Thread: Bond between cop, victim key to schoolyard killings

Bond between cop, victim key to schoolyard killings
by Jonathan Schuppe and Brad Parks
Thursday August 23, 2007, 11:06 PM

With a bullet still lodged in her head, Natasha Aeriel looked up from her hospital bed and there he was again, her guardian angel with the big smile and neatly trimmed goatee: the good-looking cop they call Lucky.

Detective Lydell "Lucky" James asked her to identify a possible suspect in the Newark playground shootings 36 hours earlier that left her brother and two friends dead, and her clinging to life. With medicine determination barreling through her 19-year-old body, Natasha didn't take long to identify the man in the photo as one of the attackers.

In the 20 days since the triple killings that rattled one of America's toughest cities and ignited another national debate on immigration, the bond between James, the lead detective in the investigation, and Natasha, the lone survivor, has emerged as a key that led to the arrest of all six suspects.

This week, James gave his first extensive interview about the slayings at the Mount Vernon School, describing how he and colleagues developed leads and tracked suspects, barely pausing to eat or sleep for two weeks. His account, interviews with other law enforcement officials and families of the dead, and official documents have allowed The Star-Ledger to assemble a more detailed account of the Newark schoolyard slayings, including new information on the victims' final hours, the crime itself and Natasha's role in the investigation.

http://www.nj.com/news/index.ssf/2007/0 ... ey_to.html

I hope NJ is a capitol punishment state.