Demand justice for Manny Mayi

Nearly 100 people marched down Broadway here on April 19 to demand justice for Manuel Mayi. A mob of white racist youths had chased the son of Dominican immigrants 16 blocks through the Corona section of Queens on March 29, 1991.

Community remembers teenager killed by racist mob. WW photo: Stephen Millies

They used baseball bats, pipes and a fire extinguisher to beat “Manny” to death. He was just 18 years old.

A blue fog of police protection immediately descended upon the perpetrators. Cops refused to let witnesses ride in police cars to find the killers. One alleged killer was later allowed to join the police department.

Queens District Attorney Richard Brown postponed court proceedings 47 times.

Now, 15 years later, the Justice Com mittee of the National Congress for Puerto Rican Rights, founded by the late Richie Perez, called upon supporters to come to City Hall Park. People marched to the local office of New York State Atty. Gen. Elliot Spitzer, who is running for governor, to demand action.

A delegation including Mayi’s mother, Altagracia Mayi, attempted to go upstairs. So did Juanita Young, whose son Malcolm Ferguson was killed at point-blank range by cops in the Bronx.

Young says they were stopped by chief investigator William Casey, who denied that his office had received letters seeking Spitzer’s intervention, even though they had been signed for.

But confronted with this determined group, Casey was forced to accept a copy.

When Transit Workers Union Local 100 went on strike, Spitzer moved faster than greased lightning to fine them. His family has a $500-million real estate fortune. No wonder his New York City office is just a block away from Wall Street.

Outside Spitzer’s office, Altagracia Mayi told protesters how her son was a Queens College student who wanted to be an engineer. “Everybody has a mother,” she said. “But now I have no Mother’s Day.”

Tony Rosario described how his son Anthony Rosario had been shot in the back eight times by police officers Patrick Brosnan and James Crowe on March 12, 1995. They also pumped 14 bullets in the back of Anthony’s cousin, Hilton Vega.

Both of these cops had been bodyguards of former New York Mayor Rudolph Giuliani, who after the killings called them to offer his congratulations.

“We have to close ranks,” declared Vicente “Panama” Alba, executive board member of Laborers Local 108.

City Council members Hiram Mon serrate and Rosie Mendez demanded action. The Justice Committee’s Jessica Sanclemente put Spitzer “on notice,” while David Galarza challenged Spitzer, who has cultivated the image of a liberal Democrat, to live up to his own words.

The voice of the late Richie Perez, who stood by the Mayi family from the beginning, was heard on tape. Martha Laur eano-Perez, co-coordinator of the Justice Committee and wife of Richie Perez, spoke. So did members of the October 22nd Committee against police brutality, the Malcolm X Grassroots Movement and the Dominicana Alliance.

Demonstrators marched to “One Police Plaza,” the fortress headquarters of the New York Police Department, to hold a brief rally before dispersing.