25 Years After Her Rape Claims Sparked a Firestorm, Tawana Brawley Avoids the Sp otlight | American Renaissance American

Renaissance Home NewsOpinionFeaturesAR VideosAbout Us Who We AreOur IssuesHow to Use This SiteActivists CornerLinksArchives ArticlesPrint Back IssuesConferencesInterviews & AppearancesReportsVideosStoreContact Us Send Us a MessageSend Us News StoriesWrite For UsDonate One-TimeMonthly Recurring powered by Posted on December 24, 2012 25 Years After Her Rape Claims Sparked a Firestorm, Tawana Brawley Avoids the Spotlight Michael Gartland, New York Post, December 23, 2012Her silence is deafening. Twenty-five years after the spotlight first glared on Tawana Brawleya black woman who as a teen claimed she was raped by a gang of white men, smeared with feces and stuffed in a garbage bagshes desperately struggling to stay hidden from public view. I dont want to talk to anyone about that, Brawley, 40, said recently after The Post found her in Hopewell, Va., where she lives in a neatly kept brick apartment complex with signs warning of video surveillance cameras. By all appearances, her lifeso chaotic a quarter-century agonow seems normal. Brawley, using aliases such as Thompson and Gutierrez, now has a young daughter, a neighbor says, and works as a licensed practical nurse at The Laurels of Bon Air in Richmond, where co-workers were clueless about her past. Are you serious? We dont know her by that name. Isnt that a trip? squealed one staffer, who called Brawley, known to staff as Tawana Gutierrez, a good worker. On a recent Friday, Brawley, noticeably heavier and dressed in pink scrubs, emerged from her apartment at about 6:30 a.m. with a small child and a man wearing red hospital scrubs. Tawana Brawley{snip} She arrived at work in Richmond about 30 minutes later, and the man pulled in minutes afterward. Hopewellwhere Brawley has lived for at least a year, according to a neighborhas the highest rate of violent crime per capita of any city or town in Virginia, local cops say. Plagued by drugs and guns, it had five murders in the last three weeks. {snip} {snip} State records show Tawana V. Gutierrez and Tawana V. Thompson have held the same nursing license since 2006. The Virginia Board of Nursing confirmed issuing it to a Tawana Vacenia Thompson Gutierrez. Brawley maintains a PO box in Claremont, Va., under the name Gutierrez, according to sources. That town is a 45-minute drive from Hopewell and is the residence of her stepdad, Ralph King, who spent seven years in prison in the 1970s for killing his first wife. Locals in the rural mill town described King, who lives in a ramshackle house near the end of a dead-end street where dogs run wild, as a nasty man and said they hadnt seen Tawana in years. Hes real mean, one man said. {snip} A quarter-century ago, Brawley, then just 15, told a story incredible for its

sheer brutality. After she went missing for four days from her home in Wappingers Falls, Dutchess County, Brawley was found in a trash bag on Nov. 28, 1987, dazed, covered in feces and with the words nr and b-h scrawled in charcoal on her body and KKK carved into her shoe. Initially, Brawley said little, simply nodding or writing notes when investigators questioned her and revealing that she had been abducted by two white men in a dark car who drove her to the woods, where four other white men were waiting. Details were in short supply. Tawana couldnt offer names or even a description of the attackers who ravaged her for four days. She said her memory went blank from the time she was attacked until she was discovered. Though she did recall that one of her attackers had blond hair, a holsterand a badge. The shocking allegations polarized New York Cityalready a powder keg of racial tension a year after a white mob attacked three black teens in Howard Beach, Queens, killing one. The case attracted attorneys Alton H. Maddox and C. Vernon Mason, and the then-little-known Rev. Al Sharpton, who used it to catapult to the national stage. Less than a week after Brawley was discovered, Fishkill Police Officer Harry Crist Jr., 28, was found dead in his apartment. Soon, Brawleys advisers would name Crist as a suspect in the rape. And when Dutchess County prosecutor Steven Pagones offered an alibi for Crist, Pagones suddenly found himself also accused. Sharpton and Brawleys lawyers claimedwithout proofthat Pagones kidnapped, abused and raped Brawley on 33 occasions. They also fingered state trooper Scott Patterson, a friend of Crist and Pagones, who found Crists body. Brawley became a cause clbre. Bill Cosby posted a $25,000 reward for information on the case; Don King promised $100,000 for Brawleys education; and boxer Mike Tyson gave her a $30,000 watch to ease her pain. But a grand jury found in 1988 that Brawley was never raped and the whole incredible case was all a hoax. The panel, which heard from 180 witnesses over its seven-month investigation, found evidence that Brawley ran away from home and was hiding out in the vacant apartment from which her parents were just evicted and that she spun her yarn to avoid being punished for staying out late and missing school. {snip} The hateful words scrawled on Brawleys body were upside downlikely written by Brawley herself, and traces of the charcoal-like material were found under her fingernails, the grand jury found. Brawley showed no signs of genital trauma or exposure. No semen was found. The feces on her body was traced to her neighbors dog. One witness said Brawley was seen climbing into the garbage bag. The grand jury found that Crist committed suicide because he was upset after breaking up with his girlfriend and over his failure to pass a state police exam. {snip} It is probable that in the history of this state, never has a teenager turned the prosecutorial and judicial systems literally upside down with such false claims, state Supreme Court Justice S. Barrett Hickman wrote at the time. {snip} In 1998, Pagones won a defamation lawsuit against Sharpton, Brawley and her lawyers. Maddox was found liable for $97,000, Mason for $188,000, and Sharpton was ordered to pony up $66,000, money that was paid by celebrity lawyer Johnnie Cochran and other benefactors. Brawley was ordered to fork over $190,000 at 9 percent annual interest. None of

that has been paid, which brings her total bill to $429,000. Pagones, who served as Dutchess County assistant district attorney until 1990, continues to search for her. Through her silence, shes as guilty of libel as Maddox, Mason and Sharpton, he said. The only way to hold her accountableat least at this stageis financially. {snip} Pagones blames Sharpton more than anyone else for his troubles. I dont ever expect him to say hes sorry, but he should at least come clean and admit that, after the trial, that now he knows Steven Pagones had nothing to do with Tawana Brawley, Pagones said. Pagones is correct: To this day, Sharpton remains unapologetic. Does Donald Trump owe the Central Park Five an apology? He advocated in the Central Park case what he believed, I advocated what I believe, he told The Post, referring to Trumps full-page ads demanding the death penalty for five teens accusedand eventually exoneratedof raping a jogger in Central Park. {snip} Original Article Topics: Hate Crimes and Hoaxes, Non-White Pressure Groups Share This Share on facebookShare on emailShare on twitterShare on printMore Sharing Services5Judge Orders Alabama to Stop Segregation of Prisoners Living with HIV CNNs Don Lemon on Gun Control: Should We Start Profiling White Men? We welcome comments that add information or perspective, and we encourage polite debate. If you log in with a social media account, your comment should appear immediately. If you prefer to remain anonymous, you may comment as a guest, using a name and an e-mail address of convenience. Your comment will be moderated. Follow Us Subscribe via RSS! Follow Us on Twitter! Join Us on Facebook! Watch Our YouTube Videos! Your Ad Here Quick Links News Opinion Features Store Donate AR Archives Articles Print Back Issues Conferences Interviews & Appearances Video Archive Latest Tweets @gregnhood reviews Tom Wolfe s Back to Blood. "In Miami, everybody hates everybody." http://t.co/SLLDtNXf 4 days ago Are there moral barriers to white survival? @alexkurtagic, @jartaylor, and Henry Wolff weigh in: http://t.co/Ujp04Wep #tcot #tpot 25 days ago Follow Us on Twitter!

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