A young Jewish woman whose antisemitic attacker was released without bail on Saturday despite admitting to her crime, voiced anger over the failure of law enforcement to protect future potential victims.
It’s “a win for the criminals, and a big fail for the protection of the vulnerable targets they’re going after,” Dalia Shusterman told The Algemeiner on Sunday.
Shusterman was among three women who were attacked by Tiffany Harris on Thursday in Crown Heights, Brooklyn. Harris was released over the weekend as a result of new bail reform legislation just passed into law and set to take effect on January 1, the New York Post reported. A law enforcement source told the Post, however, that “the de Blasio administration has made it clear that we all need to get into compliance with bail reform now.”
Harris admitted her crime to police officers, according to the criminal complaint against her. “Yes, I slapped them,” she said. “I cursed them out. I said ‘F-U, Jews.’”
According to Shusterman, the decision to release Harris was also symptomatic of the authorities’ broader failure to adequately protect the Jewish community. “It’s a malignant growth out of their unwillingness to sympathize with the Orthodox Jewish community, which has always been relegated as the other, stereotyped as oppressors, and treated as unworthy of societal protection,” she asserted.
“There are too many voices encouraging this very specific hatred and not enough efforts to call it out as the evil that it is,” she said.
Shusterman also explained her use on social media of the term “pogrom” to describe the attacks. “That’s what I’m calling it,” she said. “It’s not organized by the government. But there is a cultural attack from the African-American community towards Jews that’s been going on and is finally becoming undeniable by the population at large.”
Regarding her and her community’s feelings about being visibly Jewish in New York right now, she said, “Some are afraid. I’m personally angry. The thought that there are people walking around thinking it’s okay to hurt people because of their culture is an ancient bonehead idea that should’ve been left back in the dark ages.”
“The fact that those acting on these notions are wrongly being shielded by their own sense of cultural victimization is profoundly absurd,” she emphasized. “We’re all in this world together and we’ve all got to make it better by doing the right thing. Period. There’s no excuse for unprovoked violence.”
“As far as how I feel about being visibly Jewish, just like the song says, this land was made for you and me,” she added. “I teach my children to be proud of who they are, and I believe that ought to be a universal game plan. Our days of going into hiding are over.”
The attack on Shusterman was among at least eight other antisemitic assaults in New York over the past few weeks, culminating in a brutal stabbing assault in the town of Monsey in which five people were wounded by a machete-wielding assailant.
The Algemeiner (c) 2019 . Benjamin Kerstein
{Matzav.com}
Other site reports that this same perpetrator was arrested again the next day for a new act of “menacing, harassment, and attempted assault”, but the religion of the victim is not stated.
Here is my question to the authorities. How is it possible that a perpetrator that behaves in such a manner has not been put under psychiatric observation instead of let loose on an unsuspecting public? Any rational judge should have interpreted the “real” point of the law as being for things like a house party with alcohol that got out of hand. But it is inconceivable that the law was ever intended for cases of strangers just walking up and behaving in such irrational manner.
The Mayor and Governor must get the message loud and clear that it is unacceptable to get rid of bail.
Keep voting for DemocRATs and this is what you get.
And how do you propose that be done?
After having researched mental illness, including Dr. William Glasser’s overlooked success with curing mental illness, plus hearing from a friend who ran a mental hospital, people don’t realize that mentally ill people often have more control over their behavior than anyone likes to admit. (You can also see this in their behavior on the street.)
Maybe not perfect control, but they aren’t as powerless as they seem.
Also, a great deal of wonky (including homicidal or suicidal) behavior is actually CAUSED by the medication they take. These side effects are listed in the insert.
Mental illness needs to stop being used as an excuse for crime.
It’s just another feel-good technique for people who want to avoid more complex (yet authentic) solutions, and who want to avoid being seen as judgemental or unsympathetic.