“How did a two-time killer get out to be charged again at age 83?” reads a recent New York Times headline.
In the first two paragraphs of the story, Rebecca Davis O’Brien and Ali Watkins set the scene. In 2019, “the person before the parole panel” — later “the supplicant,” “the murderer,” and “the inmate” — was someone who “had spent decades in prison, first for shooting a girlfriend dead in 1963, and then for stabbing another in 1985, stuffing her corpse into a bag and leaving it in Central Park.” The panel granted the request for release.
The person in question, we learn, is Marceline Harvey, “a transgender woman who transitioned at some point after her release from prison.” Which means that in 2019 Harvey was standing before his parole panel unambiguously as a man.
Two and a half years after being released, Harvey was charged with killing Susan Leyden, 68.
Later, we learn how “a homeless shelter worker and people close to Ms. Leyden questioned whether, despite her gender identity, Ms. Harvey should have been placed in a homeless shelter for women, given her history of attacking and murdering them.” This is immediately followed by the writers’ assurance that “transgender people are far more likely to become victims of violence, not perpetrators, and data from the National Center for Transgender Equality suggests more than half of transgender people who stay in shelters encounter harassment.”
But back to the real point of the story — not one, but two occasions of early release and repeat offending.
At the age of 14, Harvey Marcelin attempted to rape an eight-year-old girl. At 24, in 1963, Marcelin attempted rape again and shot his girlfriend “point blank in their crowded Manhattan apartment, chased her as she staggered through the kitchen and living room, and shot her twice more before she collapsed.” He was convicted of first-degree murder. He was sentenced to life but released 20 years later. Two years later, in 1985, he killed another girlfriend by stabbing her over 30 times. After another 35 years behind bars, in 2019, Marcelin was let out again whereupon he sought “placement in city shelters” in the Bronx.
The writers report that the nurse practitioner, Anne Brennan, who ran the intake interview at the shelter “said she told Ms. Harvey that placing her in a women’s shelter seemed like a bad idea, given her history of killing women.” Yet despite Brennan’s objections, “her supervisors allowed Ms. Harvey entry.”
“Apparently his feelings and identity were far more important than all the other women that were terrified of him,” she said.
Julia Savel, a spokeswoman for the city’s Department of Social Services, said rules were followed.
“Our policy — in accordance with the law — is to place individuals in shelters based on their reported gender identity,” she said. “Being homeless or transgender does not make you inherently violent and are not connected to the crime that was committed.” [Emphasis added]
The point is not that Marcelin was homeless or transgender-identifying but that he is a man with a criminal history of attempted rape and murdering women. Given his freedom, Marcelin struck again, killing Susan Leyden, chopping her up, and dumping her remains in a bag in East New York.