Hello, AOM listeners.We are hard at work continuing to put together new Anatomy of Murder episodes for you.But this week, we wanted to take you back to an episode we featured a couple of years ago.
It's been on our minds since the recent 9-11 anniversary.This is the story of one murder that occurred in New York City on the same day unrelated to the terror attacks.
We didn't want to take away from the remembrance of the terror attacks or the many victims and survivors it left in its wake.But now that a few weeks have passed, we wanted to remind you of another victim who should be remembered, Henrikh Shviak.
Many of you may have listened when this episode first aired in September of 2021.
For you, it will be a refresh of an important story and another call for helping to try to get the answers Henrik's family continues to wait for and the justice Henrik deserves.
For those of you that are new to AOM or missed this episode for one reason or another, it's a stark look at that tragic day, told from the perspective of Henrik's sister and two investigators who we'll all truly never forget.
It's also an episode that was recognized with a Webby People's Choice Award, which we believe is due in large part to the candor and dedication of the people who helped us tell this story.
And of course, because of all of you, by caring about this case and the way these stories are presented.
If you've listened already, please listen again.And if this is new to you, this is an episode you will not forget.
While you listen, know that Anastasia and I are hard at work putting together new episodes to soon bring to our AOM community.
There was so much going on at 9-11.
ultimately ended up investigating a press homicide.There was a male shot.
I can hear you.The rest of the world hears you.
Nobody was available because everyone was dispatched to work around the events of the World Trade Center.
And the people who knocked these buildings down.
It's just, it's just heartbreaking, quite honestly.
We'll hear all of us soon.
I'm Scott Weinberger, investigative journalist and former deputy sheriff.
I'm Anaseka Nicolazi, former New York City homicide prosecutor and host of Investigation Discovery's True Conviction.
And this is Anatomy of Murder.We are approaching the 20th anniversary of 9-11, and we've put together a very unconventional episode to mark this event.
I hesitate to use the word special because I think each one of our episodes is special in the people we talk about.But this one's going to be different for sure.First of all, we spoke with multiple interviewees.As you know, it's normally just one.
But it's also going to highlight the events that happened on 9-11.
It is a raw and honest look into a homicide investigation that faced incredible challenges due to the terrorist attack in Lower Manhattan.
The NYPD and this city were overtaxed and overwhelmed, not only on that day, but in the weeks that followed, all of which unfortunately led to a death investigation that, in part, failed the victim in this case.
Our focus is on the one and only murder that happened on 9-11 in New York City.When I say that, obviously there were thousands murdered by terrorists that day.But due to the terrorism involved, they are labeled differently than other homicides.
So we are talking about a murder case apart from the terrorist attacks. For today's episode, our executive producer spoke with Lucina Szywiak.He spoke with her at her apartment in New York City.She's in her 70s now.
English is her second language, and she also had a friend help to translate as they spoke.
My name is Lucina, and I come here about 20 years ago.
Today's story doesn't start at ground zero, but actually 4,000 miles away in Poland.
We were born in Kielce.What's the name of it?Kielce.A big town.
Lucina grew up in Kielce, Poland.
Polish cities are completely different than New York.
Kielce is a city south-central Poland, which is surrounded by beautiful mountains, just less than 200,000 residents.A beautiful place to grow up.I'm sure a great place to live.
This very old city, like 1,000 years old, and was capital, Polish capital.
Lucina had two brothers.Her youngest was Henrik.
He was my younger brother.
He was also very handsome.
She described him as being a very smart boy in school.
He read books about physics, demography, anthropology.
And I almost giggle when I hear her talk about him, because she talks about him like I would talk about my own brother.
Sometimes he stay at home and sleep, but teachers come to home and wake up him.
He would sleep through school?
You know, she also talked about some European traditions.
In Poland is popular name day.
Name Day celebrations are just as big as birthdays.In fact, they may even be bigger at these times.
Wait a second.Is Name Day not the same thing as our birthday, except that it's celebrating our name?
Well, no, no, no.No, it's not your birthday.There's something called Name Day, where it actually just is a name day.And so there's a designated day for all of the Scots, and there's a designated day for all of the popular names.
It's like an opportunity to celebrate two days, your birthday and your... So how do you find out what your Name Day is? You look it up.You go on Google.What's my name day?And it has actual names.But it may not be an Anna Sega name day.
I know that, Scott, my name day is November 28th.
Sorry, guys.I'm typing as we speak. Yeah, very interesting.See, you learn something every day.I really thought and I kind of liked it.I thought that name day was a different way of celebrating instead of your birthday, getting older, your name.
And at this point in my life, I would much rather celebrate my name day.
And now when I look it up, at least the first part of my name for Anna, name day is July 26th.
And one of Lucina's fond memories of Henrik is celebrating his name day.
And we make picnic in a beautiful place, in nature.It was very nice also.
Henrik also served two years in the Polish Army and then began a career as a railroad inspector for the state-run Polish Rails Network.Along the way, he married his childhood sweetheart, Eva.
How old was he when they met?
Her cousin actually lived next door to Henrik's family and she was there on vacation one day and they met.And well, as we know today, the rest was history.
She was student and she studied biology, PhD in biology.
After the couple married, they had two children.They had a daughter first, and then a son.
How excited was Henrik to be a father?Yes, yes.
And he had idea about building house.
He wanted to build a house?
Would he actually build a house or buy a house?
And that says everything we need to know about the man that he was.
Did he like doing stuff with his hands?Did he like building things?
Yeah, because he helped building older brother.They built big house.Henrik helped him.In Poland is very popular.Every man knows many, many things.
Henrik's dream of building this home for his family, it involves more than his hands, because to buy those materials, you need the means.And that wasn't coming easily in his homeland.
And that's where we get to the U.S., because Lucina was already here, and it was her that helped him start to move more forward towards his dream.
I had private business.What business was it?Herd food.
She wasn't really anxious to leave the country that she was born and that she loved, but her business had suffered an unfortunate fire, which destroyed everything.That business was not insured.
Because my business go down, I come to America, a lottery.
And that basically means the U.S.encourages immigration to create sort of a melting pool here in the U.S.from all different countries.
It's known really as the green card lottery system that each year 50,000 people are awarded from all over the world permanent residency in the U.S.
To be eligible for the lottery, you either need to have your high school diploma or two years in one of hundreds of various businesses or trades.And that's it.So people just wait to see if their numbers come up.
And Lucina was lucky enough to be chosen and lucky enough to come to the U.S.in 1994.
When I come here, no any friends.And I also miss this place, this my friend, family and everything.
For Lucina, she basically came here when it wasn't working out in Poland, and that's ultimately what led Henrik here, too.
His plan was not to come and get that money for himself, but as opportunity for his family, he was going to take the money that he made here, send it home so that he could actually build that house for his family.
He just needed to first get the money.He needed to do it.
There was a moment during the interview that I remember with Lucina that she talked about a conversation that stuck in her mind and the family's mind.
He went to his brother's house.His brother called to his son and he said, come here to our house because you will see him the last time.He said, oh my God, what did I say?
You know, there are these things that we say sometimes when it is just a slip of the tongue.And sometimes because of events that transpire afterwards, you wonder if there was something more to it.It was just this throwaway line.
But obviously, we all know that we wouldn't be talking about this today if it didn't lead somewhere very dark.
It was in the late 2000s that Henrik moved to the U.S., about a year before the 9-11 attacks.He was in his mid-40s at the time, settling in first with his sister in the Rockaway section of Queens, and then just a few doors down from his sister.
When Henrik came to the U.S., his daughter was 17 and his son was 10.And while he was thousands of miles away, his heart was very close.He spoke to his family every single day.
Henrik was highly motivated to set up a new life here.He took any job he could get.You know, oftentimes Henrik and his sister would talk about life and even talk about death.Tell me about the last time you saw Henrik.
A few days before, we talking.
By this point, Henrik had been in the country for 11 months.
We talk about life, and he has vision that die soon.I say, crazy.
Now this is the second time that we're hearing this already, right?In just a few moments that first there's the line to his son when he's leaving and now it is Henrik himself saying to his sister that he had premonitions he was going to die.
Now I don't know how all of you feel about these things.
Yeah, I mean, we all have feelings, but they don't always translate to facts.
And it's eerie that just a few days later, it was 9-11.That morning at 7 a.m., he went to work, and on that same day, he was murdered.
And in order to understand the murder and the investigation, we have to unpack the events of that day.
It's also important to say for this podcast, it's not our intent to regurgitate the tragedies that we've all witnessed 20 years ago, but see it from a different point of view.
And with that, that's going to bring us to the other two interviews that we did for this podcast.Two former members of the New York City Police Department that I have known for years, Detective Mike Prate.
It's kind of bizarre, right?The radio sounded quiet. Then there was like one of the guys that said, hey, did you feel that?
And at the time, his lieutenant commander of detectives, Tommy Joyce.
Someone came running in and said a plane just got hit.A plane just hit the World Trade Center.A plane just hit the World Trade Center.
You know, it's hard for me to think about that day without even thinking about where I was myself.You know, Scott, you and I were both in New York. My office actually faced the World Trade Center.I'll never forget that morning.
It was one of those beautiful, crisp September mornings that you are so thankful to be in New York City.The sky was blue.
And almost as soon as I got to my office, my paralegal called me to the window and said, look out the window because one of the World Trade Centers is on fire.
Anybody know what that smoke is in lower Manhattan?
And as I looked, a second plane went and hit the other tower.
It was a Tuesday, and I remember clearly, I was on a downtown subway train headed to cover a story for NBC, where I was a street reporter for the local station.
I was diverted by a pager message, and you remember those pagers that had typing on it, and the message said, quote, small plane hit Twin Towers, go.
And seconds later, the train had stopped short of the Cortlandt Street station when the conductor announced that there was some type of emergency and the train would be holding short of that subway stop.
But seconds later, the train pulled in and the doors opened, but the announcement over the PA said, do not leave the train.But I got off. I walked up the stairs to the Cortland station, and within a flash, the second plane hit the South Tower.
And the stuff that happened next, I don't often talk about, but it was an incredibly difficult, difficult experience to witness. American Airlines Flight 11 had a crew of 11 and 76 passengers on board, not including the hijackers.
And those hijackers flew the plane into the northern facade of the North Tower of the World Trade Center in New York City, hitting the building at 8.46 a.m. Next was United Airlines Flight 175 that had a crew of 9 and 51 passengers.
The hijackers flew that plane into the southern facade of the South Tower of the World Trade Center in New York City, and that happened at 9.03 a.m.
The whole building just came apart.Holy smokes.
Outside of New York City, at 9.37 AM, American Airlines Flight 77 deliberately crashed the plane into the Pentagon, killing 64 people on board and another 125 people in the building.
And then a short time later, United Airlines Flight 93 crashed into a field in Somerset County, Pennsylvania, killing all 40 of the passengers and crew on board.
In lower Manhattan, there are thousands upon thousands upon thousands of people there every single morning, including that day.And at that point, they are all trying, those who could, to get away.
You know, for Mike and Tom, both were assigned to the 7-9 precinct, which covers Bed-Stuy, Brooklyn, and they were miles away from ground zero.
From that point on, we were deployed to open up the flow of traffic so that all of the first responders coming in, additional fire units, rescue units could get into Manhattan.
Now, I remember being evacuated.We were in a government building, so we had to walk down 16 flights after the second plane hit.
And as soon as I got off, there was already people, hundreds, it seemed like thousands, but it was at least hundreds coming off.They had ash.There were already National Guardsmen in the street.
And you can just imagine the scene all over as people, those who could again, trying to get out.
If you can imagine the Super Bowl letting out and only coming through two exits, That was every single person that was working in lower Manhattan was streaming over the bridges.
I remember doing a lot of activity.I have very, very vague specifics around memories.It's kind of like this one big giant blur.
It's a crazy dynamic of people who are totally ash covered to people who are totally clean.
Every on-duty member of the NYPD was being utilized to react.
This is instincts kicking in and, you know, thinking about, OK, well, you know, missing unidentified persons, you know, we're probably going to get people.They're probably going to utilize all the hospitals in the New York City area.
So I dispatched two detectives over there for the potential of having to handle a missing persons, unidentified people coming in who haven't been identified.Notifications haven't been made to family members.
from the beginning of a Herculean search and rescue effort, to the crash site, to evacuating a half a million New Yorkers trapped on the island of Manhattan, to clearing the streets so emergency equipment could make it down to lower Manhattan.
I do remember, and no one ever mentions them, the work of the iron workers, never herald for what they did.And they did amazing work too, moving structures, girders and beams, you know, weighing tens of thousands of pounds and tons and tons.
I saw one of the guys that I coach soccer with from my own community, my own neighborhood.We stood there and hugged for five or 10 minutes.
It's interesting the way I heard Lucina describe what she thought of what was going on.
Watch TV, dangerous situation in New York, and I didn't believe.
He go to work.Seven in the morning he went to work.But after this I don't know next.
Did you see him at all that day?
No, no.I feel in this evening very, very bad.
And then hours go by until it's 5 a.m.the next day.
Detectives would knock on Lucina's door to deliver the news that Henrik was dead.Not as a result of the terror attacks in Lower Manhattan, but shot dead on the streets of Bed-Stuy, Brooklyn.
They say that he died on the street.She was like paralyzed.Completely shocked.
His sister was here, but the rest of his family was far away in Poland.Who told Eva?Eva was absent at home.And when she called the home, Eva, his wife, wasn't there.And she was left to tell the only person that was home, his 10-year-old son.
Yeah.I was completely crazy.
The family was angry because she said to him, father is dead.And the family, his wife didn't want him to know father is dead.
I think about that for anyone to get that news, let alone a child and from someone thousands of miles away.It's hard for me to wrap my head around that.
Yeah, I mean, the world seems so big and the world seems so small at the very same time.Being 10 years old and having to process the fact that the father you were told to say goodbye to the last time, 11 months before, is actually deceased.
And so right away, his family, of course, in Poland, is grieving.But they also wanted to know what was it that happened to Henrik here in New York.
So let's go to the crime scene in Bed-Stuy, Brooklyn, where police responded to a 911 call.It came in at around 11.30 p.m.
We were back at the station house.We were in our 7-9 detective squad office.We had received notification that there was a male shot.Decatur and Albany was the location.
It all happened within the 7-9 precinct command, which encompasses the neighborhood of Bedford-Stuyvesant, also known as Bed-Stuy, Brooklyn.It's a high crime area 20 years ago and still is today.
We were like, you know, we just couldn't believe it.Here we are, probably the worst day law enforcement has ever seen.And it's just getting worse, not better.There's nothing, no good news is coming in.And then here we have to respond to a male shot.
The intersection of Decatur and Albany is just a few blocks away from a subway stop, and Henrik had been shot multiple times in the chest.
And so that led to one detective only going to the scene.
Detective Caffrey was the lone detective who responded to the scene.
And I can tell you that is many, many less people than would normally be dispatched.And beyond the precinct and homicide detective response, that extended to the NYPD forensic units that were able to respond to.
You'd have at least two crime scene unit detectives show up and evidence collection responded and process that scene versus crime scene unit.
Now normal course in any homicide case is for crime scene investigation to show up.They are specially trained in the homicide investigative techniques utilized and trying to find every scrap of potential evidence.
Well, evidence collection is basically going to the scene, determining what is evidence in this investigation, processing it and collecting it.
But it's not a real deep scientific dive on what happened there, not using the techniques of drawing out the crime scene to a point where you can determine blood spatter, where you can determine direction of travel, or you can really determine ballistics.
Evidence collection normally responds basically to property crimes.When a car is broken into, when there's a burglary, they come and dust for fingerprints, they take a look around.It's a much less in-depth type of investigation in the aftermath.
And then the evidence collection team is kind of a feeder into the crime scene unit and they do basic evidence collection.
But yet on that day, obviously, as you can imagine, crime scene was dispatched, like every other member of law enforcement, to try to help in some way and manage the aftermath of the terrorist attacks.
On any given day, this homicide would bring a team of detectives to the scene.On any given day, this event would bring crime scene investigators to process the scene for clues.
On any given day, several detectives would be knocking on doors, getting statements. But on this day, one lone detective would arrive with just one evidence collection member of the NYPD to preserve and process and collect evidence.
But not as forensic scientists, not making critical observations on a public street where the crime scene would be tainted, walked over moments after they left. This was not any given day.This was 9-11.
And while difficult and understandable choices were made, it is the day that this murder victim deserved more.
You only get one shot at that.It just couldn't get done.
And that's where you really come to the push and pull of all this, because anyone that thinks about this can understand the incredible difficulty of any member of law enforcement.
They are out there literally trying to control what only can be described almost as a hell on earth.
Your own family members who work down in lower Manhattan.Have we heard from them?Did we see them?Where have they been?How did they get out?How did they end up in New Jersey?
They are trying to find the dead, help the living, help those that survived, help people even just navigate the incredible loss.
It never seemed to end.So you're taking all of those different thoughts and then you're trying to help the guys who are in the office managing with a death investigation.
But now there's a man found in the street.While we can all say we get it because of that day, as Mike Prate said best,
How do you explain that to a family?
To best discuss the murder of Henrik Saviak, we really need to start with the place, where his body was found, that block.
He was found on the street level.I believe it was a couple blocks away from the subway exit.If you were able to look on a map, it's sort of like a little bit of a zigzag.He had to make like a left, a right, and a left.
And he was probably two or three blocks away from the subway station.
Let me tell you all a little bit about Bedford-Stuyvesant.I got to know it as a prosecutor.On the one hand, it is beautiful.It always was.It has these incredible brownstones and there's families living there and young people and old people.
But you also had lots of crime.
That was a chronic, problematic area.A lot of violence, a lot of narcotics activity in that community.Not a lot of cooperation.
We are talking into some of the heyday of narcotic and that block was known in particular, whether it was day or night.The street trade was busy, including on September 11th.
Was he in that area for narcotics use as a potential buyer?
Given the fact that this was 9-11, you may be asking whether everything paused in that day and the city was frozen with the events that occurred in Lower Manhattan.
But I would say that there is an element who believe that the NYPD and all law enforcement were so hyper-focused on those events in Lower Manhattan, they would not have the time to address street-level drug transactions and robberies.
Could it have been the perfect time to commit a murder? You have to look at it both ways.
It's an interesting point, and I think that you're right.
The lone detective on scene began to look at a number of theories, possibly a robbery that turned into a homicide.In my first look, that would make sense.The 911 caller told dispatch they heard some sort of argument before the gunshots were heard.
The reason why I think robbery would be at the top of my list is what the 911 caller said. He said that they heard an argument ensue before the shots were fired.So there was some type of verbal exchange between the shooter or shooters and the victim.
And to me, that could point towards robbery.
Did he always have money on him, cash?
He was sending to Poland everything she said before, so he has $5 with him.
She doesn't think it could be robbery because her brother only had $5 on him.But you know what someone has left on them doesn't really determine what crime was being committed when they were killed.Was this an attempted robbery gone wrong?
Because I can tell you all that most murders that happen during the course of a robbery or an attempted robbery is because the attacker or perpetrator gets scared in some way.
Either the person, the victim is trying to fight back or doesn't give up the property or goes to make a quick move.And if you're holding a gun, unfortunately, people holding a gun may quickly pull that trigger or use it.
Yeah, I mean, we've already heard the stories of how he would send every single dollar back to his family. So somebody sticking you up with a gun and asking you for $5, to him, that meant a lot.
To him, that meant $5 that wasn't going to his family members.But also, he didn't speak English.There may have been a confusing moment in between there that, you know, what was he being asked for?
I have to think that may have been part of the equation.
And if any of you out there are saying, oh, wait a second, he didn't speak English, but he was living here.You know, it is very possible to live in various areas and continue with the language that you grew up with.
She stands out in the neighborhood.His dress is not speaking English.I guess his belongings or his bag that he's carrying would make him what you would say to be a target.
There's something about the day and Hendrik's appearance itself which makes you wonder about something else.
He was dressed in camouflage.So he was an older male dressed in camouflage.
That day he was wearing a camouflage jacket.
That was the normal way he dressed when he went out.
He was similar like Arabic people.
His skin was of a darker complexion.And we're also just hours after and a few miles away from the worst terror attack in U.S.history.
Here's this guy coming through the neighborhood at night wearing camouflage and some of the community members were trying to say that they thought that maybe they were still under attack.
He didn't speak English very well.And just imagine, you all know, for those of you that remember that day, how high tensions were everywhere.
So is it possible that his murder wasn't really happenstance at all, but it was directed, making it a hate crime? The idea of this being a potential hate crime, it's interesting to me in two ways.
One, tensions were clearly very high, anxieties were very high, and we certainly heard about the aftermath of these attacks bringing about race-related, ethnicity-related crimes.
You know, right after the attack, many of the mosques in New York City, and actually all over the country, were asking for extra protection.And rightly so, because they were concerned about what the atmosphere was like.
They were concerned if people would take retribution just because of the fact of what they followed and what their beliefs were.
That was definitely one of the things that was discussed, but that never really gained a lot of traction.
Could it have been that?Sure.But at least to me, based on the timing and where it was, that seems much more unlikely to me.
Maybe people in the block believe that this was an ongoing terrorist attack.As a detective, I'm like, man, come in and tell me that story.Let me bring you down to the DA's office.I want to put you in the grand jury.Tell that story.
And again, that came in from people in the neighborhoods, people in the neighborhood telling us Well, this is what we heard.Oh, really?Well, we'd love to speak to those people who saw that because, you know, maybe they could shed some light.
But they would never step forward.
So as we get into the timeline of events for this investigation, we knew that Henrik was already at his job at 7 a.m.on the morning of 9-11.
And when investigators interview his family, they piece together what happened to Henrik that day.
After terror, he knows that everybody go to home, but he come to home and start to looking another job for night.This is cleaning supermarket.
And as we mentioned, he was willing to work as much as he could to send that money home.So it's no surprise to learn that he was starting a new second job beginning at midnight on 9-11 at a supermarket in Brooklyn.
And according to his sister, Henrik knew his way around Manhattan and Queens via the subway system, but Brooklyn was a whole new story.
He didn't know about what places are danger.
And on the night of 9-11, it would be his first attempt to find that workplace in Brooklyn.
And he was pointed in the direction along one of the subway lines, the A line, and he got off at a stop.
However... He's completely in the wrong neighborhood, not even close to where he should have been.
We know that the 911 call came in at 1130, which was 30 minutes before he was supposed to be at that new job.So he came early.He was prepared to go through this route and find that location.
Is it possible that Henrik just got lost?
just made the wrong turn, ended on the wrong block, and was trying to make sure that he was getting to that job on that first day, when he was supposed to be there, until he was met with gunfire.
The happenstanciveness, that really is one of the biggest tragedies to me in this case.
And it's really tragic and unfortunate what happened to him, but to think that he wasn't even supposed to be in that area.
Because I can tell you, it is not hard to get lost in New York City.I mean, Scott, think about it.When I think about the numbered streets and the avenues, that's the only place in New York that I think that's really easy to navigate.
Because you know after 42nd comes 43rd.But in most other neighborhoods, they are close to one another, but the streets are very different.
And so if all of a sudden you are on a block that has two unfamiliar names, there's really no easy way to figure out where you're supposed to get to where you want to be.
And here Henrik is getting off the subway and potentially making a wrong turn right into the place that Mike and Tom and even you Anastasia described really as a sort of a chronic crime zone.
And it's something that Lucina said that really I think paints a crystal clear picture.
two detectives who come in here.I say, I can go to your station.They say, no, no, no, never, never go.Never go.
think about that for a moment.It's obviously easier for them, for her to come to them, but they said, you know what?
We know that there are dangerous areas that are unfortunately at the time overridden with crime, that they wanted to protect her from that, that they would come to her.And it's that location that plays in so much here.
It's not only what led to his death, but it also is what is causing some of the difficulty in getting the answers of not only how he ended up there, but by who.
The streets do not talk, and Anastasia, you know this.The lawful residents don't want to be seen talking to police, fearing retribution from criminals and gang members.
And even if you're on the other side of the law, you don't want to be seen talking to detectives.That's because you could be labeled a snitch.So ruling out the lawful and the lawless, there are not many folks left.
showcases are found out there, that becomes a concentration on trying to get a basic story as to, well, how did he end up like that?
You know, another critical investigative tool is the canvas.
Looking in the surrounding areas for things like surveillance cameras, where around at the time in 2001, there obviously were surveillance cameras then, but they may have been the kind of cameras that the tapers recycled every few days.
And not canvassing in a timely manner, you could lose potential evidence.
Then there's backtracking his steps.Who was the token booth clerk at that location?Who was the token booth clerk?Who was the conductor on the train that he might've taken?All of that research, all of that different stuff, it's a tsunami for one guy.
Those opportunities were lost.Lost because just a few miles away at ground zero, nothing made sense.The finest and the bravest were trying to figure it all out.
Because not only of the events on 9-11 and that day, but the subsequent six months after that, there just wasn't a lot of attention paid to this case.Not because we wouldn't have any desire or mission to do so.We just didn't have those resources.
And while they had many challenges, they still did get some cooperation.They did have some people that could give them something.But really all they got was this.
he tried to knock on one of the doors of one of the brownstone so he had to run up the stairs and then you know trying to get help so maybe it was fleeing from someone
But that's it.And as we all know, just from hearing it, that's not a whole lot to go on.
I mean, I'm thinking about Henrik on that street that night and why he was rushing to get to that job, to send every single dollar back to his family.
And he may have just taken the wrong turn and been in the wrong place and been in the worst of circumstances on the worst day in American history.
I always felt with immigrants, they came here for a better life.And to only be killed at the hands of another human being is the exact opposite of what they came here for, for an opportunity.
And to die that way on that night, it's just, it's just heartbreaking, quite honestly.
And as this case started to go cold, back in Poland, Henryk's family held his funeral.
And many people, all family and friends come.
This is one of those stories.In a very simple way, it was powerful for me.
And what was very extremely strange, we see priest who was completely similar like him.
The priest in his native country of Poland was the spitting image of Henrik.
All the same face, hair.We got impression that he make funeral for self.He make funeral for himself.
I'm sure it gave the family some comfort during that service.
Now everything we've talked about to now is really all detectives had.And it didn't get any better.
The family reached out to the Polish embassy to try to see if their home country could assist in this investigation.
Nothing to do with them.We asked lawyers and they say no.
Now that's very different when people hear, well, if something happens to a U.S.citizen, certainly abroad, that the embassy gets involved very quickly.
But very often there is not reciprocity in that, which means that the other countries are loathe to get involved.They don't really know how they can be of assistance.
And that certainly sounds like what Lucina encountered when she wrote to her consulate.
You know, Anastasia, we've covered a lot of cold cases during this season on this podcast, and we always see the resolve that the investigators and prosecutors have in solving that case for the victim, solving that case for the family, and sometimes it does happen.
And unfortunately, sometimes they don't, or certainly not within the timeframes that we would hope.And when I think about this case and all the challenges that investigators faced, I've never really seen anything quite like it.
I've had plenty of cases that went cold because there weren't witnesses or something, someone just disappeared or was found somewhere.But 9-11 was a phenomenon like no other.
And everything that that added to the mix really just made this case that much more difficult to solve.
On the 10-year anniversary of the 9-11 attacks, a tremendous amount of attention was paid, and it should be also pointed out that Mike Prate and Tom Joyce share those same feelings, but solving this murder case for them is equally important.
We in the squad never stopped working murders, but 10 years seemed to be a milestone.
Let's turn to the cold case squad, because that is where this case ended up.
You know, I come from an agency of just 3,000 sworn officers.
So when I look at the NYPD, a force of around 35,000 sworn officers and another 20,000 civilians, 30 detectives, 30 are in the cold case squad and they are some of the best the agency has to offer.
We really worked with the chief of detective's office. The Crime Stoppage Unit, we worked with the mayor's office to get the reward money to be offered a little bit higher.We handed out cards and flyers and, you know, hung things up.
You know, I often refer to an approach or a method investigators use in a particular case to get answers.But we're about to talk about one which I think is one of the best of them.
Yeah, so in 2010, what we tried to do is rebuild the neighborhood.
Listen how cool this is.Because of various technology, they could actually rebuild the neighborhood to get information about everyone that was there.
It really is an effort to identify everyone living within a square mile. Anybody who was arrested in that square mile, who are they, where are they?Then using anybody who might have rented there, who was associated to there, who had relatives there.
And then what we were able to do is try and find out where those people live now.
Whether it was because they had their name or who was living there or because they owned a building or rented or had just passed through and they could prove it through various means.
You know, you're sending emails, you're sending cell phone calls, you're sending a text message.
Did you see anything?Did you hear anything?Do you know anything?
And when you have all those people, on the one hand, it's overwhelming because those are lots and lots of doors to knock on, phones to call, but it also gives you, hopefully, this huge swath of information, this blanket, if you will, where at least, hopefully, they now had somewhere to go.
And out of that, we were able to identify like 300 people.
And while this wild technology is cool and it brought lots of new information, did it lead anywhere here?No.Today we approach the 20th anniversary of 9-11.
The investigation into the World Trade Center terror attack quickly ID'd hijackers and the terror organization who sent them on their mission.But as of today, we still do not know who gunned down Hendrick on that Brooklyn street 20 years later.
And from law enforcement perspective, it is active, open, and they are hoping for answers.
I never liked being here.My dream was completely different.But after my brother died, I lost motivation.What are we doing?For what?
And let's think about closure of this case, what it would bring, obviously for Henrik's family, to at least know why his life was taken, perhaps, and also who took his life and what that closure would give them.
How has his family dealt with this loss?
They must live without him.That is very, very big loss.
And for investigators who lost so much, not only in family and friends lost in the terrorist attack, but knowing that they couldn't give this case what it rightly deserved on the day that someone chose to take Henrik's life?
that it would give them that breath of, you know what, we got this.And in a way, a nod to the terrorists who took those almost 3,000 lives.We're not going to let you take this one additional life by letting it be unaccounted for too.
We are recognizing the nearly 3,000 that died that day on 9-11 in Lower Manhattan.23 members of the NYPD were killed in the attack on the World Trade Center.An additional 241 members have died because of 9-11 related illnesses.
343 New York City firefighters died that day.An additional 227 also died from illnesses based on that day.37 members of the Port Authority, Sorry.
37 members of the Port Authority Police Department also made the ultimate sacrifice, including one of my closest friends.You do it.You go.
You OK?I don't know what's going on. Scott, knowing what this day means to so many people and what it took from so many, I guess what do you want to say to people out there who are listening to this now?
I mean, everyone deals with this event their own separate way.I was so fortunate in a way to have my law enforcement experience that day because I was able to process what I saw that morning and I've been able to deal with it over the years.
But I lost friends, people who ran into the building when people were running out.And I know that sounds like what we all talk about in a fire or in a hostage situation or a bank robbery.
But it's overwhelming to think how many lives were lost in such a short span of time.
And how, you know, 37 members of the Port Authority Police Department also lost their lives, including a very close friend of mine, Inspector Anthony Infante, who was supposed to be at my wedding party just two weeks after it.
So, you know, something that brought America back was a simple line.And the simple line was, you know, never forget.And we will all never forget.But for Henrik's family, Not only should it be never forget, but it also has to be never give up.
So to all of those detectives who are out there working and all the people and all the families, they should never give up.
You have to, as the law enforcement agency serving that community, you have to convey the message to them that every single person has not been forgotten and that we're going to continue to work.
Mike Prate and Tom Joyce put it all out on the table during their interview with us.
And I have tremendous respect for their honesty, their dedication, and even though they have retired, their reason to speak out, to continue to get the message out, they do believe that this is a case that is solvable and will be solved.
Look, we're here now. And we can't promise results, we can only promise effort.And I promise you now that we're looking at this case again, we're going to give it everything we have and we're not going to drop it.
Breaks in cold cases happen, and it usually starts by someone willing to break that chain of silence.
Social media is an incredibly powerful tool and today is the day that all of you can maybe help get those answers.
We are going to give you not only the information you've gotten during this recording, if you look on our website there will be all the information that investigators can and will give as far as where to reach out.
But contact anyone you can, anyone that may have been in the area or you may know someone who knew someone who knows something.You just never know.It can sometimes be just taking one.And so we are now turning this to all of you.
And for every family who has an open homicide case.
I can hear you.The rest of the world hears you.
We already know you never forget, but we also know that you'll never give up.And neither will we.
At some point, this is going to be stopped.
Tune in next Wednesday when we'll dissect another new case on Anatomy of Murder.
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