Tawana Brawley was a fast 15-year-old being raised by a single mother when she became the center of a civil rights firestorm in 1987. Brawley, of Wappingers Falls, New York, accused six white men — including police officers — of raping her.
Brawley, who had been staying with a boyfriend for four days, claimed the white men smeared her with feces and wrote racial slurs on her body before leaving her partially naked in a dumpster. In 1988, a NY grand jury released its report calling Brawley a liar.
Last week, ex-prosecutor Steven Pagones received the first payments from Brawley since 1998, when a court granted him $431,000 in damages in a defamation lawsuit. “It’s a long time coming,” said Pagones, 52, after receiving 10 checks totaling $3,764.61 from Brawley.
Brawley, now 41, works as a nurse in Virginia where a court garnished six of Brawley’s paychecks to begin paying the judgment to Pagones. Pagones, 52, told The Post he is more interested in hearing a confession from Brawley.
Now a single mother of a daughter, Brawley has never admitted she lied or apologized for her actions.
“Every week, she’ll think of me,” Pagones told The Post. “And every week, she can think about how she has a way out — she can simply tell the truth.”
Photos: AP, Mike Theiler
