Capturing the Friedmans Page #2

someone that cleaned.

He says, "Don't let

her clean in here."

It's okay. I don't want

my things disturbed."

So all right.

I never went in there.

Then one of our inspectors

moved the piano

that was in that office.

And that's where his stash

of magazines were held,

behind the piano.

And this was Arnold's secret.

He liked to look

at pictures of boys.

And it's not that he

acted on these things.

He just wanted to look at these

pictures and meditate or

And these are listings

of the magazines

that were found

behind the piano.

"Young Boys & Sodomy."

"Incest Case Histories."

something called

"Chicken Pickin's Magazine."

And in addition to that,

we found evidence

of a computer class being

taught there by Mr. Friedman.

And we did seize

some list of names

that we thought

could be students.

I remember walking

in there saying,

"Goddamn. We could

have a problem here."

Just when you think everything

is going to be dull,

something gets dropped

on your lap, you know,

and it turns out to be something

bigger than you ever thought.

What happened was one

of the detectives

from the vice squad

came in to see me.

And he had a list.

And it was at that point that

we were able to learn

that these were computer

classes that went on

literally every day of

the week and Saturday.

And we drew a big map of the

whole village of Great Neck

sectioned it off, and started

sending detectives out

to do interviews.

She set us up in teams,

male/female teams.

And we got a list

of alleged victims.

Soon as we went into the house,

we were usually approached

by the mothers.

And we explained why we're

there, what we're doing there,

and we'd really like to

talk to their children,

preferably alone.

The parents were

becoming impatient.

They wanted something

done immediately.

But you always want to be very

careful about how you proceed,

because the one thing

that you worry about

I know I worried about

it all the time, is

just charging somebody

with this kind of a crime

is enough to ruin their lives.

So you want to make sure that

you have enough evidence

and that you're convinced that

you're making a good charge.

And how much time was

there between the time

the postal inspector

searched the house

and the time that you went

in for the second search?

Well, it would have been

less than a month,

because we did that the day

before Thanksgiving.

A prominent middle-aged teacher

in a prosperous Long Island town

is charged with sodomizing young

boys who were his students.

Police are charging that

sexual abuse went on

behind the doors of

17 Picadilly Road in Great Neck.

We rang the doorbell.

As soon as he realized who it

was, he wasn't gonna let us in.

So one of the detectives

broke the door down.

And we went into

the premises at that point.

Arnold was by himself.

His wife was out shopping.

I was out to the store to

buy a Thanksgiving turkey.

And I go up the front

walk to the house,

and there're people

all over the house.

And my husband is sitting,

looking very sheepishly

in the dining room, handcuffed.

By this time, just about

every news organization

you could name had

arrived on the scene.

I went home for Thanksgiving.

Got to the house, and there's

cops and news trucks

all over the place.

And

I got worried, of course.

When David came to the house,

we were able to

ascertain eventually

the type of business he was in.

And we heard that he was

involved in children's

entertainment in the form of

some sort of clown activities.

I was there when

the clown came in.

He was ranting and raving.

We had words.

And I was going

through the folders.

We told him to take a hike.

And he kept trying

to come into the house,

and I kept telling him

that he couldn't,

that he had to leave.

He wasn't allowed

while we were searching.

And finally, he came in

for the last time.

He bent down.

I really thought he had

a weapon in that duffle bag.

Everybody kind of, you know,

reached for a gun at one point.

What he came out with

was a pair of Fruit

of the Loom underwear.

And he started prancing around,

flailing his arms in the air,

saying, "Look at me.

I'm an a**hole."

They're harassing my father

for no reason at all.

If I had had some kind of

Arabian sand scarf

I would have wrapped

that around my face

and been Lawrence of Arabia.

Maybe that

would have been better.

But I took out underwear,

and I put it on my head

because I didn't want

to be on camera.

The first arrested

was Arnold Friedman,

a retired schoolteacher who was

charged with sodomizing boys

aged 8 to 11.

The charges are that, while

running a computer school,

Arnold Friedman and his son

engaged in various forms

of sexual abuse

against minor children.

Jesse pulls up coming

home from school.

His friends dump him

out of the car.

David sort of grabbed me,

and we were sitting

a couple of houses down,

sort of on the sidewalk.

And he was saying

something to me.

And then one of the TV

cameras came over,

so we kind of ran

to the backyard.

And we went behind the house.

And we were in the backyard

of our house.

And the cops came back, and they

said, "What's going on here?"

And I said, "Don't worry about

it. It's just me and Jesse."

And they said,

"Well, we want Jesse.

We need Jesse in the house now."

Of course, we thought, you know,

we didn't know why that was.

As we conducted more interviews

of the children,

Jesse's name started to pop up.

And Jesse was there.

What did Jesse do?

And then eventually we were

able to ascertain

that Jesse's role was not one

of, you know, helping his dad

conduct the computer class,

but basically abusing

the children himself.

We didn't have children

telling us

that Arnold had

slapped them around.

But quite a number of the kids

reported incidents

of being slapped and having

their hair pulled

or their arms twisted by Jesse.

He was, by far,

the more violent one.

All these policemen

said that Jesse

was some kind of aggressor.

That even his father

was cowering,

and Jesse was this sexual,

molesting tyrant.

I challenge anyone

to find anyone

who Jesse had even teased

as a child or called a name.

Jesse was not an angry person.

He was not an upset person.

So we ended up spending

a lot of time together.

I was over his house 3 days

a week, 4 days a week.

And as far as I know him,

none of this ever happened,

not on my watch.

Eighteen-year-old Jesse Friedman

also stands accused

of sex abuse and using a child

in a sexual performance.

The only thought that I just

kept having the whole night

was, "We're gonna get bailed out

and then we'll go home"

and we'll figure out

what's going on,

and the lawyers will

take care of this,

"and they'll straighten

this out."

Because it was still

just a matter of,

"This is a big

misunderstanding."

But when the bail was set

at a million dollars,

instead of going out

with Mom and David

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