Selects: The Kitty Genovese Story

Summary

Stuff You Should Know: The Kitty Genovese Story

Episode Information:

• Title: The Kitty Genovese Story
• Host/Author: iHeartPodcasts
• Release Date: June 14, 2025
• Description: An in-depth exploration of the infamous murder of Kitty Genovese, unraveling the myths and truths behind a case that redefined societal views on bystander apathy.

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Introduction

In this compelling episode, hosts Josh Clark and Charles W. Chuck Bryant revisit the tragic murder of Kitty Genovese, a story that has long been cited as a quintessential example of urban apathy. Josh sets the stage by acknowledging the widespread recognition of the case but hints at deeper complexities:

Josh Clark [01:05]: "I chose our 2016 episode on the murder of Kitty Genovese. Her story is fairly famous. She was murdered while an entire apartment block of people watched and did nothing. But that's not exactly the real story."

Revisiting the Myth

The narrative of Kitty Genovese's murder has been widely misunderstood and oversimplified over the decades. Charles emphasizes the importance of revisiting the facts to honor Kitty's true legacy:

Charles W. Chuck Bryant [03:32]: "It was tough."

They highlight recent efforts, such as the documentary "The Witness," which seeks to shed light on the actual events and Kitty's life, moving beyond the superficial portrayal of her as merely a victim of bystander apathy.

Kitty Genovese: A Life Beyond the Tragedy

Kitty Genovese was born in 1935 in Brooklyn to Italian-American parents, Vincent and Renell Genovese. Charles paints a picture of her vibrant and beloved personality:

Charles W. Chuck Bryant [04:03]: "Born in 1935 in Brooklyn to Vincent and Renell Genovese."

Kitty was well-loved in her community and held a special bond with her younger brother Bill. Their relationship is explored, revealing the depth of Kitty's character and the impact of her loss on her family.

Personal Struggles and Identity

The episode delves into Kitty's personal life, including her brief marriage to a man named Rocco and her later realization and acceptance of her sexuality. This aspect of her life was not widely known or acknowledged at the time:

Charles W. Chuck Bryant [07:00]: "In honoring that, why don't we talk a minute about Catherine Genovese. Kitty."

Kitty's role as a bar manager in Hollis, Queens, showcases her independent spirit and commitment to her community.

The Night of the Murder

On March 13, 1964, Kitty Genovese was tragically murdered by Winston Mosley. The detailed account of the crime reveals a more nuanced and horrifying event than the widely believed version:

Josh Clark [10:41]: "But Mosley unfortunately gets down to where Kitty is just being stabbed multiple times again."

Mosley's actions that night were brutal and premeditated, contradicting the simplistic narrative of countless indifferent bystanders.

Media Misrepresentation

A critical examination of The New York Times' reporting on the case highlights significant inaccuracies that shaped public perception for decades:

Charles W. Chuck Bryant [22:50]: "They misreported possibly, that no one called police."

Originally, the Times reported that 38 witnesses watched the murder and did nothing, a claim later found to be largely unfounded. This sensationalized reporting fueled myths about urban apathy and the bystander effect without sufficient evidence.

Impact on Society and Psychology

Despite the inaccuracies, the Kitty Genovese case had profound effects on society and the field of psychology. It spurred the creation of the 911 emergency system and ignited studies into the bystander effect and social responsibility:

Josh Clark [26:45]: "It created this whole field of psychology that looks into the psychology of crowds and why we would just stand around."

The case became a foundational example in understanding human behavior in emergencies and influenced policies aimed at improving emergency response.

Winston Mosley: Beyond the Genovese Case

Winston Mosley's criminal activities extended beyond the murder of Kitty Genovese. His subsequent crimes, including additional murders and a violent escape from prison, paint a picture of a deeply troubled individual:

Charles W. Chuck Bryant [34:34]: "He sounded like a true sociopath."

Mosley's actions continued to instill fear and demonstrated the complexities of criminal behavior, further complicating the narrative surrounding the Genovese case.

The Documentary "The Witness"

The documentary plays a pivotal role in re-examining the Kitty Genovese story. It features emotional interviews, including one between Kitty’s brother Bill and one of Mosley’s sons, offering personal perspectives and challenging longstanding misconceptions:

Charles W. Chuck Bryant [35:41]: "So, you know, the sins of the father aren't the sins of the sons."

These interactions humanize both the victims and perpetrators, fostering a more nuanced understanding of the tragedy.

Reassessing the Legacy

The hosts emphasize the importance of accurate historical accounts and the dangers of sensationalized reporting. They argue that while the Kitty Genovese story has had significant societal impacts, it's crucial to recognize the discrepancies in the original narrative:

Josh Clark [37:13]: "But I just disagree with that. I think that there's a lot more that people could have done that didn't."

The episode calls for a balanced view that honors Kitty's life and scrutinizes the media's role in shaping her story.

Conclusion

"The Kitty Genovese Story" serves as a powerful reminder of the complexities behind widely accepted narratives. By unraveling the myths and presenting the true events, Josh Clark and Charles W. Chuck Bryant encourage listeners to critically evaluate historical accounts and understand the multifaceted nature of human behavior in crises.

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Notable Quotes

• Josh Clark [01:05]: "I chose our 2016 episode on the murder of Kitty Genovese. Her story is fairly famous. She was murdered while an entire apartment block of people watched and did nothing. But that's not exactly the real story."

• Charles W. Chuck Bryant [04:03]: "Born in 1935 in Brooklyn to Vincent and Renell Genovese, Italian American parents."

• Charles W. Chuck Bryant [22:50]: "They misreported possibly, that no one called police..."

• Josh Clark [26:45]: "It created this whole field of psychology that looks into the psychology of crowds and why we would just stand around."

---

Key Takeaways

1. Complexity of the Event: The murder of Kitty Genovese is more nuanced than the widely believed story of mass apathy suggests.

2. Media Influence: The New York Times' sensationalized reporting significantly shaped public perception, often overshadowing the truth.

3. Psychological Impact: The case influenced the development of emergency response systems and the study of bystander behavior.

4. Humanizing the Story: Recent documentaries and investigations aim to honor Kitty's memory by presenting a more accurate and empathetic account.

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Further Exploration

Listeners are encouraged to watch the documentary "The Witness" for a deeper understanding of Kitty Genovese's life and the true circumstances surrounding her tragic death. Additionally, exploring original articles and retractions by The New York Times can provide further insights into the evolution of this narrative.

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Note: This summary excludes advertisements, intros, outros, and non-content sections as per the guidelines to maintain focus on the core narrative and discussions of the episode.

Transcript

[Josh Clark]

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[Charles W. Chuck Bryant]

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[Josh Clark]

Hey, everybody, it's me, Josh. And for this week's select, I've chosen our 2016 episode on the murder of Kitty Genovese. Her story is fairly famous. She was murdered while an entire apartment block of people watched and did nothing. But that's not exactly the real story. Like most things in life, there's more to it. And we explained what actually happened. We relied a lot on the excellent documentary the Witness for this episode, and I highly recommend watching it. In the meantime, I hope you enjoy this one.

[Ryan Seacrest]

Welcome to Stuff youf Should Know, a production of iHeartRadio.

[Josh Clark]

Hey, and welcome to the podcast. I'm Josh Clark. And there's Charles W. Chuck. Brian. And there's Jerry. So this is stuff you should know podcast. True crime edition, actually.

[Charles W. Chuck Bryant]

Yeah.

[Josh Clark]

But so much more than just a single crime.

[Charles W. Chuck Bryant]

Agreed.

[Josh Clark]

A crime that echoed throughout a city, throughout the world, throughout decades. And it's true, man. Like, there are very few crimes you can point to that had more of an impact than the murder of Kitty Genovese.

[Charles W. Chuck Bryant]

Agreed. And there are a lot of true crime podcasts out there. We are not trying to become one. No. This is just something we do from time to time.

[Josh Clark]

Sure.

[Charles W. Chuck Bryant]

As I researched this and as I watched. Did you watch the Witness?

[Josh Clark]

Of course.

[Charles W. Chuck Bryant]

The documentary recently on Netflix. Right now it is HBO documentary. And I was disturbed and I'M glad it finally covered it in the documentary. But I was disturbed that Kitty Genovese and we'll get to her murder, but very quickly she was murdered and became the symbol for people not helping out.

[Josh Clark]

Right. What came to be known as bystander apathy or the bystander effect that the more people who are around, the less likely anyone is to help.

[Charles W. Chuck Bryant]

Yeah. So she became such a symbol that you never hear about Kitty Genovese and who she was as a person.

[Josh Clark]

That was one great thing about that documentary. There are multiple great things about it, but that it really talked about her and showed her and revived her spirit.

[Charles W. Chuck Bryant]

Which I was really looking for because even in researching online it's hard to get a lot of information.

[Josh Clark]

So some things, some even contemporary articles still aren't mentioning that she was gay.

[Charles W. Chuck Bryant]

Well, yeah. Her own brother who made the documentary didn't know that she was gay.

[Josh Clark]

No, it's true. But it's been out since. I'm not sure when actually that came out.

[Charles W. Chuck Bryant]

It was just this year.

[Josh Clark]

Oh, okay. So it was fairly new this year.

[Charles W. Chuck Bryant]

Last year. Yeah.

[Josh Clark]

I thought it was in the last five years maybe.

[Charles W. Chuck Bryant]

So in honoring that, why don't we talk a minute about Catherine Genovese. Kitty.

[Josh Clark]

Yep.

[Charles W. Chuck Bryant]

Born in 1935 in Brooklyn to Vincent and Renell Genovese, Italian American parents. And it's weird, I don't see. Oh yeah, Rachel was her mother's name. She was Rachel Petroli at first. So they lived in Brooklyn and she was very well loved in school.

[Josh Clark]

Yes. She was like the leader of her clique.

[Charles W. Chuck Bryant]

Yeah. And she was apparently a lot of fun and a good mimic of her teachers. And she was voted class cut up in her senior year graduating class. She went to an all girls school in Prospect Heights. And it was just by all accounts this vivacious, fun loving, really sweet, sweet lady.

[Josh Clark]

Yeah.

[Charles W. Chuck Bryant]

Or girl at that point.

[Josh Clark]

Her little brother Bill, who ended up making the or being featured in the documentary the Witness was just in love with her. She was just amazing to him.

[Charles W. Chuck Bryant]

They had a very special relationship.

[Josh Clark]

Yeah. I think she was about 13 years older than him.

[Charles W. Chuck Bryant]

Yeah, quite a bit.

[Josh Clark]

Maybe 12 years older. I had a sister like that. There's a very special relationship. None of that sibling rivalry. They're not old enough to be your mother. That's just a unique situation to be a younger sibling and to be able to inherit all that worldly wisdom and they're going through all their own things and their own struggles and their own travails. But too that 13 year old younger brother, they Know everything. And they're the coolest person walking the planet, and they're the kindest person walking the planet because they've lived long enough to figure out some of the major stuff, you know?

[Charles W. Chuck Bryant]

Yeah. Even my own sister is only six years older, and we very much had and still have that relationship where. And she and my brother are great now, too. But, you know, when you're two or three years apart, there can be a little bit of the knocking of heads. But by the time I came along, I was like, you know, my sister was six. It was perfect. I was a little baby doll for her. So anyway, that was very much the relationship that Kitty had with Bill. And it seemed like one of the older brothers always had a little bit of a, like, yeah, she always liked him better kind of attitude.

[Josh Clark]

Seemed like everybody kind of knew, like, she liked Bill the most.

[Charles W. Chuck Bryant]

Yeah. Which I kind of felt bad for. But that's just those family dynamics, man.

[Josh Clark]

You know, the thing is, when. Whenever you do start to kind of talk about somebody who's died, especially someone who's died violently and young, it's easy to canonize.

[Charles W. Chuck Bryant]

Sure.

[Josh Clark]

You know, really put them up on a pedestal and forget their flaws. And, of course, I'm sure Kitty had tons of flaws, but she didn't seem to have any from. From what I'm gathering, that were, you know, just terrible flaws or that made her, like, a bad person. She seemed like she was a. Yeah. Like a overall above average great person.

[Charles W. Chuck Bryant]

Yeah. Agreed. So New York was getting too dangerous for her family, they thought to have all these kids. So they moved when she graduated high school to New Canaan, Connecticut. And she said, you know what? I'm staying here in New York. I'm 18 now. I love it here. She got married for a brief time to a guy. What's his name? Rocco.

[Josh Clark]

I don't remember his name either.

[Charles W. Chuck Bryant]

Rocky or Rocco. And in the documentary, Bill tries to get in touch with him. He's like, I really? Cause he found out she was gay and was like, you know, we didn't even know this. I think Rocco can help shed some light. And he very respectfully asks for his own privacy.

[Josh Clark]

He said, my relationship with Kitty will remain forever a mystery.

[Charles W. Chuck Bryant]

Yeah.

[Josh Clark]

It's like. That's an odd response.

[Charles W. Chuck Bryant]

It was. I think he just didn't want to. I mean, if she was gay and they were married for a short time, he either didn't know and maybe felt the fool, or he did know and was maybe trying to do right by her in some way.

[Josh Clark]

Sure.

[Charles W. Chuck Bryant]

Either way, he didn't want to talk about it. But she worked as a secretary for a little while. She was a waitress for a little while. Eventually, she was a bar maid, bartender, and then became bar manager at a place in Hollis, Queensland called EVs 11th hour.

[Josh Clark]

That is a great bar name.

[Charles W. Chuck Bryant]

Well. And from all accounts, it was one of those wonderful neighborhood bars opened at 8am yeah. Where the people were in there getting sauced pretty early in the day.

[Josh Clark]

Sure.

[Charles W. Chuck Bryant]

And everyone knew everyone, and everyone loved Kitty, and she helped take care of everybody, but was very much an independent kind of firecracker of a woman. Sure. Drove a red Fiat convertible. Her dad used to tease her about, like, when are you gonna find the right guy? She was like, I make more money than any guy I would go out with. I don't need that. Which is, I guess, 1960s for dad. I'm gay.

[Josh Clark]

I'm gay. Yeah.

[Charles W. Chuck Bryant]

And I can't say it, but she did make pretty good dough as the bar manager. And then in March 1963, she met a woman named Marianne Zalonko at Swing Rendezvous. It was an underground lesbian bar in the Village. And they moved in together shortly thereafter.

[Josh Clark]

Yeah. And Kitty actually used to bring Marianne home with her to visit, but her family was all like, well, they're just good friends and roommates.

[Charles W. Chuck Bryant]

Right.

[Josh Clark]

It's the 60s, right? The early 60s.

[Charles W. Chuck Bryant]

Yeah. And there's an audio interview with her in that documentary that's really touching. She didn't want to be on camera, but Bill was able to speak to her. And I think what was so compelling about this documentary was that he was. It was a search of a man looking for closure.

[Josh Clark]

It's a harrowing, sometimes almost unbearable to watch Search.

[Charles W. Chuck Bryant]

It was tough.

[Josh Clark]

I mean, like, he's at odds with his family here or there. He's just doing things where if you watch it in the context of the documentary and you just follow along the documentary, it all makes utter and complete sense.

[Charles W. Chuck Bryant]

Right.

[Josh Clark]

But then if you stop and remove yourself long enough to be like, this is a documentary, which means this guy really did this stuff.

[Charles W. Chuck Bryant]

Yeah.

[Josh Clark]

And there was a camera following him along while he was doing it. I was like, I couldn't have done half of it.

[Charles W. Chuck Bryant]

Oh, I know.

[Josh Clark]

You know, he really. He just. At one point, he calls it an obsession, but it's. It's not. He doesn't come off as obsessed.

[Charles W. Chuck Bryant]

Right, agreed.

[Josh Clark]

You know.

[Charles W. Chuck Bryant]

All right, so let's detail the crime, and then we will take a break after that. How does that sound?

[Josh Clark]

Yeah.

[Charles W. Chuck Bryant]

All right, so Flash forward to 3-13-1964, it's 3:15 in the morning and Kitty Genovese is, as she often did, was making her way home from work late at night as a bar manager and was being trailed by a man, a man by the name of Winston Mosley.

[Josh Clark]

Yes. Who is definitely the villain of this story, but is not the only one that will turn out.

[Charles W. Chuck Bryant]

Right.

[Josh Clark]

So Kitty was 28 and at the time she was killed, and Winston, her killer, was 29. Just turned 29, I think like a week or so before. And I think you said this is March 13th. Yeah, 1964.

[Charles W. Chuck Bryant]

Yeah. He was married with a couple of kids.

[Josh Clark]

Yeah. His wife Elizabeth worked the night shift. She was a hospital nurse. And Winston's mother stayed at home with the kids. So he basically said, you know, I own my own house, I've got a great job operating computers. No one even knows what I'm supposed to be doing with him yet, but I'm making money doing it.

[Charles W. Chuck Bryant]

Yeah, he was a smart guy.

[Josh Clark]

So I'm going to indulge myself. I'm going to go out and stalk women and murder them in my spare time. That's what I'm gonna do. So that's what he was doing on this night. He was cruising around looking for a woman to kill, basically.

[Charles W. Chuck Bryant]

Yeah. That was his direct quote in questioning. Yeah, I was looking for a woman to kill.

[Josh Clark]

Yeah. So he saw at, I believe a red light, this little red Fiat convertible caught his eye and there was Kitty driving. So he started to follow her and she parked and she parked in the parking lot for the Long Island Railway, which the parking lot went backed up to the side of her apartment building, which is a two story tutor job that had shops in the bottom and apartments in the top. Right?

[Charles W. Chuck Bryant]

Yeah. This was in Kew Gardens in Queens. So he followed her on foot. At this point, she sees him and knows that something is going on. He has a knife in his hand, so she starts running. He catches up to her outside of a bookstore and stabs her twice in the back right off the bat with this knife.

[Josh Clark]

Right. And she had been running toward a bar that she thought would be open, but it turned out apparently there was a new manager and the new manager had closed down early. So when she stabbed twice in the back, it's on this darkened street, but right across the street, Austin street, is a 10 story apartment building with dozens of windows looking out onto Austin street, where she's being stabbed in the back. And she screams, she cries out. I think she said something like, oh God, he stabbed me. Help me. Help me. Is what they said, basically, definitively is what she screamed. And people who were witnesses to this recounted that one guy said that he was, I think, a 10 or 11 year old kid who was inside one of the apartments in the Mowbray apartment building, and that he was awakened from a deep sleep. The scream was so loud, he said it was the loudest thing he's ever heard.

[Charles W. Chuck Bryant]

Yeah.

[Josh Clark]

So she screams and a man living in the Mowbray apartment buildings opens his window. What's his name?

[Charles W. Chuck Bryant]

Yeah, Robert Moser opened his window and screamed out, hey, get out of there. What are you doing? And Mosley took off. Yeah, took off running away.

[Josh Clark]

He's very frequently misquoted as having said, like, let that girl alone. But even by his own words, in his own testimony, he said, hey, get out of there.

[Charles W. Chuck Bryant]

Yeah. At any rate, he scared him away.

[Josh Clark]

Right.

[Charles W. Chuck Bryant]

So in between that time, about 30 minutes passes, Kitty makes her way around to the vestibule of her own building, right?

[Josh Clark]

Yeah.

[Charles W. Chuck Bryant]

And goes inside the vestibule and like, you think the horror is over for her. She could probably survive these wounds.

[Josh Clark]

Right.

[Charles W. Chuck Bryant]

Is in shock, I would imagine. And then Mosley went to his car, kind of checked out the building, saw that some lights had gone on, and reason to himself, no one's going to do anything. Puts on a different hat and goes back, finds her in the vestibule and finishes the job in the most horrific ways you can imagine.

[Josh Clark]

Yeah. He stabbed her at least 12 more times, they think at least she was stabbed at least 14 times. He said he doesn't remember how many times he stabbed her, but he basically kept stabbing her until she stopped screaming, she was still alive. I saw that he attempted to rape her, and I've also seen that he raped her.

[Charles W. Chuck Bryant]

Yeah.

[Josh Clark]

I'm not sure which one's correct.

[Charles W. Chuck Bryant]

Yeah.

[Josh Clark]

But at one point, and this is really important here, as he's stabbing her and she's screaming in the vestibule, there's a staircase that leads directly up to a door, and behind that door lived a man named Carl Ross. And Carl Ross opened his door and looked down one single flight of stairs at Winston Mosley stabbing Kitty Genovese, who was bloody. There was no confusing what was going on. And he closed the door and he called his girlfriend and his girlfriend said, don't get involved. Yeah, I'm worried for you. Just leave it alone. It's none of your business. And he did. He didn't do anything, at least for a little while.

[Charles W. Chuck Bryant]

All right, so that's a good place to break here and we're going to come back and talk about who saw and heard what and what they did about it. Right after this.

[Josh Clark]

Stuff. You should know.

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[Charles W. Chuck Bryant]

All right, so at this point, Kitty Genovese is not dead yet, but dying in the vestibule. A woman did come down and was with her. Her name is Sophia Farrar. She's still with us. And she was a neighbor and friend of Kitty's. And so she went down there and apparently was with her as she passed away, tried to calm her down, evidently did calm her down and likes to think that she at least saw a friendly face and that she was being cared for as she passed. The weird thing is that is not mentioned. I guess we gotta get into the New York Times now.

[Josh Clark]

Yeah. So after the murder, like, the next day, the Times ran four paragraphs on the Kitty Genovese murder. It was not incredibly newsworthy at first because that year there were 636 murders in New York City.

[Charles W. Chuck Bryant]

Yeah. And that was just one of them.

[Josh Clark]

Just one. But a couple weeks later, the head, the city editor of the New York Times, a guy named Abe Rosenthal, who's a legendary journalist, was having lunch with, I believe, the police commissioner of the nypd. And the commissioner said, did you hear about that Genovese murder? That's one for the books. 38 people standing around watched the whole thing. Nobody did a thing about it.

[Charles W. Chuck Bryant]

Yeah. Now you've got a story.

[Josh Clark]

Abe Rosenthal, legendary journalist, is like, thank you for that. Here's my Diners Club card. I have to go now and get this story done. So he did. He assigned it out to a guy. What was the original reporter's name? His name was Martin Ganzberg. And they wrote on the front page. I shouldn't say they wrote. It was definitely all Gansburg, but he was assigned and definitely under the direction of Abe Rosenthal. Like, this is the story. 38 people stood around and did nothing.

[Charles W. Chuck Bryant]

Yeah. The title of the article was 37. It was 37 at the time. 37. Who saw murder, didn't call the police. And basically the entire article and the entire narrative from that moment to forward for decades was a not about this woman at all. Hardly she became a symbol B, not necessarily even about the crime, but about the crime of these people who didn't. The crime of apathy for these 37 or 38 people. But it was very much misconstrued in the New York Times to the point where in 2004, they all but wrote a retraction with new information. Because the original article, they said, like, these people witnessed it. That is not true. Maybe only a couple of people might have actually seen anything with their eyeballs. The other 35 or 36 may have heard someone screaming. They might have thought it was drunken couple in their neighborhood coming home from a bar. There might have been some apathy involved, for sure for some of them. But to characterize this as 37 or 38 people witnessed this horrific crime and literally shut their doors and windows to it was not accurate at all.

[Josh Clark]

Right. They said specifically. Well, the way that they put it was that there were. The way the story read was that 38 people had watched this murder which took place. They misreported that there were three attacks and that the man had been chased off twice and came back two more times, but that this whole thing had taken place over 30 minutes, this long, prolonged attack, and that 38 people had just been sitting there watching it, doing nothing. And that is definitely a mischaracterization of what had happened. Like you're saying, for the most part, people were ear witnesses, not eyewitnesses. There were certainly not 38 eyewitnesses.

[Charles W. Chuck Bryant]

Right.

[Josh Clark]

And most people weren't in a position to do much, if anything, about it, certainly physically. But I don't know if you could call it like a retraction, because the point that Abe Rosenthal, he never apologized for it, ever, even in the documentary he's interviewed, and he's like, this is great. I'm glad that it did what it did.

[Charles W. Chuck Bryant]

Yeah, sure.

[Josh Clark]

The point is still there, that there was apathy in that there were two people who could have done something and they didn't. But then from what the other witnesses said, the scream was pretty clearly not a purse snatching and not a couple fighting drunkenly. That it was a violent crime being committed on this woman and people still didn't do anything.

[Charles W. Chuck Bryant]

Yeah. They misreported possibly, that no one called police. Apparently, perhaps up to three people called the police, although police logs showed only one call came in. And it may be a case of these people now telling themselves like, I called the cops, I did something when they may not have. They did not report at all that Ms. Farrar had gone down to be with her. She was not mentioned ever. So I kind of went from feeling like, yeah, you know, this bystander effect, it had good. It led to the 911 being created, apparently, in some ways. And people study this in class, and it raised awareness. So, you know, if they stretched it a little bit, then it had a good effect. That's what Abe. Basically, that was his position. That still is his position, but, well, he's dead now. Oh, did he finally pass away? Yeah, and then I finally came around and be like, no, you know, the truth is what you should print. And if you're a reporter and you run a story, you should print the truth and not some sensationalized version of it to sell newspapers.

[Josh Clark]

No, no, absolutely I agree with you. And I think the one thing that you can hang on Abe Rosenthal is that that story was definitely fashioned in a manner to be as sensational as possible, to shock and outrage the public as much as possible. But I still think it's rooted in the basic fact that there was apathy involved and that it possibly allowed Winston Mosley to finish the job, that Kitty Genovese might have survived had somebody done more than just sit up, look out their window and go back to bed, or not even bother to look out the window. And like you said, Chuck, this had a lot of impact because this story comes out in 1964 and for 40 years. It wasn't until 2004 that the times saw fit to go back and really reinvestigate, and they did. There's a great article called Kitty 40 years later, I think. And the author goes through and reinvestigates the case and really sets a lot of facts straight. But within that 40 year period, the effects that this murder had were just sweeping. It led to the establishment of 911. It's a big one.

[Charles W. Chuck Bryant]

Sure.

[Josh Clark]

And it created this whole field of psychology that looks into the psychology of crowds and why we would just stand around. What is this diffusion of responsibility? None of that understanding existed until the Kidi Genovese murder.

[Charles W. Chuck Bryant]

Yeah. And weirdly, why is someone. Why is a solo witness more apt to act than a group of people?

[Josh Clark]

One thing I saw is that it's called social influence in that we take our cues from others. So if inaction is basically what is on the table right, then we're going to be inactive as well. If people are starting to move toward it, toward the problem, we'll probably join in, too.

[Charles W. Chuck Bryant]

I could see that, or people thinking like, either I'm not someone else is better equipped to deal with this than me or I feel like someone else will do this so I don't have to. A lot goes into play. It's pretty interesting.

[Josh Clark]

One of the less productive things that came out of it, though, is this idea that when you live in a city, in a big city, you put enough people together, everybody stops caring about anybody else. They're all out for number one. And Kew Gardens became the center of this or just such a. A symbolic example of urban uncaring, I guess. And Kitty Genovese became a symbol of that as well. And the need to do something to act out to help other people when you see them need help.

[Charles W. Chuck Bryant]

All right, so let's take another quick break here and we're going to get back into what happened to Mr. Moseley and the further effects of this crime after this.

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[Charles W. Chuck Bryant]

So a week after this murder, Mosley was breaking into a house. He's not a good guy.

[Josh Clark]

No, he was a terrible guy.

[Charles W. Chuck Bryant]

He was beyond being a sociopath and a psychotic, was just a burglar. And he was just straight up robbing a house one day of a television. And one of the neighbors saw this, called the cops, cops came and arrested him.

[Josh Clark]

No, no, no, no, that's not true.

[Charles W. Chuck Bryant]

What?

[Josh Clark]

The neighbor. Here's the thing. This is the great ironic twist of the Kitty Genovese story. He went to a different neighborhood. He was robbing a house, and the neighbor said, hey, what are you doing? And he started to run from the house. The neighbor chased him and tackled him and held him until the cops came.

[Charles W. Chuck Bryant]

Oh, well, yeah, he called the cops.

[Josh Clark]

That's how he went down. Intervention.

[Charles W. Chuck Bryant]

Yeah, yeah, yeah.

[Josh Clark]

Not apathy. Intervention. A week later. Yes.

[Charles W. Chuck Bryant]

Okay, so at any rate, he calls the cops, he gets arrested, and very like matter of factly says that he killed Kitty Genovese. And not only that, but he killed supposedly two other women. A woman named Barbara Kralik. Well, actually, she was a girl. She's only 15. And then a woman named Annie Mae Johnson. And apparently both of them had been sexually assaulted. And he was never tried for those. But he did plead not guilty by reason of insanity, which did not work, was sentenced to death, and by luck of timing, was able to appeal. And the death penalty had gone away for most crimes in that time period. And he was re sentenced to life in prison.

[Josh Clark]

Yes. Supposedly the prosecution had withheld some evidence about his mental state during his sentencing, so he was able to get it reduced. So he was hanging out, doing his time, and he was in Attica, I believe, and he had injured himself and was being taken to the hospital. And on the way there, he got the gun away from the guard who was escorting him and took off. And for, I think, five days, he basically just. The city of Buffalo was in mortal fear of the fact that the guy who murdered Kitty Genovese was now on the loose in their town. And they were afraid, rightfully so. He raped one woman. When the cops closed in on him, he got ahold of five people and held him hostage in a standoff that lasted for a little while with the FBI before they finally got to him. He was a bad dude. So they sent him back to prison and they said, you're not getting out of here ever.

[Charles W. Chuck Bryant]

Yeah. He was later a part of the Attica prison riots as well. And the one lady that he killed, he burned her alive. Like, the family was upstairs. And he broke into her house, raped her, killed her, and burned her alive in the home. And the house went up in flames. So it sounded like he had no. He sounded like a true sociopath. Like, he had. No. Not that there was ever a reason for killing someone, but it was always just at random because he wanted to do that.

[Josh Clark]

That's a lot what it sounds like. It was a self indulgence.

[Charles W. Chuck Bryant]

So in the documentary, very powerful scene where the son. I'm sorry, the little brother of Kitty, who, it's told through his eyes, interviews and sits down with one of the sons of Mosley. And it's just like. I mean, you cut the tension with a knife, obviously. It's just so, like, fraught with tension. And he had told his son that she was yelling racial slurs at him. He also said that he was just a getaway driver for some mobster. And the Genovese family was related to the crime mob family, the Genovese family. And none of this stuff is true. And the brother was just like a. No, we're not related to that family at all. We have nothing to do with that. And he just gives him a look when he talks about the racial slurs. Like, come on, man, that's not what happened. So it was a really, really powerful scene of these two guys kind of working it out in a way.

[Josh Clark]

I didn't see them working anything out.

[Charles W. Chuck Bryant]

Oh, see, I did.

[Josh Clark]

Which made it even worse for me.

[Charles W. Chuck Bryant]

I thought there was some between them. They kind of came to a nicer place.

[Josh Clark]

Oh, really?

[Charles W. Chuck Bryant]

Than where they'd started.

[Josh Clark]

I did not catch that at all.

[Charles W. Chuck Bryant]

Maybe you skipped forward or something.

[Josh Clark]

Maybe I was like, I can't take this. Gotta fast forward.

[Charles W. Chuck Bryant]

Well, the son was saying, like, you know, I think, you know, we need to.

[Josh Clark]

Bill.

[Charles W. Chuck Bryant]

No, the son of Winston Moseley.

[Josh Clark]

Gotcha.

[Charles W. Chuck Bryant]

Was saying that they needed to move on from all this. And then the brother was saying, I definitely don't. You know, the sins of the father aren't the sins of the sons.

[Josh Clark]

Yeah, he said that.

[Charles W. Chuck Bryant]

So, you know, I felt like they were better off than when they started for having that conversation.

[Josh Clark]

I honestly did not catch that.

[Charles W. Chuck Bryant]

Yeah.

[Josh Clark]

Well, regardless, Winston Mosley, after. I guess after his second. His first escape, his second little crime spree in Buffalo, when he was captured, he apparently reformed himself, or he claimed to be reformed. He got a degree in prison. He wrote an editorial that the New York Times published where he basically said, I'm a changed man. And. And everybody said, oh, look at that. It's just about the time your first parole hearing's coming up. This is great timing. He went up before the parole board, and they said no. He went up before the parole board again, they said no. He went up 18 times. 18 times the parole board said no. I think the last one was just a couple years before he died, but he died in 2016 at age 81 in prison.

[Charles W. Chuck Bryant]

Yeah. And the brother tried to get an interview with him, and he said no, that he didn't want to be exploited anymore. And you could just feel this brother's pain of, like, really wanting to try to talk him into it again. And basically the people that were the go between were like, yeah, you know, you can try. We can't keep you, but he's not going to change his mind.

[Josh Clark]

Right.

[Charles W. Chuck Bryant]

So he never got that interview, but I feel like he got. I don't think he was looking for answers. I mean, in the documentary, he went back to many of these apartment windows just to look at what their vantage point might have been. He got an actress to recreate what the screaming would have sounded like from down there on the street, which was very chilling scene. And I don't know that he was looking for. Like you said, he was at odds with his family at times. You could tell the one little brother was like, man, this is hard on all of us, so you need to stop.

[Josh Clark]

Right.

[Charles W. Chuck Bryant]

But I don't think he was necessarily looking for the closure in that. I want to find out for sure if these people could have stopped it. I think the closure comes more in the journey of learning about his sister and learning as much as he can about this case.

[Josh Clark]

Right.

[Charles W. Chuck Bryant]

It's really interesting.

[Josh Clark]

It was very interesting, that 2004 Times article. And then now this. This documentary has definitely exonerated Kew Gardens as a whole. They've said now there's way more nuance to this. There's way more. But two people that have not been exonerated are a guy named Joseph Fink and a guy named Carl Ross. Carl Ross was the guy who lived at the top of the vestibule, who opened his door. The ironic thing about Carl Ross is, if you notice, it says 38 witnesses, 37 did nothing. 30. That last 38th witness that the Times is referring to was Carl Ross. They said he's the one who called the police. He called the police, like, long after Kitty Genovese was dead. Oh, yeah, yeah. So he was actually. He was actually. I don't want to say celebrated or whatever, but he was exonerated initially by this Times article when it turns out that he was one of the two people who could have done something and didn't. The other one was Joseph Fink, who saw the initial attack from his vantage point in the elevator. He ran the elevator in the Mowbray Apartments across the street, and he apparently saw what was happening and left his elevator and went to bed. Yeah, that was that. But again, it seems like the overall feeling is okay. Other than those two guys, everybody else is fine. I just disagree with that. I think that there's a lot more that people could have done that didn't. And I don't think it's. I just don't think that everybody's off the hook for that.

[Charles W. Chuck Bryant]

Yeah.

[Josh Clark]

Yep.

[Charles W. Chuck Bryant]

You got anything else?

[Josh Clark]

No, man. If you want to know more about Kitty Genovese, just search the Internet. There's a lot about her. But be careful what you read because it's all over the place, frankly. And since I said Internet, it's time for listener mail.

[Charles W. Chuck Bryant]

Fish fraud follow up. Hey, guys. I recently began began a job as a marine fisheries observer.

[Josh Clark]

Nice.

[Charles W. Chuck Bryant]

For the Department of Fish and Game in the Bering Sea. And just listen to your fish fraud episode. Each season, a percentage of vessels fish fishing here at least, are randomly selected. Have an observer on board to monitor the operations and bycatch that come up in their pots or nets. The presence of an observer is admittedly a bit of a drag for the this fisherman who have to put up with us skinny nerds. Lol. We are generally a great deterrent of any mischief at sea, but from what I have seen, most of the fishermen are real sharp, honest folks who know what they're doing. Of course, this is only a small portion of all the vessels on the water and it isn't going to solve that problem by any means. But thought you'd like to know that there is some coverage on fish fishing vessels and processors. Thanks for all the laughs, my dudes. That is from Kevin Alexandrowitz in Olympia, Washington.

[Josh Clark]

Thanks a lot Kevin.

[Charles W. Chuck Bryant]

Had no idea, did you, that these people did that?

[Josh Clark]

That there's basically like a sky marshal program fighting fish fraud on the high seas.

[Charles W. Chuck Bryant]

Yeah, we talked about that.

[Josh Clark]

We did, Yeah. I don't remember that.

[Charles W. Chuck Bryant]

Yeah, we were just like, it's just so infrequent and random that you know, what's, what good is it doing and sounds like he agrees in some ways.

[Josh Clark]

I guess so. But still, have fun out there on the high seas. Don't get seasick. If you want to get in touch with us like Kevin did, you can send us an email to stuff podcaststuffworks.com and as always, join us at our home on the web stuffyou should know.com.

[Ryan Seacrest]

Stuff you should know is a production of iHeartRadio. For more podcasts my heart radio, visit the iHeartRadio app. Apple Podcasts are wherever you listen to your favorite shows.

[Lester Holt]

Hey, it's Ryan Seacrest for Albertsons and Safeway. Now through June 17th. Shop in store or online for your favorite personal care Items and save $5 when you spend $15 or more. Stock up on items like Dove Body Wash, Degree Motion Sense Deodorant, Tresemme, Hairspray, Dove Shampoo, Dove Bar, Dove Men's Body and face Wash and Dollar Shave Club blades. And save $5 when you spend $15 or more. Hurry in before these deals are gone. Offer ends June 17. Promotions may vary. Restrictions apply. Visit albertsons or safeway.com for more details.

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[Erica]

The OGs of uncensored motherhood are back and badder than ever. I'm Erica. And I'm Mila, and we're the hosts of the Good Moms Bad Choices Podcast, brought to you by the Black Effect Podcast Network every Wednesday. Yeah, we're moms, but not your mommy. Historically, men talk too much and women have quietly listened. And all that stops here. If you like witty women, then this is your try. Listen to the Good Moms Bad Choices Podcast every Wednesday on the Black Effect podcast network, the iHeartRadio app, Apple podcast, or wherever you go to find your podcast.

[Charles W. Chuck Bryant]

This is an iHeart podcast.