Nov 09, 2007  |  By: LOU CHIBBARO J  | COMMENTS     

Law enforcement officials may be reluctant to investigate whether the execution-style murder of three college students in a Newark, N.J., schoolyard last August was an anti-gay hate crime because they are reluctant to “out” one or more of the victims, the head of New Jersey’s largest gay rights groups said this week.

Steven Goldstein, chair of Garden State Equality, said he and many of the state’s gay activists are worried that police, prosecutors and Newark Mayor Corey Booker may be downplaying evidence of a possible gay bashing angle to the murders, which stunned Newark residents.

“We continue to ask officials to look into the possibility of a hate crime,” Goldstein said. “But we are not getting any clear answers, even though there is clearly enough evidence of a potential hate crime.”

Dashon Harvey, 20, who was openly gay, Terrance Aeriel, 18, and Iofemi Hightower, 20, were lined up against a wall on the grounds of Newark’s Mount Vernon Elementary School just before midnight on Aug. 4 and shot in the head, according to police accounts. The three were pronounced dead at the scene. Police said Natasha Aeriel, 19, Terrance’s sister, was also shot in the head and left for dead.

Natasha Aeriel survived the shooting and gave police an account of what she saw, the Newark Start-Ledger reported. She is recuperating after several surgical procedures and has remained in seclusion under protective custody, a spokesperson for the Essex County, N.J., prosecutor’s office said.

Authorities have yet to release a detailed account of what Natasha Aeriel told police about the incident and friends have said she has declined to talk about what she saw and heard that night at the advice of law enforcement officials.

Within a month of the incident, police filed murder and robbery charges against six males in connection with the case. Three of the six are juveniles. All six have connections to a local youth gang, but police have said they are uncertain whether the murders were gang related.

Police and the mayor’s office have said the motive for the murders appears to be robbery because Natasha Aeriel reportedly told police that one or more of the six accused assailants stole some belongings from some of the victims.

But friends of the victims have said little of value appeared to have been taken and that all of the victims’ wallets were left at the scene.

One of the victims’ friends told the Blade that all four of the students, who were enrolled at Delaware State University, planned to join him in attending a black Gay Pride event in Queens, N.Y., the day following their deaths.

The friend, who spoke on condition that he not be identified, said Dashon Harvey was openly gay and was out to his family. The friend said Iofemi Hightower did not identify herself as gay but “was pretty much like a tomboy.”

The friend, who is also openly gay, said he and other friends find it hard to believe that the six assailants, some of whom had guns, would choose to kill the victims over a petty robbery. According to the friend, the mother of one of the victims said police told her that one or more of the assailants slashed the two male victims — Terrance Aeriel and Dashon Harvey — before shooting them to death.

“She thought it was more than just a robbery,” the friend said.

Lube Todd, press secretary for Cory Booker, Newark’s mayor, said high-level advisers to the mayor have met at least twice with local gay activists to discuss the case.

When asked if the mayor has responded to criticism by some activists that city officials may be downplaying a possible gay bashing angle in the case because they are uncomfortable with gay issues, Todd said she would not get “into a back and forth” over the gay question.

“I’m comfortable with the way the police are handling this,” she said. “The one thing that needs to be remembered is there are survivors of this heinous attack.”

Todd noted that Natasha Aeriel, the only surviving victim, is helping police and prosecutors in their case against the men charged in the murders. Todd said the parents and families of the victims are also coping with the loss of their loved ones.

“I don’t think we should go into the horror of the situation,” she said. “It is really not up to us to put out any circumstantial information that is not factually based.”

Goldstein said the evidence of a possible hate crime is substantial. He said that officials with Garden State Equality are asking only that ...