Sherrice Iverson Case

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Jeremy Strohmeyer, 19. a California teenager, sexually assaulted and strangled a7-year-old girl in the bathroom ofa Nevaua casino while her father was gambling intheearly morning hours of May 25, 1997.Mr. Strohmeyerisaccused of following Sherrice Iverson into the women's restroom of the Primmadonra casino inPrimm, Nev., a small town about 40 miles south of Las Vegas, and attacking her in a handicapped stall beforestrangling her ano breaking her neck.The gifl had been left to playinan arcaoe by her father, who was gambling elsewhere in the casino.Mr.Strohmeyer and his high school friend. David Cash, were in the arcaoe waiting for Mr. Cash's father to finishgambling.Mr. Cash - who witnessed the beginning of the attack and did not report it or intervene - has not been charged withany crime.Law: The Baa Samaritan A friend told David Cash he hao committed murder. Cash kept quiet ;CathyBoothfBerkeley With reporting by David Willwerth/Berkeley; ; Time; 09-07-1998;He was just an innocent bystander, he says. A bystander who peered over the top of a toilet stall and discovered-inthe women's rest room of a casino on the California-Nevada border-his best friend Jeremy Strohmeyer, 18,struggling with a seven-year-old girl. He tapped his friend's head, he says, knocking off his hat, but couldn't get himto stop. So David Cash Jr. decidea to take a walk.The scene in front of him could not have been any clearer a nearly 6-ft.-tall teenager and a little girl who didn't yetweigh 50 lbs. locked in the stall of the Primaoonna Resort casino at 3:47 in the morning. Ana yet Cash goes for awalk. He says nothing to the security guards. Less than half an hour later, Strohmeyer emerges a r d tells Cash hehas molested and murdered the child. Cash, stunned, does not ask why. Accoroing to grand jury testimonyobtained by the Las Vegas Review-Journal, Cash does venture one question: Had the little girl been aroused? Bythe time Sherrice Iverson's broken body is found at 5 a.m., stuffed in a toilet bowl, the two teenagers are already ontheir way to Las Vegas.Flash forward 15 months. This week Strohmeyer goes on trial in Las Vegas for the murder, kianapping and sexualassault of Sherrice Iverson. If convicted, he faces a possible death sentence, but his lawyer, Leslie Abramson,claims his confession was extracted by police while he was drugged. His friend Cash, now 19 and an aspiringnuclear engineer in his sophomore year at Berkeley, is not chargeo with anything, but he faces a trial of anotherkind, from angry Californians. The tale of the bad Samaritan has touched a nerve.Theyare angry that he told the LosAngeles Timeshe was not going "to lose sleep over somebony eIse'sproblems ' Angry that he felt more sorry for Jeremy than for Sherrice because, after all, he had lost his best friend,and he did not knowthegirl or her family. Angry that he told theTimeshisnotoriety had helped invigorate his sociallife—a comment he has since denied. And angry simply because he did nothing before or after the carnage. "Whathave I done?' he defiantly asked radio disk jockey Tim Conway Jr. one night during an impromptu call-in to LosAngeles station KLSX. “I have done nothing wrong." Even the police have tola him so. Cash said. "You s.o.b.l"screamed Conway in return. "I hope you burn in hell!!"Technically, Cash is right.InNevada, California and in fact most of the U.S., doing nothing about a crime is nocrime at all. Only a handful of states—including Vermont, Wisconsin a r d Minnesota-have "duty to assist" lawsrequiring those who witness a crime to offer aio a r d report it. Cash's callousness, though, has sparkeo a movementi r both California and Nevaoato pass something calleo "Sherrice's Law" to reouire witnesses to intervene andreport cases of sexual assault against children. If necessary, says Najee Ali, spokesman for Sherrice's motherYolanaa Manuel, advocates of the proposeo law will go to the federal level to win passage.Meanwhile, they want revenge on Cash. Last week an unusual coalition of Muslim and Jewish activists, mothersa r d ranio deejays drove 400 miles north from Los Angeles to stage a protest in Berkeley's historic Sproul Plasa inhopes of ostracizing the college sophomore—if not ejecting him altogether from the University of California system."This isn t a guy who should be going to Berkeley. He should be going to San Quentin," said an irate Conway."WeTe going to do everything possible to get his ass kickeooutof Berkeley and make his life as miserable aspossible."

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Yet Berkeley chancellor Robert Bertiahl made it clear last week that there would be no expulsion. "The public hasbeen outraged not only by the crime itself but by reports of callous and reprehensible statements attributed to thestudent. I had the same reaction myself," he said. But rules are rules; Cash violated no law. “Most people seem tobe under the impression that I was in a position to stop the heinous crime." Cash wrote in an angry e-mail sent tothe San Francisco Chronicle and the Daily Californian. "I did not witness the allegeo molestation and murder."Staying mostly out of sight in his dorm room in modernistic Putnam Hall. Cash gave no interviews. His lawyer, MarkWerksman, however, said Cash "regrets" his statements to the Los Angeles Times. Werksman warned that lashingoutinfrustration to expel Cash is no answer either. Then the lawyer sighed. "What canIsay? I can't explain orjustify what he said."In Sproul Plaza, many students were at first horrified, then angry at Cash, and finally resigned to doing nothing. “Ipersonally think he's a psycho,butI'm not sure there's legal grouno." said a student. Rajan Bhattacharyya. 19, asophomore, says he knew Cash in junior high as a "normal bratty kid" and defended his legal right to remain inschool: “I don't think this is the first time someone has left a crime victim at a scene or something like that. Theycan't just kick him out because they oon't like him “ Masoud Seberi, 22, a junior, agreed: "He's not here to upholdany moral standard or position. He came here to get ar education."A few were angry, however, or disconcerted by his presence. “I'm appalled to be at the same campus with thisguy." said sophomore Keith Pallin. “A seven-year-old girl lost her life, and he's bragging about getting chicks?"Young women in the neighboring dorms said Cash gives them the creeps. Canoice Blagmon, 17, a freshman, saidthe baby-facec Cash had been sociable, helping other students in his dorm set up their computers—but now, shesaid, 'the dorm people are outraged." Stacy May, 17, another dorm neighbor, said she and others had decided tosnub him. "Everybody I know is not going to say hi to him. He's an awful person." Ethan Berger, 13. had morepractical advice: “I'd leaveifI were him."Copyright 1993TimeInc.Outrage follows cold reply to killing ; Lynda Gorov, Globe Staff; : The Boston Globe; 08-07-1993;Outrage follows cold reply to killingByline: Lynda Gorov. Globe StaffEdition: City EditionSection: NATIONAL/FOREIGNMemo: FRIILOS ANGELES -Yolanda Manuel's little girl is dead, and David Cash is about to start his sophomore year incollege. The muroer trial begins a week before classes.Cash is not charged with killing 7-year-old Sherrice Iverson. A young man he calls his best friend is. But Manuelsays itmightas well have been Cash's fist over her daughter's mouth, his hands aroundherneck.Cash has admitted he was in the Nevada casino restroom moments before Sherrice died. He says he saw hisfriend, Jeremy Strohmeyer. struggle with her in a stall. Then Cash left. Now, more than a year later, he says henever thinks of the girl, ano that his newfound notoriety has helped him meet women.Legally, Cash may be home free. Las Vegas police say he violated no state law. But his refusal to help Sherricehas triggered a campaign to make him an outcast among his college peers."David Cash has been saying horrible things," Manuel said.He says he cries over no one. He mentions that hewants to go to school and get girls and I don't think that's the place he needs to be. He needs to be in jail. You don'tdo nothing when a child - a child - is getting her life taken away.“Calling Cash an accessory to her daughter's May 1997 murder, Manuel has launcheo a petition drive demandingthat some form of criminal charge be filed against him. With her blessing, two radio talk show hosts in Los Angelesare also planning to make his life miserable on campus, since it is unlikely he will be expelled for his inaction.University officials "are behind me. baby," Cash, 19, told the radio duo on KLSX-FM last week. Later in thebroadcast, he added, "There is no chance I will go to jail, simply because I have done nothing wrong."

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Sherrice's mother, as well as radio hosts Tim Conway Jr. and Doug Steckler, say otherwise. They say Cash shouldhave stopped Strohmeyer. 20. or gone for help. Now they want him punished,ifnot by Nevada authorities, if not byuniversity administrators, then by them.When Cash returns to the University of California at Berkeley this month. Conway and Steckler intend to greet himwitha busload or two of picketers. They plan to distribute fliers. Theiraim:to drive the aspiring nuclear engineerfrom class by making him a pariah.The demonstrationswill coincide with Strohmeyer's trial, slated to begin Aug. 17. Cash, who, like Strohmeyer, grewup in relative affluence in Long Beach, is expected to testify. Yolanda P.1anuel, who lives in South-Central LosAngeles, is trying to raise enough money to attend the Las Vegas trial of the man accused of sexually molestingand killing her only child"We will demonstrate at the school, at his house; we will demand justice," said Irv Rubin, who is national chairmanof the Jewish Defense League and is involved in the upcoming protest as a friend of the radio duo. "You can callme a vigilante: you can call me anything you want."University officials, however, say Cash has the same right to his education as any student. After all, he faces noformalcharges, since failing to report a crime or refusing to help a victim is not against the law. Spokesman JesusMena pointed out that Cash's class was admitted to Berkeley in March 1997. two months before the May 25murder."People are morally outraged that this young man probably had the opportunity to do something to save this younglady's life and they want there to be some type of remedy for their indignation," said Stewart Bell, the districtattorney in Clark County, Nevada, where Strohmeyer will be tried. "But the remedy for what he did requires aresponse from a higher authority. That will requiredivineintervention."Conway and Steckler said they are more outraged by Cash's decision to leave the murder scene than by hisactions and statements to the Los Angeles Times afterward. Cash admitted he did not turn in his friend whenStrohmeyer became a suspect. He said he did not regret keeping quiet, and told the newspaper his connection tothe case gave him a kind of cachet."We couldn't believe that this kid. who could have prevented a death, not only decided not to do anything aboutitbut that he's going to use it to score with chicks." said Conway, whose popular show airs weeknights. "We wanteverybody on campus to know exactly what kind of person he is."On the air, in a show filled with profanity, Cash said he was sorry for the Iverson family. But again he denied anyfeelings for Sherrice."It’s a very tragic event. OK," Cash said on the radio. "But the simple fact remains I do not know this little girl. I donot know starving children in Panama. I do not know people that die of disease in Egypt. The only person I knew inthis event was Jeremy Strohmeyer and I know as his best friend that he had potential."I'msad," he added, "thatIlost a best friend."Earlier he had told the Times he was not upset when Strohmeyer told him what he had done: later, however, Cashwas furious when their high school refused to allow him to attend graduation or the prom. He showed up outsideanyway,ina rented limousine. The moment, Cash standinginthe sunroof, hisfistraised in triumph, was capturedon film."I'mnot going to getupset over somebody else's life," Cash was quoted as saying in the Times. "I'm not going tolose sleep over somebody else’s problem."Said Conway, who has received hundreds of e-mails from listeners offended by Cash's comments. "It'sunbelievable that he's going to be getting his degree when he shouldbe inprison as an accomplice to murder. . . .If we don’t do anything else, we're going to make him quit school."Cash, who testified before a grand jury, could not be reached by the Globe for comment. But he has not disputedthe outline oftheaccusations against Strohmeyer -although, on the radio, he called them "out of character."

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