After a Decade of Grief, Tears of Forgiveness and Understanding

Dobbs Ferry, October 3 – At the site of the Venice Deli on Ashford Avenue, something magical happened. It was the tenth anniversary of the tragic events that left one man dead, and another imprisoned for 20-Years-to-Life. At about 6:00pm twenty-five relatives and friends of the late Charles Campbell, known to his closest associates as “Chazz,” began gathering on the sidewalk near the spot in front of the deli where Charlie had died in a violent episode, that had begun as a dispute over a parking space.

A large photograph of Campbell, who was 37 at the time, leaned against a picket fence, surrounded by ten candles, one for each year, in remembrance of the tragedy. And, as his cousin, Michael Lynch asserted, “in celebration of Chazz’ life.” William Campbell, the decedent’s older brother, stood amongst those gathering.
Four uniformed Dobbs Ferry Police Officers handled the traffic that passed the site, what with the narrow sidewalk overflowing with Campbell supporters and news media. Rosemarie DiGuglielmo, mother of former New York City Transit Police Officer Richard DiGuglielmo, together with her husband Richard, their daughter Rose, and a few friends were inside the deli, which ordinarily closes at six, standing near the open door.

Suddenly, William Campbell emerged from the crowd, and approached this reporter. Half asking, and half stating, that I might be close to the DiGuglielmo’s, he accepted my response that I had befriended them over the last few years, but, that I truly felt “ two families had been destroyed by what happened ten years ago,” on the parking lot where we now stood. William Campbell then proceeded to ask if I would be willing to communicate to Richard in prison, from him, that despite the fears that he had expressed in his prison interview with The Journal News reporter Shawn Cohen, he, William, did not hate him, and could find forgiveness in his heart for him.

As he spoke, Rosemarie DiGuglielmo, seeing us together, had begun walking toward us and was a few feet away as I responded to Mr. Campbell, “Perhaps it would be better if you asked Richard’s mother to convey your feelings.” Where upon she drew closer, arms extended, and their hands grasped each other’s. They placed an arm around each other, pausing for several seconds, each looking down in deep sadness and silent reflection, as if needing to cry but too emotionally drained, too exhausted, and perhaps numbed by the sudden and unexpectedbonding of their spirit and souls in profound grief and mutual respect.

Standing midway between the gathered crowd, and the deli, for one beautiful moment, the brother of long deceased Charlie Campbell, and the mother of the man long-imprisoned for killing him, to save his own father, stood holding onto one another in silent communion, and commiseration. The pain and frustration of ten years deeply etched in their faces, they shared a momentary relief neither could have anticipated. It was a rare moment of truth, a fleeting triumph of their spirit over the evil, unnecessary, stain that had been poured all over an already too tragic event, ten years earlier, by a cruel, mindless, prosecutor.

To be sure, something terrible had occurred on the very ground on which they now stood, bonded in their mutual grief and compassion. God only knows neither of them, nor their families, needed Jeanine Pirro to step into their lives, confabulating a scenario worse than the already horrific reality.

No matter, she would play the race card, claiming that she had “thirteen witnesses who had heard racial epithets,” but, at trial failing to produce even one. As with so many other heartbreaking incidents over her 12-year regime, Jeanine Pirro would torture, and torment each family for one full year prior to trial, arranging with Al Sharpton to have paid pickets in front of the DiGuglielmo’s deli every weekend for 52 weeks, as she churned the media without a moment’s concern for the tragic truth or the devastating impact of her conduct on all those involved.