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Lawyers: Hate crimes ignored in Miller Place death

BY KEITH HERBERT | keith.herbert@newsday.com

9:49 PM EST, December 29, 2007

For the defense in the John White case, it's a question that remains unanswered: Why weren't members of the angry group of white teens that gathered at the end of a black family's driveway in August 2006 charged with a bias crime?

A week after the trial of John White, the black Miller Place father convicted of manslaughter in the death of white teenager Daniel Cicciaro Jr., 17, White continues to get support from the Rev. Al Sharpton, among others, who are asking the same question.

White, 54, also has the backing of 100 Blacks in Law Enforcement Who Care and the NAACP. Nation of Islam minister Kevin Muhammad visited White's home on Thursday.

White's even found support from some homeowners -- black and white -- who say he had the right to defend his home and family, his attorneys said.

"We have been receiving e-mails" of support, said Marie Michel, one of White's attorneys. "Mr. White has been receiving cards and baskets."

Meanwhile, the defense team has turned its post-verdict attention to how the Whites were treated by law enforcement versus how the teenagers were handled.

White's defense attorneys, interviewed Friday, said they believe the white teens who drove to Miller Place to confront White's son, Aaron, on the night of Aug. 9, 2006, should have been charged.

Sharpton, who plans a protest rally at the Suffolk County Courthouse in Riverhead on Saturday, raised the issue last week, saying the circumstance "smacks of 1950s Mississippi."

The teens could have been arrested for harassment and trespass as bias crimes, defense attorneys said.

Bob Clifford, a spokesman for Suffolk County District Attorney Thomas Spota, declined to comment on whether charges against the group of teens were considered. A Suffolk police spokesman last night declined to comment.

The teens, including the boy who was killed, crossed onto the White family's driveway and used the N-word, according to John White's trial testimony.

In a prior telephone call, Cicciaro had used a racial epithet to refer to Aaron White, according to prosecutors.

Also, before his testimony to a grand jury, Aaron White had received anonymous threatening instant messages over the Internet. Racial slurs were used 10 times in the 30-minute conversation, according to court testimony.

It's clear from the evidence, the defense lawyers said, that Cicciaro and the others came to do harm -- Cicciaro had accused Aaron White of threatening to rape his female friend. The accusation turned out to be false.

"It's a free pass," said Michel, of Port Jefferson. "It says that the only one wrong on that night was Mr. White."

Michel said the group's actions that night were a violation of White's civil rights.

Defense attorney Frederick Brewington, of Hempstead, said the Suffolk County Police Department's bias-crime unit should have investigated the teen's behavior on the night of the fatal shooting, not just the police homicide unit.

Attempts to reach Sgt. Robert Reeks, of the Suffolk County police hate-crimes unit, on Friday and yesterday were unsuccessful.

Brewington said the defense is considering requesting the U.S. attorney's office investigate the case for civil rights violations.

"Mr. White's civil rights were violated from the beginning because this was a bias incident," Brewington said.