John White Found Guilty

The trial for a murder that began as a dumb joke has reached a verdict. Fifty three year old John White, an asphalt foreman on trial for killing an acquaintance of his twenty year old son Aaron, was found guilty of second degree manslaughter late Saturday night by a jury of his peers. Mr. White was convicted of shooting an inebriated seventeen year old Daniel Cicciaro in the face on August 9, 2006, outside the White’s Long Island home after a heated, racially charged exchange with Mr. Cicciaro and his friends.

It is my understanding that on August 9th of 2006, Aaron White was at a beer bash at a friend’s house when he was confronted by Daniel Cicciaro. Jennifer Martin, a sixteen year old at the party, complained about a MySpace posting that claimed Aaron wanted to rape her. Aaron was told to leave. Although he denied making the threat Aaron complied and left the party. Cicciaro and his friends then called Aaron on his cell phone to continue the dispute and made threats against the entire White family. Racial references such as monkey assed niggers were used. Dan Cicciaro got four of his friends together and the posse arrived in the front of the White home shortly after 11 p.m. These men had the bright idea to avenge the girl’s honor by threatening violence upon the Whites.

Over the phone, Aaron White responded with race laced profanity of his own. John White took his pistol, a thirty two caliber Beretta, to the end of his driveway followed by his son Aaron with a shotgun. Legally drunk, the seventeen year old Cicciaro reached for the gun. There was a struggle. The gun went off just three inches from Daniel Cicciaro’s face. He was pronounced dead at the hospital. John White was arrested for first degree manslaughter and for the illegal possession of an unregistered handgun.

Suffolk County Court Judge Barbara Kahn granted a request that allowed the jury to consider convicting Mr. White of reckless endangerment, a misdemeanor that carries a prison term of up to one year. But the jury found him guilty of second degree manslaughter which carries a minimum sentence of five years and a maximum sentence of fifteen.

The prosecutor says that Mr. White should have locked his door and called the police. The time from the first call from Daniel Cicciaro to the moment the posse arrived was about twenty minutes. It is the prosecutor’s contention that the Whites had plenty of time to call New York’s finest for help. This would be the same New York police department that was acquitted for helping other black people like Sean Bell, Abadou Diallo, Patrick Dorismond, and others. With public service like this for the black community, if I was a black person in New York I wouldn’t call the dogcatcher on a bionic, rabid pit bull on steroids out of the very reasonable fear that somehow New York public servants would make me regret it.

Why didn’t Daniel Cicciaro call the police when he discovered that the girl’s honor was in question? NYPD doesn’t have a reputation for the contagious shooting of white people so obviously they had no reason to fear getting the police involved. Why didn’t he call the police in the twenty minutes it took for him to arrive in front of the White’s house? Why didn’t he call the police when he saw the armed man standing at the end of his driveway? Why didn’t someone else in the posse call the police? Why didn’t someone from the party call the police? Why didn’t Daniel’s parents keep their drunkard son at home to get his buzz on? We could ask why questions and if questions all day long.

But this is just another instance of the American public refusing to take a serious look at the circumstances of this dreadful situation from the black man’s perspective. Daniel’s mother, Joanne Cicciaro, described her son saying, “He was loyal to his friends, and everyone. He was a wonderful, wonderful person. He had a wonderful bright future.” Yes he did. But the young man chose to throw his future to the wind when he made the choice to confront the Whites. He may have been wonderful, but the young man was also very vulgar and very drunk and obviously provocative that Wednesday night. Said Daniel’s father, “It’s unfortunate that they chose to try to portray my son as a racist, but the truth is out now.” That truth is that Cicciaro junior had liquored himself up, arranged to be driven across town, made a series of racial slurs, made a number of threats, and confronted a black man who he mistakenly thought had the impudence to threaten a white girl.

The only thing that matters is that a black man killed a white man. It wouldn’t have mattered if these men had raped his wife and beat his son within an inch of his life like they said they wanted to do. A black man would have the audacity to do something to protect himself from a young white mob. Such a black man does not know his place in America. The black community obviously needs another reminder of its place in the American social structure. Pull a gun on a white boy? And accidentally kill him for threatening you, your family, and your property? Black man don’t you know you were in New York? Don’t you know your place here in America? You are obviously too crazy to be allowed to be free.