Race And The Charles Stuart Case, 25 Years Later

On Oct. 23, 1989, a white woman named Carol DiMaiti Stuart was murdered in Boston's Mission Hill neighborhood on her way home from a childbirth class at Brigham and Women's Hospital. The killing shocked the city. Her husband, Charles Stuart, claimed that an unidentified black man was responsible.

Local police responded aggressively. They searched homes in Mission Hill, stopped and frisked black men and boys, and eventually named a suspect: a young black man named Willie Bennett. But the city learned the truth when Charles Stuart jumped to his death off the Tobin Bridge shortly after his brother, Matthew Stuart, identified him as the real killer.

The murder, the hoax and the investigation consumed the city. It opened old racial wounds in Boston and it's on many people's minds again this week.

WBUR's Sacha Pfeiffer speaks with a local journalist who has written about the Stuart case — and who has spoken in recent years with Bennett, the wrongly accused suspect.

Adrian Walker, columnist at The Boston Globe. He tweets @Adrian_Walker.

The Boston Globe: Charles Stuart Case's Awful Legacy, In Black And White

WBUR: The Murder That Forced A Divided Boston To Reflect

Boston.com: Mission Hill Can’t Erase Charles Stuart, Even After 25 Years