Tanya Mosley

What was the actual truth of the four of them, of who they actually were?

There were essentially two trials.

So there was the criminal trial, and it was a mostly white jury that acquitted Bernie Goetz of attempted murder.

And then there was the civil trial that happened a few years later, and that was a mostly black jury.

And they found Goetz liable and awarded Daryl KB $43 million, but he never received money for that.

Is that right?

One of the things that I keep using the, I keep saying astounding, but, you know, you mentioned how race wasn't at the forefront in this criminal trial.

They managed to downplay race entirely.

I mean, Goetz's lawyer portrayed him as this pan-racial urban hero.

And how did they pull that off again?

And why did it work on the jury?

Like there were all of these racial undertones that were right there and very apparent, and yet race was downplayed in the trial.

Is it right that this case changed New York's self-defense law?

Let's take a short break.

If you're just joining us, we're talking with Pulitzer Prize-winning historian Heather Ann Thompson about her new book, Fear and Fury, which traces how a 1984 New York City subway shooting helped shape the politics of fear we're still living with today.

We'll continue our conversation after a short break.

This is Fresh Air.

Heather, one of the most fascinating characters for me in this book is the media.

There is this phrase in journalism, if it bleeds, it leads.

And what you're asserting here is something that we know to be true, that