Frthom's Blog

I made my way south along Broadway Greenlawn on that muggy August morning in 1984.  I drove conservatively because I probably could have been cited for driving while comatose if pulled over by police.  The sun had barely found its way above the horizon.  No one in his or her right mind could voluntarily be up and attempting to function that early on a Saturday, or so I thought.

I had decided to work a few early hours  to try to lighten the load of paper on my desk.  At 5:30 AM, I was surprised to see any sign of life let alone a contingent of Suffolk County Police sector cars diverting traffic off Broadway. That much police activity and what was obviously a crime-scene investigation shocked me out of my mid-summer funk and my self-imposed somnambulism.

I read in the next day’s newspaper that the bloodied, battered, body of a young woman had been found on Broadway Greenlawn, close to the intersection of Milton Place.  She  was identified as Evelyn Battel, a 24-year old waitress who was living on Wall Street in Huntington Village.  The fact that I am still thinking about this gruesome crime so many years later should serve as an indication as to profound effect that her death had upon me.  Raising two pre-teenaged daughters at the time, I was overwhelmed by the horrific, senseless loss of life.

Years passed and little was heard about the case.  A reporter made an off-the-record inquiry as to the status of  the investigation.  An off-the-record answer came back that, thus far, no arrests had been made and one was not imminent. The cops had a suspect but were taking their time putting together a case.  Finally, three years after the crime, a local man was arrested.  He was released prior to a trial because prosecutors lacked irrefutable evidence linking him with the woman.  The accused persistently maintained that it was all a case of mistaken identity, and inconclusive DNA testing subsequently cleared him.

We hear a great deal about the unpleasant by-products of the bar scenes in our towns, villages, and hamlets:  under-aged drinking, the altercations, the traffic accidents, the drug and alcohol overdoses.  Yet, not enough emphasis is placed upon the dangers lurking in the corners of the clubs, the guys with too much booze, too much smoke, or too much blow or smack or Ecstasy or steroids in them, looking to prove yet unresolved manhood, to perhaps compensate for an underdeveloped or abused psyche, or to satiate restless hormonal surges.

And then there are the young ladies with their own growing pains, looking for companionship, looking for male approval, or maybe just looking for a dance partner.         Parents caution kids so often about so much that we are more than likely “yessed” to the  heights of condescension while the listening mode has actually been shut down.  They often don’t hear us when we tell them that a drink or two, or a tablet or a toke or three can ease self-consciousness, can relax them into a calm, courageous state of vulnerability, which can transform that pretty young package of potential into a victim waiting to happen.

For every five young women sitting wistfully at a table sipping a drink, there is probably at least one guy coming out of the men’s room who’s not  in touch with his manhood, whose brain is just toasted enough to snap at an implied rejection or the word “no.”

Is there an answer to all this?  I have none.  Cracking down on underage drinking, more counseling about the poison that is readily available in bottles and cans,  closer monitoring of the over-crowded bars and early-morning drinking hours don’t seem to provide an easy answer.

There is a disturbing bottom line here.  A woman gets off work, goes to a local pub, leaves with a man, and is found the next morning discarded in the middle of the road, beaten, raped, strangled, and dead.  The killer could still very well be walking down local streets, frequenting the stores, the restaurants, the jogging paths, with your wife, your daughter, maybe mine.  He’s aged since he murdered Evelyn Battel.  But he’s killed before and is capable of doing it again.

I would like to be able to ask Evelyn Battel for her opinion on these matters, but unfortunately, she’s not available at this time.  More than two decades have passed, we still don’t know why she never had the chance to celebrate her 25th birthday.

FrThom