Killer Acknowledges 1994 Attack Targeted Jews

by IPT News  •  Mar 28, 2012 at 12:31 pm

http://www.investigativeproject.org/3505/killer-acknowledges-1994-attack-targeted-jews

A cab driver's killing of a 16-year-old Yeshiva student in 1994 "was one of the early cases of terrorism in New York City," the victim's mother said this week, but it has never been determined who else might have been involved.

Rashid Baz is serving a 141-year prison sentence for shooting into a van carrying Yeshiva students on the Brooklyn Bridge. The case initially was cast as an act of road rage, but the New York Post reported Monday that Baz told investigators in 2007 that he deliberated targeted the van.

"I only shot them because they were Jewish," he said.

Ari Halberstam was killed. Two other passengers were hit and critically wounded, but survived the attack. It's not clear why Baz acknowledged his motive or what investigators did with the information. He told them he followed the van for two miles before attacking.

Someone gave Baz the guns, Devorah Halberstam told television station PIX 11, but investigators "let it go."

Halberstam also is upset by Baz's incarceration in a New York state prison, where he has enjoyed some questionable privileges, rather than in a federal penitentiary that houses terrorists.

The years have done little to ease her pain. "I yearn for my child," she said, "always."

Related Topics: IPT News

Read More: Ari Halberstam, Rashid Baz, Brooklyn Bridge, Devorah Halberstam