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New York City Mourns Wendy's Victims
By Mayor Rudy Giuliani

With the swift arrests of John Taylor and Craig Godineaux in the Wendy's tragedy, New Yorkers have breathed a sigh of relief.

We are fortunate to have the finest Police Department in the world, and I congratulate Commissioner Safir, First Deputy Commissioner Kelleher, the Queens Homicide Squad, 109th Precinct Detectives, and the Suffolk County Police Department for making the arrests less than 48 hours after the shootings at the restaurant in Queens. The NYPD extended every possible effort to find the people responsible for this tragedy, and from all indications, they succeeded.

Taylor and Godineaux, both ex-convicts, were ordered held without bail on charges they murdered five Wendy's employees, ages 18 to 44, and wounded two during the robbery at the Main Street location in Flushing.

Godineaux, a parolee, has served time for robbery and narcotics offenses. Taylor was on probation and a fugitive since skipping bail last year in another fast-food holdup case. Here are two more compelling reasons why parole should be done away with, completely and absolutely.

We know that individuals previously convicted of crimes are the ones most likely to engage in criminal activity. Five of the past 14 police officers killed in the line of duty were killed by parolees, and 44% of the State inmates released on parole in 1993 returned to prison within three years, according to a recent New York State Department of Correction study.

I don't know how much more evidence we will need before the State Legislature takes up the City's and Governor's long-standing call to end parole. Perhaps this latest tragedy will be the wake-up call that is needed.

Now, it is time for healing. I think everyone was shocked by this horrible, terrible crime, and the city has been in mourning ever since. Again, I want to express my sympathy and concern and support to the families of all the victims. I know that all New Yorkers join me in praying for the full recovery of Jaquione Johnson, the most seriously injured of the robbery's two survivors.

I hope that the families of the victims will obtain some peace of mind from the knowledge that justice will be done and that the thoughts and prayers of an entire city are with them. Many of the victims were in their teens or 20s, and when people die young, the most difficult and painful thing to come to terms with is the loss of their futures - their hopes, their dreams, their aspirations.

This is also a time to put this horrible tragedy in perspective. In a city of almost eight million people, terrible crimes occur. And we pledge to do everything possible to reduce these crimes, even more than we have up to now. But please remember that, for the last four years, New York has been the safest large city in America. Overall crime is down 55 percent. Murder is down nearly 70 percent, to its lowest level since the 1960s.

The intense interest in the Wendy's tragedy is testimony to the rarity these days of such incidents. The media attention should not be allowed to distort our perception of what New York is - a city that has become a much safer place to live and to work.

If there is anything positive that we can take away from this tragedy, it should be a renewed faith in the fact that New Yorkers care about one another. And that is the overriding message of New York City. Because so many people have asked what they can do to help the families of the seven victims, we established the Wendy's Employees Relief Fund, which will allow people to make donations and know that the money will go to the families directly and without delay.

To make a monetary contribution, checks can be made out to: Wendy's Employees Relief Fund, Mayor's Community Assistance Unit (CAU), 51 Chambers Street, Room 630, New York, N.Y. 10007. Individuals with further questions on how they can help are encouraged to call (212) 788-7410 or (212) 788-7418.