A deadly encounter

14 months after Kendra Webdale’s was killed, her family returned to court in March of 2000, listening for the second time to the excruciating details of their daughter’s death.  It seemed as if the torment Andrew Goldstein caused them would never end. 

Patty Webdale, Kendra's mother: I used to look up behind the judge...and I’d see “In God We Trust.” And I guess I felt like whatever the decision was that the jury made was going to be the right decision.

Once again, the issue would be Andrew Goldstein’s mental state. Once again, prosecutors argued that Goldstein pushed Kendra Webdale in front of the subway, because he hated women. But Goldstein’s attorney sought to demonstrate that Andrew was truly sick. The court gave the defense permission to take Goldstein off his behavior medication, to in effect, risk letting him succumb to the hallucinations and voices and violent behavior that had marked him for the past ten years. 

Then the defense team videotaped an interview with Goldstein.

Interviewer: Why did you do it?

Goldstein: I don't know.

Interviewer: Why did you kill that girl, Andrew?

Goldstein: Oh, I don't know. I feel like people talk, uh, talk through me, you know.

Interviewer: Who talks through you?

Goldstein: Poeple. Like they say things, you know, like it's a plot or something.

Interviewer: What's a plot?

Goldstein: Against, against, against me. 

Interviewer: Against who?

Goldstein: Against me.

But the jury would never see the tape. The judge ruled it was inadmissible. Also kept from the jury a report commissioned by New York State which found Andrew’s care over the years had been “fragmented and oftentimes inappropriate”—and insufficient to protect Goldstein and those around him.”

As jurors deliberated, they rejected a defense request that they go through Goldstein’s 3,5000-hundred page medical record to determine for themselves the depth of his illness.

Gina, juror: It didn’t appear to me that there was any long-standing, in-depth analysis of what his mental condition was.  And I think that the thing that characterized Andrew Goldstein over 10 years is that he was violent more than he was anything else.

Once again, the key question was whether Andrew Goldstein knew what he was doing at the very moment he pushed Kendra Webdale in front of the train.   Dateline spoke to 5 of the jurors, who said that they had no doubt about the answer.

Holly, juror: Witnesses all say that he actually picked her up and threw her in front of the train.  He didn’t just you know, push her over or, you know, a little nudge. 

Jain, juror: He was obviously aware of what he did.

After an hour and a half of deliberations, this jury delivered its unanimous verdict: guilty of 2^nd degree murder.  Andrew Goldstein was sentenced to 25 years to life.

Ralph, juror: I think we felt that justice was done.

Patty Webdale, mother: I cried, and it was probably tears of joy, that, you know he was being held accountable and that, you know, he was going to live a different lifestyle because he had taken someone else’s life away.

But the Webdale’s relief would be short-lived.  To their horror, they would soon find out that their odyssey through the criminal justice system was not yet over.

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