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Hastings Library To Screen 'The Central Park Five'

HASTINGS-ON-HUDSON, N.Y. -- The Friends of the Library will screen "The Central Park Five," a documentary based on the infamous Central Park jogger rape case in 1989, at Hastings High School Tuesday at 6:30 p.m.

Friends of Hastings Library To Screen "The Central Park Five."

Friends of Hastings Library To Screen "The Central Park Five."

Photo Credit: Hastings Library

The film, produced by famed documentarians Ken and Sarah Burns, was edited by Hastings resident Michael Levine, who will be interviewed by "Talking Pictures" film series host Harvey Lerner following the screening. "The Central Park Five" chronicles the arrest, false conviction and 10-year imprisonment of five teenagers for the rape of a jogger. 

The film, which runs 119 minutes and is rated R, is not suitable for children. 

Hastings Library Director Sue Feir said in the library newspaper that she vividly recalled the incident in describing the film.

"In 1989 I was 39 years old, living in Westchester, not yet working for the Hastings Public Library, when the report of an attack and rape of a young female jogger in Central Park was all over the news," the newsletter reads. "Five teenagers were convicted of the assault. I remember the case well.

"A decade later, DNA evidence and a new confession proved that that the five young men were innocent. I do not remember those details as well. Somehow we get caught up in the emotions of a crime but don’t spend the same amount of time or energy thinking about legal mistakes that are sometimes made, with young lives put into hiatus, if not ruined."

Lerner said he has interviewed Levine previously. "I have interviewed Michael Levine before and in addition to being a very talented editor, he is particularly articulate when discussing his work," Lerner said.

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