Cialdini raamat
turned from work. Murder is never an act to be passed off lightly, but in a city the
size and tenor of New York, the Genovese incident warranted no more space than
a fraction of a column in the New York Times. Catherine Genovese's story would
have died with her on that day in March 1964 if it hadn't been for a mistake.
The metropolitan editor of the Times, A. M. Rosenthal, happened to be having
lunch with the city police commissioner a week later. Rosenthal asked the commis-
sioner about a different Queens-based homicide, and the commissioner, thinking
he was being questioned about the Genovese case, revealed something staggering
that had been uncovered by the police investigation. It was something that left
everyone who heard it, the commissioner included, aghast and grasping for expla-
nations. Catherine Genovese had not experienced a quick, muffled death. It had
been a long, loud, tortured, public event. Her assailant had chased and attacked her
annaabi.ee 
