GANG RAPE' PACK BARES EVIL SCHEME
By MURRAY WEISS, GEORGETT ROBERTS, PHILIP MESSING and ADAM MILLER
December 22, 2002 -- Four homeless men have confessed to brutally beating and gang-raping a woman for two terrifying hours in a shantytown near Shea Stadium, police sources said yesterday as the squalid encampment was dismantled by officials.
In graphic, gory detail, the Mexican immigrants, who showed no remorse for the chilling attack, admitted their guilt in videotaped statements, saying it "was a robbery that went way out of control," one of the sources said.
"Let's rob them," Carlos Rodriguez, 22, the alleged ringleader, told three pals, the sources said.
The victim, a 42-year-old Queens mother of two, told cops the men told her "they would have to kill her because she could identify them," said Queens District Attorney Richard Brown.
"The plan was to sexually assault her, kill her and dump her so her body wouldn't be found," said another official.
The attack began shortly before 10 p.m. Thursday, when the suspects jumped the woman and her boyfriend, a 38-year-old watch salesman, on the walkway linking the National Tennis Center at Flushing Meadow Park to the Long Island Rail Road and No. 7 train stations, cops said.
The men, who range in age from 18 to 22, beat and robbed the couple, then dragged the woman down a flight of rickety stairs leading to the LIRR platform, across the tracks and to a cluster of shanties in the deep woods nearby, police said.
"I have children, I have children," the woman, a Cuban immigrant, cried as she begged the men to stop, the sources said.
After brutalizing her, they snatched a gold chain and a credit card from her, cops said.
When her boyfriend came to his senses, he borrowed a passer-by's cell phone to call cops.
More than 75 cops descended on the park.
A police dog tracked the suspects to the shantytown, which cops surrounded.
After the victim, beaten and bloody, emerged from one of the hovels, the dog, a 10-year-old German shepherd named Sean, was unleashed and rousted the suspects.
Arrested along with Rodriguez - who cops said is a member of a Mexican gang known as "Knights of Destruction" - were Jose Hernandez, 18, Victor Cruz, 22, and Louis Carmona, 20.
Late yesterday, police said they were looking for two more men they believe were involved in the heinous crime.
Jesus Torres, 28, was also arrested and implicated in the attack, but cops now believe he was not involved.
The woman was released from New York Hospital on Friday after being treated for bruises and cuts all over her body.
Brown called the attack "a devastating ordeal of violation and terror."
The shanties, which were ripped down by Parks Department workers, sat on property belonging to the Metropolitan Transportation Authority.
The four suspects were ordered held without bail last night after being arraigned on rape, sodomy, kidnapping, assault and robbery charges.
If convicted, each faces up to 25 years in prison.
Torres was held in lieu of $500 bail on misdemeanor trespass charges.
Gee, they showed no remorse. what a surprise.
By MURRAY WEISS, GEORGETT ROBERTS, PHILIP MESSING and ADAM MILLER
December 22, 2002 -- Four homeless men have confessed to brutally beating and gang-raping a woman for two terrifying hours in a shantytown near Shea Stadium, police sources said yesterday as the squalid encampment was dismantled by officials.
In graphic, gory detail, the Mexican immigrants, who showed no remorse for the chilling attack, admitted their guilt in videotaped statements, saying it "was a robbery that went way out of control," one of the sources said.
"Let's rob them," Carlos Rodriguez, 22, the alleged ringleader, told three pals, the sources said.
The victim, a 42-year-old Queens mother of two, told cops the men told her "they would have to kill her because she could identify them," said Queens District Attorney Richard Brown.
"The plan was to sexually assault her, kill her and dump her so her body wouldn't be found," said another official.
The attack began shortly before 10 p.m. Thursday, when the suspects jumped the woman and her boyfriend, a 38-year-old watch salesman, on the walkway linking the National Tennis Center at Flushing Meadow Park to the Long Island Rail Road and No. 7 train stations, cops said.
The men, who range in age from 18 to 22, beat and robbed the couple, then dragged the woman down a flight of rickety stairs leading to the LIRR platform, across the tracks and to a cluster of shanties in the deep woods nearby, police said.
"I have children, I have children," the woman, a Cuban immigrant, cried as she begged the men to stop, the sources said.
After brutalizing her, they snatched a gold chain and a credit card from her, cops said.
When her boyfriend came to his senses, he borrowed a passer-by's cell phone to call cops.
More than 75 cops descended on the park.
A police dog tracked the suspects to the shantytown, which cops surrounded.
After the victim, beaten and bloody, emerged from one of the hovels, the dog, a 10-year-old German shepherd named Sean, was unleashed and rousted the suspects.
Arrested along with Rodriguez - who cops said is a member of a Mexican gang known as "Knights of Destruction" - were Jose Hernandez, 18, Victor Cruz, 22, and Louis Carmona, 20.
Late yesterday, police said they were looking for two more men they believe were involved in the heinous crime.
Jesus Torres, 28, was also arrested and implicated in the attack, but cops now believe he was not involved.
The woman was released from New York Hospital on Friday after being treated for bruises and cuts all over her body.
Brown called the attack "a devastating ordeal of violation and terror."
The shanties, which were ripped down by Parks Department workers, sat on property belonging to the Metropolitan Transportation Authority.
The four suspects were ordered held without bail last night after being arraigned on rape, sodomy, kidnapping, assault and robbery charges.
If convicted, each faces up to 25 years in prison.
Torres was held in lieu of $500 bail on misdemeanor trespass charges.
Gee, they showed no remorse. what a surprise.
