again. When lights popped on again and windows opened, Moseley ran back to his car and drove away. A bus returning from the airport drove past the buildings without stopping to help the injured woman. Genovese’s neighbors went back to sleep without going down to check on her, who by then had managed to crawl through one of the apartment building’s back doors. Though inside a building, she wasn’t safe. Moseley returned, found her in the apartments and stabbed her to death before fleeing once more.
Police received their first phone call some 30 minutes after the attack began and, arriving just two minutes later, found Genovese dead at the bottom of the stairs. Thirty-seven of the people in the surrounding homes heard the attack but didn’t call the police, citing they “didn’t want to get involved,” “thought it was a lovers quarrel,” “were too tired,” and even “didn’t know” why they didn’t call the police. Even the man who did eventually get authorities to the house said he first called a friend asking for advice if he should call the police, then went to a neighbor’s house to get the elderly woman to phone authorities because he “didn’t want to get involved.”
At least, that’s what The New York Times said happened.
In years following, people, including Genovese’s younger brother, have done their own investigation into what happened that terrible night and uncovered a very different story. Yes, two repugnant neighbors did hear and ignore Genovese’s cries for help, but other neighbors acted. As reported in the article, one person yelled out of their window to get the man away from Genovese, and Moseley later said the action scared him into running back to his car. Another woman ran down to Genovese and held her in her arms as she died; meanwhile several other people called the police. In addition, the district attorneys weighed in that there never were 38 witnesses, saying they “only found about half a dozen that saw what was going on, that we could use.” Ultimately, officials have never even released a list of 38 people.
There’s another big issue too: the article made it seem like people watched the entire horrific scene play out, but no one could have actually seen the entire attack unless because Genovese moved from the street into the stairway of an apartment building. The person would have needed to be following her to actually see what happened.
Despite running the article two weeks after Genovese’s murder and having plenty of time for fact-checking, The New York Times got other issues incorrect. Genovese was attacked two times, not three, as the paper reported. The story also excluded that the second time Moseley attacked Genovese, he raped her and then left her to die.
One author says that mythical 38 witnesses number came information incorrectly relayed to the police commissioner to New York Times editor Abe Rosenthal. Rosenthal then assigned the story with the facts he’d been told to Gansberg. Others say it was just too good of a story to pass up. Whatever the reason, because of this fact-checking error, New York received a worldwide reputation as being a cold, callous city that stands idly by as innocent women are attacked. It’s a terrible stigma its held ever since, some say unjustly.
Despite the picture painted of Genovese’s death is incorrect, the article and its effects changed American laws and society for the better. In response to the horrific story, authorities codified things like the 911 system and passed “Good Samaritan” laws that legally protect anyone that helps someone in trouble. Genovese’s death also spurred research and the discovery of the bystander effect, which says the more people witness a crime, the less they are inclined to act because they think someone else will. But perhaps the most long-lasting legacy of Kitty Genovese’s murder is the symbolic death of New York’s social decency, a badge the city has carried ever since.