罗西的三个弟弟每天都出现在法庭上，和他一起坐在前面的长椅上，都穿着相同的蓝色西装。

 他的律师告诉陪审团，年轻的达莱桑德罗是一个错误身份的受害者，他在法庭上称他为 "弗兰克"，而不是 "罗西"，这与女孩记忆中的昵称非常相似。

谢尔博指出，那个从一排人中挑选出他的11岁女孩当时曾说过，他在公寓里看起来比较高。

也许是为了加强混淆，罗西的三个弟弟每天都出现在法庭上，和他一起坐在前面的长椅上，都穿着相同的蓝色西装。

Young D’Alesandro was a victim of mistaken identity, his lawyer told the jury—referring to him in court as “Frank” rather than “Roosie,” which was so similar to the nickname the girl remembered. Sherbow noted that the eleven-year-old girl who picked him out of a lineup had remarked then that he had seemed taller in the apartment. Perhaps to reinforce the case for confusion, Roosie’s three younger brothers showed up each day in court and sat on the front bench with him, all wearing identical blue suits.

 

我毫不犹豫地告诉你们，如果本案在没有陪审团的帮助下提交给我，我会毫不犹豫地说是无罪的，法官在陪审团开始审议前告诉他们。

被告父亲的显赫地位不应成为一个因素，无论如何，他继续说道。

"如果这个男孩被驳回，那将是臭名昭著和无耻的。

如果他仅仅是出于偏见而被定罪，那也同样是臭名昭著和无耻的。

"

“I have no hesitancy in saying to you that if the case was submitted to me without the aid of jury, I would have no hesitancy in saying not guilty,” the judge told the jury before it began its deliberations. The prominent position of the defendant’s father shouldn’t be a factor, one way or the other, he went on: “It would be infamous and outrageous if this boy were dismissed out of favor. It would be equally infamous and outrageous if he were convicted merely out of prejudice.”

 

当宣读 "无罪 "的判决时，在整个审判过程中一直坐在法庭上的达莱桑德罗市长站了起来，哭了起来，并拥抱了他的妻子。

When the verdict of “not guilty” was read, Mayor D’Alesandro, who had sat in the courtroom throughout the trial, stood up, wept, and embraced his wife.

 

在这一切中，家人和朋友都试图将13岁的南希从这场风暴中保护起来。

"圣母学院的同学凯伦-卡达尔告诉我，"我们对此保持沉默，然后用第三人称提到自己。

"你会怎么说？我记得我父亲和他认识的某个人谈论过这件事，但凯伦却没有想到。

这比任何事情都更令人费解。

" 南希是他们的朋友，这对他们来说是最重要的，Linda Wanner同学补充说。

没有什么能改变这一点。

Through it all, family and friends tried to shield thirteen-year-old Nancy from the firestorm. “We kept quiet about it,” Karen Kadar, a classmate at the Institute of Notre Dame, told me, then referred to herself in the third person. “What would you say? I remember my father and somebody he knew talking about it, but it went right over Karen’s head. It was more puzzlement than anything.” Nancy was their friend, and that was all that mattered to them, classmate Linda Wanner added. Nothing changed that.

 

@@@
罗西-达莱桑德罗的法律问题并没有随着他的无罪释放而结束。

在接下来的两个星期里，其他三名被告的审判也由史密斯法官主持进行。

他们都被判定犯有法定强奸罪或变态行为，而且都牵涉到达莱桑德罗。

他们在罗西的审判中没有成为证人，因为他先走了。

由于他们自己的审判正在进行中，他们的第五修正案中反对自证其罪的权利意味着他们不能被强迫作证。

Roosie D’Alesandro’s legal troubles weren’t over with his acquittal. Trials for three other defendants followed in the next two weeks, also presided over by Judge Smith. All of them were convicted of statutory rape or perverted practices, and all of them implicated D’Alesandro.They hadn’t been witnesses at Roosie’s trial because he had gone first. Since their own trials were pending, their Fifth Amendment right against self-incrimination had meant they couldn’t be compelled to testify.

 

法官命令州检察官开始进行伪证调查。

12月，一个大陪审团起诉罗西撒谎，称他在审判中的证词是 "故意和腐败的虚假"。

The judge ordered the state’s attorney to open a perjury investigation. In December, a grand jury indicted Roosie for lying, calling his testimony at his trial “willfully and corruptly false.”

 

罗西-达莱桑德罗的第二次审判比第一次审判持续的时间更长。

检察官指出，此时，还有8名证人提供了与他的否认相冲突的证词。

这些证人包括两名警察，他们是市长家的保护小组成员，他们说他们在第一个关键的夜晚看到罗西和其他男孩在一起。

Roosie D’Alesandro’s second trial lasted longer than the first. At this point, prosecutors noted, eight other witnesses had given testimony that conflicted with his denials. Those witnesses included two police officers, members of the protective detail at the mayor’s home, who said they had seen Roosie with the other boys on that first, crucial night in question.

 

陪审团的审议也持续了很长时间。

经过六个多小时，他们投票决定无罪释放。

当判决书被宣读时，大南希伸出手来抱住她的儿子，哭了起来。

玛丽-安-扬科夫斯基，也就是现在罗西的未婚妻，抓住他的手并亲吻了它。

休庭时，这个年轻人在他的律师脸上吻了一下。

"市长的儿子在伪证案中被宣告无罪"，《巴尔的摩太阳报》第二天早上在头版以横幅标题的形式大肆宣传。

The jury deliberations lasted longer, too. After more than six hours, they voted to acquit. When the verdict was read, Big Nancy reached out for her son and wept. Mary Ann Jankowski, the girlfriend who was now Roosie’s fiancée, grabbed his hand and kissed it. When court was adjourned, the young man planted a kiss on the face of his lawyer. “Mayor’s Son Acquitted in Perjury Case,” the Baltimore Sun blared in a banner headline across the front page the next morning.

@@

她指出，她的父亲是第一个被选为市长的意大利裔美国人和第一个天主教徒，在巴尔的摩政治的 "竞争世界 "中运作。

"因为有爸爸，所以才会这样，"她说。

"他们总是想把他打倒。"

Her father was the first Italian American and the first Catholic to be elected mayor, she noted, operating in a “competitive world” of Baltimore politics. “It was like that because of Daddy,” she said. “They’re always trying to take him down.”

 

在成长的年龄，南希-达莱桑德罗已经得到了关于公共生活的残酷教训，关于它可能带来的审查和头条。

她看到她的家人团结一致，她的父母坚持不懈，她的父亲在一切都结束后竞选并赢得连任。

这是一个关于挨打，然后保持清醒的案例研究。

想想多年后她是如何描述她的政治工作的。

她说，她每天都会穿上 "一套盔甲 "开始工作。

At a formative age, Nancy D’Alesandro had gotten a brutal lesson about public life, about the scrutiny and the headlines it could bring. She saw her family close ranks, her parents persevere, her father run for and win reelection after it was all over. It was a case study in taking a punch, then keeping your head up. Consider how she would describe her job in politics years later: She said she would begin each day by donning “a suit of armor.”