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The Kew Gardens neighborhood of Queens has, since 1964, been identified largely with one event: the horrific 1964 murder of Kitty Genovese as she walked home. What made the Genovese murder distinct in an age of rising crime rates was that the New York Times reported that dozens of Kew Gardens residents heard her screams and refused to intervene. Though the initial accounts of apathetic neighbors have largely been discredited, the murder has become part of popular culture and led to the term “bystander effect.” As historian Marcia M. Gallo demonstrated in her recent book, the changing ethnic demographics fueled fears of urban decline in some minds and this is why the murder of Genovese led many to so easily accept accounts that dozens heard her screams when the truth is that the neighborhood responded to the killing by supporting more measures aimed at promoting safety. Genovese's apartment was on the floor above what is now Austin's Ale House.

Kitty Genovese

Kitty Genovese

Austin's Ale House on the left, Mowbry Apartments on the right

Austin's Ale House on the left, Mowbry Apartments on the right

The doorway where Genovese died

The doorway where Genovese died

In 1964, Kew Gardens was seen as a safe neighborhood with a small-town feel. For a year, Catherine “Kitty” Genovese lived in an apartment on Austin Street with her girlfriend, Mary Ann Zielonko. It was a more conservative age, even in New York City, and the two women presented themselves as “roommates.” In truth, they were quietly living as lovers. The two met in 1963 at a lesbian bar in Greenwich Village, began dating, and eventually decided to move in together.

By all accounts, Kitty Genovese was a friendly, well-liked young woman who chose to stay behind in the city when her parents and siblings moved to Connecticut. This was perhaps because Genovese knew that life in the city would offer more of an LGBT community and Kitty, after apparently struggling with her sexuality, was living openly, if quietly, as a lesbian. At the time of her death, Genovese was working as a bartender at Ev’s Eleventh Hour Sports Bar.

On March 13, 1964, in the early hours of morning, Genovese was returning home after working at the bar. She parked her car at the Long Island Rail Road parking lot and started the short walk to her building. A man, Winston Moseley, watched from the other end of the parking lot before following her up Austin Street. As she neared her apartment, Moseley repeatedly stabbed Genovese in the back as she screamed. At least one resident of the apartments across the street opened a window and shouted for him to leave her alone. Moseley, apparently startled at the sound, walked away as Genovese dragged herself around the building, opened the nearest door, and collapsed in the stairwell. Remarkably, Moseley returned to his victim, attempted to rape her, and left her to die.

The murder of Genovese initially attracted little attention outside of Kew Gardens. New York was a violent city and would become more so in the coming years, and the murder of a young woman on the street seemed unremarkable. But shortly after the murder, the New York Times published a lurid front-page article on the crime, maintaining that 38 people—Genovese’s neighbors—heard her screams and watched as she was attacked but refused to intervene or even call the police. In a comment that came to be emblematic of a coldly indifferent city, one neighbor explained his inaction with the statement, “I didn’t want to get involved.”

In an age when violent crime was increasing and the city was widely perceived as an apathetic place where people lived and died anonymously, the Times story of a young woman brutally murdered as dozens of her neighbors looked on horrified readers around the country. The country as a whole was becoming more violent, and sociologists, criminologists, and others began to delve into what came to be known as the "bystander effect." Scholars concluded that people are less likely to intervene during the commission of. a crime when there are other bystanders present, and the greater the number of bystanders, the less likely it is that any one of them will act to stop the crime. Kitty Genovese's murder is credited with the formation of self-defense groups like the Guardian Angels as well as the creation of the 911 emergency system.

In later years, however, the number of witnesses cited by the Times would be widely discredited. Later researchers, as well as the Times itself, have concluded that the number of people who heard Genovese's screams and failed to help her was actually far smaller, perhaps fewer than ten. But the central fact remains: a young woman died violently and her neighbors, with one exception, failed to help her. The exception was neighbor Sophia Farrar, who heard her friend's screams and ran downstairs to find Genovese dying in a doorway. Farrar cradled Genovese in her arms until help arrived.

Today, the building where Genovese and Zielonko lived appears much the same as it did in 1964, as do the Mowbry Apartments across the street.

Kilgannon, Corey. Queens Neighborhood Still Haunted by Genovese's Murder , New York Times. April 6th 2016. Accessed October 7th 2020. https://www.nytimes.com/2016/04/07/nyregion/queens-neighborhood-still-haunted-by-kitty-genoveses-murder.html#:~:text=The%20bartender%20at%20Austin's%20Ale,night%20in%201964%20when%20Ms..

“What Really Happened the Night Kitty Genovese was Murdered?” National Public Radio, March 3, 2014.

Gannon, Seth. Revisiting Austin Street: The Death of Kitty Genovese, 50 Years Later , Pacific Standard. March 13th 2014. Accessed October 7th 2020. https://psmag.com/social-justice/revisiting-austin-street-death-kitty-genovese-50-years-later-76460.

Kitty Genovese Residence, NYC LGBT Historic Sites Project. Accessed October 7th 2020. https://psmag.com/social-justice/revisiting-austin-street-death-kitty-genovese-50-years-later-76460.

Roberts , Sam . Sophia Farrar Dies at 92; Belied Indifference to Genovese Attack, New York Times . September 2nd 2020. Accessed October 7th 2020. https://www.nytimes.com/2020/09/02/nyregion/sophia-farrar-dead.html.