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The Witness

The Case

Kitty Genovese was murdered at about 3:20 am on March 13, 1964, in the Kew Gardens neighborhood of Queens, New York. The lede of the initial article in The New York Times about her death, written by Martin Gansberg, read:

" For more than half an hour 38 respectable, law-abiding citizens in Queens watched a killer stalk and stab a woman in three separate attacks in Kew Gardens. "

The film argues that although "absolutely riveting", most of that statement was inaccurate:

Journalist Jim Rasenberger tells Bill Genovese in the film: "If the story had been reported more accurately, it still would have been a two or three day—maybe a four-day story; but it would not have been a 50-year story. We would still not be talking about it today."

Bill Genovese's Investigation

William "Bill" Genovese was 16 when his older sister Kitty was murdered. For many years, Kitty’s family found it too painful to look into the facts of her death. Starting in March 2004, however, Bill began his own investigation into whether it was true that 38 witnesses failed to help his sister. With leads from prosecutor Charles Skoller, he obtained the police interviews and the transcript of Winston Moseley's trial, and set about finding the witnesses or informants who were still alive. His findings, which are documented in the film, include the following:

Only 5 of the "38 witnesses" were called to the testify at Moseley's trial, among them:

According to defense attorney Sydney Sparrow (as reported by his son), Moseley was bright and manipulative. Moseley told the story of killing Kitty in a cold "conversational tone", and also confessed to murdering Annie Mae Johnson two weeks before Kitty. He shot Annie Mae four times as she was getting out of her car at night, then raped her in her house while her unknowing family members were upstairs, then set the house on fire.

Moseley was sentenced to death for the murder of Genovese, but his sentence was reduced to life imprisonment on appeal. In 1968, he escaped from prison and terrorized Buffalo, New York, for 4 days, breaking into houses, raping a woman at gunpoint, and taking hostages before being captured by the FBI. He went on to complete a sociology degree from prison in 1977, and later claimed to be reformed.

Bill attempts to interview Winston Moseley, who refuses, saying he was "tired of being exploited." Moseley's son Steven, a minister, does agree to meet with Bill, however. He says his father told him that Kitty had hurled racial slurs at Moseley, who "snapped" and killed her, but a dubious Bill points out that Moseley had previously killed Annie Mae Johnson, who was African American. Steven then states that he was scared to meet with Bill because the story in his family is that Kitty was related to the Genovese crime family, which Bill denies. Later, Bill receives a letter from Winston Moseley, which makes the "bizarre claim" that Moseley had just been an unwitting getaway driver the night Kitty was killed, and "an Italian mobster named Dominick" killed Kitty over an unpaid debt, threatening Moseley and his family if he revealed the truth.

Bill concludes: "I've come to realize that the whole truth about Kitty's death will never be known, but maybe that's why the story continues to fascinate people…but I know she'd want me to move on."