Homicide District Attorney Whistle Blows on National and International Radio

John Scarpa, former homicide Assistant District Attorney in the Queens County District Attorney's office, who worked there for about twenty years, said on the National and International radio program, the Michael Dresser talk show, on March 8,2004 [www.themichaeldressershow.com], the following about the Medical Examiner in charge of Christopher O’Connor’s case, Doctor Josette Montas: "What Doctor Montas overlooked was critical and that was this: This young man had called the police, and had reported that he had been assaulted, reported that property had been taken from him, reported that he was bleeding from the eye but he was lucid enough at the time he was making these calls to give detailed information about where he was and what had happened to him.  Repeating to the 911 operator, over and over again, where he was and how to get there, but most tellingly, expressing to the 911 operator that he was concerned that the police wouldn't even respond to this location, that this is a location which subsequent information proves, showed that it was really owned [not on paper] but in reality, by a mafia connection and that there was something going on over here that prevented the police from actually responding correctly. The police rather than responding to a call of a male caller, the cop gets there and he says, I do not see any females. Which is absolutely, totally ridiculous and leaves without having recovered any information at all about what happened to this young man. Now, when doctor Montas examines the body, she finds that he certainly was intoxicated but she completely ignores the ligature marks on the neck, which show up on the autopsy kodachromes, which are photographs and x-rays, which are taken at the time of the examination of the body and are preserved. Subsequent Medical Examiners look at this and say that this is an absolute butcher job that she did. The question is why. To be honest with you, Michael [talking to host, Michael Dresser], I like to give everybody, the benefit of the doubt, so I would like to believe, I would hope that doctor Montas was just incompetent, but it really stretches credulity beyond belief to believe that the one person who's going to make the determination as to whether or not this person was a victim of an unnatural death or just an accidental intoxicated situation, would be deprived of the information from the police as to the 911 call. Who made that decision? Who made the decision to deny doctor Montas that information? Had she heard that and then decided not to find it a homicide, that would be one thing, so I don't  really  think that it was doctor Montas who consciously made the decision, not to classify this as a homicide, in the first instance but somebody decided not to give her that information which would have been critical. Any competent coroner would have asked for that kind of information. She was denied that, and the question now is why. You know, at the time, you might not have been suspicious, but as events have unfolded over the years and as things that I have personally become involved with and learned about this case, it lead me to the inescapable conclusion that there is a major cover-up of a homicide. In my opinion, this is more political than it is mob oriented [answering Michael Dresser's question on mob involvement]. And I will tell you why I came to that conclusion. We have, in Queens County, just as there is in every part of the United States, some organized crime but organized crime is limited in its power projection to that which it can obtain from political connections and so what happened in this particular case is that it became relatively clear early on, that there was some political interference with the full performance of an investigation and, subsequent events, which I think, Michael Salem, may  able to  give you some really good insights into as to the early experiences that he had on a civil suit and how evidence became suppressed in that particular situation. You have here, an organized crime run establishment [referring to the L'Amour East night club]. Something happens very bad at that establishment. They have a lawyer who happens to have very, very, very powerful and very, very, heavy political connections. He uses those powerful connections that he has to the betterment of his client, these mafia people, to make sure that there is no investigation inside of the District Attorney's office or in the police department to uncover or reveal the way this young man died and, therefore, the major portion the corruption is political. That's my opinion of about what happened here."