Micah Loewinger: This is On the Media. I'm Micah Loewinger.

Brooke Gladstone: I'm Brooke Gladstone. We're back with the story of how the press covered a notorious and divisive 1984 New York City subway shooting, part of a new series called Vigilante From Fiasco. The podcast hosted by Leon Neyfakh, which you can find only on Audible. We pick up with the gunman's emergence far from the scene of the crime.

Speaker 30: New Hampshire is a land of history, of contentment, and charm. Here are quaint covered bridges--

Leon Neyfakh: Nine days after the shooting, big news came from an unexpected place.

Robert Libby: My name is Robert F. Libby. I go by Bob. In 1984, I was a lieutenant on duty for the day shift of the Concord Police Department.

Leon Neyfakh: Concord New Hampshire was home to about 30,000 people. It was so quiet that it had earned the nickname that city in a coma.

Robert Libby: There were some days when it was boring. People would come to the window. I would have to talk to, or people would call on the phone, and I'd have to talk to. I'd review police reports and pass them along in the system.

Leon Neyfakh: On Sunday, the day before New Year's Eve, Libby happened to be reading about a high-profile crime in his local newspaper. It had taken place more than 250 miles away in a New York City subway station.

Robert Libby: Then the next day, I'm sitting in my office and this guy walks in the front lobby and the sergeant says, "This guy wants to turn himself in." I said, "What for?" He said something to the effect of, "Have you heard of the Subway Vigilante?"

Leon Neyfakh: After nine days of media speculation and a manhunt that seemed to be stuck in neutral, the gunman had surrendered.

Robert Libby: At some point, he told me his name was Bernie Goetz.

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Leon Neyfakh: Bernhard Goetz was a 37-year-old electronics engineer who had lived in New York for almost a decade. Judging by how he introduced himself at the Concord Police Station, it seemed he had been following the news closely enough while on the run to know about his new nickname.

Robert Libby: At that point, I had a patrol officer in the station. I had him come up, take him upstairs to the library, and get a statement from him.

Leon Neyfakh: Now that the subway gunman had a name, he was instantly the biggest story in the country. Journalists flocked to Concord to get a look at him. An assistant district attorney from Manhattan went up as well, along with two detectives. Together they questioned Goetz and bit by bit the timeline of what he'd been up to since the shooting began to come together. It seemed that Goetz had left the city and then returned to his apartment a few days later. This is Jim Levison, then the detective supervisor for the precinct where the shooting had taken place.

Jim Levison: When he entered the building, his doorman said, "A couple of detectives were here a few days ago and they left their car, they wanted to talk to you," not knowing the doorman had no idea what it was about. Then he knew the gig was up.

Leon Neyfakh: After two days in the Concord jail, Goetz was brought back to New York.

Jim Levison: I remember there was a caravan of press cars that followed them from New Hampshire down to the courthouse in New York.

Leon Neyfakh: Levison eventually asked his detective, "Did Goetz ever explain why he turned himself in in Concord and not New York?"

Jim Levison: Bernie said that he was afraid the New York cops were going to beat him up because he had caused so much trouble [chuckles] I said, "Okay," [laughs] Thinking New York City wants to give him a medal and we're going to beat him up.

[music]

Speaker 31: Bernhard Goetz waived extradition from New Hampshire after earlier saying he was afraid to return to New York. He said, "I feel like a sitting pigeon."

Leon Neyfakh: Once Goetz was back in the city, the public was voracious for more information about him, even his booking and his arraignment brief courtroom procedures drew huge crowds. On January 2nd, The Post wrote about a neighbor who'd once joined Goetz in a rent strike. He's a gentle and caring soul. She was quoted as saying, "And he cared about doing good and cleaning things up. Every garbage can on the street is because of Bernard."

Speaker 31: Neighbors in his Greenwich Village apartment building say Goetz is an unlikely vigilante.

Speaker 32: Bernie was a regular guy. You know what I mean? He is a regular guy. There's no big thing about him. I was really surprised.

Leon Neyfakh: Upon his return to New York City, Goetz was placed in a special high-security wing on Rikers Island. The same one that had once held John Lennon's killer. Goetz's bail was set at $50,000. Right away, offers of help flooded in.

Speaker 31: Money is being donated in his apartment house at an electronic store where he was a customer, and people are sending money from as far away as Florida.

Leon Neyfakh: Comedian and New York native, Joan Rivers sent Goetz a telegram at Rikers with, "Love and Kisses." The chairman of New York's Republican Party offered him $5,000 towards his bail.

Speaker 32: I think a person has a right to defend themself against 1 or 10 or whatever.

Speaker 33: Goetz turned down a $50,000 bail check, supposedly from a private citizen.

Leon Neyfakh: Goetz declined all the offers and paid the bail himself. Once Goetz was released from Rikers on January 8th, the media frenzy around him somehow reached even greater heights. Here again is Ruben Rosario from The Daily News.

Ruben Rosario: This was balls-to-the-wall coverage in a city that has big news pretty much every week. This was the biggest news for a period of weeks and even months. The news media pretty much camped outside his apartment building. I made quite a bit of money just sitting in the car, munching on donuts and coffee, trying to get a glimpse of Bernard Goetz.

Leon Neyfakh: The Post assigned Cynthia Fagen to write about Goetz's background. Her piece was published under the headline, "The Vigilantes Untold Life Story," and it described young Goetz as a quiet scholarly boy. Fagen quoted Bernard's sister, Bernice as saying that her brother was always taught to be a polite gentleman. Fagen also included an important detail. Goetz had been mugged several years earlier. In the wake of that mugging, he had tried unsuccessfully to get a license to carry a gun.

The Post found the transcript of the gun permit hearing and published excerpts from it in which Goetz said the experience of getting mugged had changed him profoundly. The incident was an education, Goetz stated in the hearing transcript, "It taught me that the city doesn't care what happens to you." This attempt by Goetz to buy a gun prompted a conversation about New York's gun laws, and soon the National Rifle Association jumped into the fray.

Richard Feldman: New York media was very scary to NRA at the time. The anti-gun New York media, oh my God.

Leon Neyfakh: Richard Feldman worked for the NRA helping to direct the organization's political efforts in the northeast. After the shooting, Feldman was not scared of engaging with journalists. He saw it as an opportunity.

Richard Feldman: Yes, I'm from New York. To me, they were my hometown media. Knowing that the people in New York were very much on the side of Bernie Goetz, it was a moment to make a statement about changing the gun laws in New York.

Leon Neyfakh: Feldman convinced his boss at the NRA to take out ads in New York's local papers that read, "Self-protection is your right."

Richard Feldman: He came back to me a few days later and said, "Richie, I can't believe it. You are completely right. These ads are doing fantastic."

[music]

Leon Neyfakh: In a remarkably short period of time, Goetz had become a national figure. A Washington Post, ABC news poll taken in mid-January showed that 86% of Americans were aware of the Goetz shooting. That was higher according to The Post than nearly every other national event, including the Iran hostage crisis. At a White House press conference on January 9th, ABC's Sam Donaldson even asked President Reagan about Bernie Goetz.

Sam Donaldson: Mr. President, a man in a subway in New York City took a gun and shot four youths who apparently were trying to shake him down. What do you think about the use of deadly force in trying to defend oneself against attack?

President Reagan: In general, I think we all can understand the frustration of people who are constantly threatened by crime and feel that law and order is not particularly protecting them. On the other hand, I think we all realize there is a breakdown of civilization if people start taking the law in their own hands. While we may feel understanding or sympathy for someone who was tested beyond his control and his ability to control himself, at the same time, we have to abide by the law and stand for law and order.

Leon Neyfakh: Reagan didn't specify what exactly had tested Goetz beyond his control. He also didn't say how much control people should be expected to possess. Meanwhile, back in New York, Jimmy Breslin was not wasting time on equivocation, even though only a few others had joined him in condemning Goetz. Les Payne, a columnist for New York, Newsday called Goetz a hero to the hysterical and accused the media of dispensing spoonfed police details instead of pursuing the truth. Mayor Koch called out Breslin specifically for his coverage of the Goetz case, saying that he was exacerbating racial tensions.

Speaker 34: Breslin has been outspoken in his criticism of Goetz saying in one column, "He shot the four of them because they were Black. Don't worry about it. Shot them, bang, bang, bang, two in the back. Bernie Goetz of the Light Brigade."

Leon Neyfakh: No matter how much Breslin appealed to reason, much of the public remained as supportive of Goetz as ever. Just one day before the White House press conference, talk show host Phil Donahue dedicated an entire episode of his show to the controversy. The Phil Donahue show was among the most widely watched in the country at the time, and it was there that Jimmy Breslin came face-to-face with the public support for the subway gunman.

Phil Donahue: Newspapers can't seem to write enough about the issue of Bernard Goetz. We seem to be coming apart at the seams, and we are giving standing ovations to people who appear to be taking the law into their own hands. You should also know that on the person of three of the four victims were found sharpened screwdrivers.

Jimmy Breslin: Wrong.

Phil Donahue: Jimmy Breslin is here-

Jimmy Breslin: Wrong.

Phil Donahue: -to correct me in public. [laughter]

Leon Neyfakh: Breslin had not given up on his attempt to correct the misreporting around the event. He wasn't going to let this moment pass by without calling it out.

Phil Donahue: What's your point, Mr. Breslin?

Jimmy Breslin: After the shooting, they found three screwdrivers unsharpened, two in one jacket and one in the other. The captain in charge of the investigation for the New York City Police Department says that the screwdriver never came into play and were no part of the investigation that they're conducting. Apparently--

Leon Neyfakh: This vivid but totally false image of sharpened screwdrivers had stuck in the minds of the public and in much of the media. In fact, nearly 40 years after the shooting, press accounts still frequently mentioned the sharpened screwdrivers, which again, never existed.

Jimmy Breslin: The screwdrivers apparently are not going to be any part of the case. In other words from what he is saying, the screwdrivers never were shown. They were there obviously for thieving. The guys were going to break into these Pac-Man games and hit subway turnstiles, but they were unsharpened. The press has made it sharpened and each one of them had one, and thereby giving people the vision of these three kids, putting the screwdriver in the guy's eyes or something. It's all part of the story of the fear and resentment that's produced this outpouring.

Phil Donahue: It's a part of the prejudiced effort to railroad these victims. Is that your point?

Jimmy Breslin: They're trying to make a poor guy when a fellow I've regard as being a little unstable, Goetz, went and shot four people. He's going to go to jail for it. Whether anyone likes to hear that or not, he will go to jail. He shot four kids. When he's sitting in the jail, they'll still remember sharpened screwdrivers that never were sharpened.

Phil Donahue: He appears to be getting a standing ovation from more than a--

Jimmy Breslin: From the unwashed, the loudmouths. Of course, quite a few of them, they all stand up.

[background noise]

Leon Neyfakh: There was an audience member who confronted Breslin first.

Speaker 35: Are you a doctor, sir?

Jimmy Breslin: What has that got to do with it?

Speaker 35: Well, you're passing judgment, the man was unstable. How can you say that?

Jimmy Breslin: He shot four people in a subway car. What's that? Stability?

Speaker 35: Are you kidding? It should have happened to you, what reaction would you have had then, sir?

Jimmy Breslin: What happened?

Speaker 35: If they shot you.

Jimmy Breslin: What happened?

Speaker 35: What would've happened?

Jimmy Breslin: Wait a minute. What happened?

Speaker 35: You don't know what happened. You weren't there.

Jimmy Breslin: I know four kids got shot. Two of them in the back.

Speaker 35: I know a man's in jail, but I still don't believe it why?

Jimmy Breslin: Oh, you don't believe why?

Speaker 35: No, sir.

Jimmy Breslin: You don't believe why he's in jail? Because he pulled a gun and shot four people. Very simple. You go to jail for that. There's laws-

Speaker 35: Well, we'll see.

Jimmy Breslin: -not your emotion. Big difference.

Speaker 35: Thank you. We'll see

Leon Neyfakh: For Ruben Rosario, this was Breslin at his best, challenging the worship of Goetz even when few others were willing to do so.

Ruben Rosario: He was a journalist at heart, meaning that he would try to find the truth for wherever laid-- There was a genius to his journalistic madness.

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Leon Neyfakh: Breslin's madness wasn't enough to break through the madness that had seized the public. Bernard Goetz was still a hero, and the popular appetite for uncritical news about him did not abate. On January 10th, 1985, two days after the Donahue panel, New Yorkers woke up to a special edition of the New York Post. Murdoch star columnist, Steve Dunleavy had managed to score a long exclusive interview with Goetz. "I really hope some good comes of this," ran the pull quote from Goetz on the front page.

Below that in a smaller font was a headline about 19-year-old Darrell Kabe, whose spine had been severed in the shooting. Kabe had developed a severe case of pneumonia in the hospital. He had fallen into a coma and in the words of The Post, he was fighting for his life. If Darrell Kabe died, the DA would have to consider prosecuting Goetz for murder.

Brooke Gladstone: Kabe and Goetz, three other victims did survive the shooting, and Goetz, well, he did less than a year in prison. About the fate of Daniel Penny, the white man who killed Jordan Neely, a Black man on the subway earlier this year gets quipped to The post that Penny has, "Got to pay." Leon, it seems both obvious and yet worth pointing out that in life and art, most would-be vigilantes are white and their victims, they're black.

Leon Neyfakh: Who gets to be a vigilante? If you're someone who takes the law into your own hands, sometimes that's called crime and other times it's called heroism. Who gets to be called a vigilante is a question that runs through our series for sure. It's also a question that runs through coverage of something like January 6th because those are indeed people who felt that the government was letting them down and they needed to take their country back. That's a pretty good distillation of the vigilante spirit.

Brooke Gladstone: In Fiasco, you share a clip of New York City Mayor Eric Adams, former NYPD transit officer and police captain, suggesting that crime needs to be addressed equally as a real problem and as a feeling.

Leon Neyfakh: Yes, and it is a little bit scary to hear him say that the perception matters as much as the reality because if that's what we're going off of, then the policy choices that we're going to make are very different than what's actually going to solve our problems as a society. There's a balance that everyone should be seeking, and I'm worried when I hear someone say that the perception matters as much as the reality because it seems like a recipe for getting that balance badly wrong.

Brooke Gladstone: Thank you, Leon.

Leon Neyfakh: Thank you, Brooke.

Brooke Gladstone: Leon Neyfakh is the host of Fiasco, a podcast about pivotal moments in US history. The latest season Vigilante is available exclusively on Audible, but you can find previous seasons of Fiasco wherever you find your podcasts.

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Brooke Gladstone: On the Media is produced by Eloise Blondiau, Molly Schwartz, Rebecca Clark-Callender, Candice Wang, and Suzanne Gaber with help from Shaan Merchant, our technical directors, Jennifer Munson. Our engineer this week was Andrew Nerviano. Katya Rogers is our executive producer. On the Media is a production of WNYC Studios. I'm Brooke Gladstone.

Micah Loewinger: And I'm Micah Loewinger.

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