The nickname "thrill killers" was given to them by the media after Kings County's District Attorney commented that the boys, who never robbed any of their victims, "apparently had no reason except the thrill they got". The four boys admitted to a litany of offenses, which included pouring gasoline over a man and setting him alight, and horsewhipping two young women in a public park late at night. Trachtenberg and Lieberman, who had not participated in Mentor's murder, appeared to be relieved by their arrest. Koslow stated that he considered vagrants to be social "parasites". Īfter their arrest, Mittman and Koslow were belligerent and bragged that murdering Mentor had been a "supreme adventure". The four gang members were arrested shortly after Mentor's murder. They beat him and threw him in the East River, where he drowned. Koslow and Mittman found Mentor as he was sleeping on a bench after a drinking binge. Their second victim was Willard Mentor, a 34-year old black man who worked at a local bag factory. The first man killed by the gang was a local homeless alcoholic named Reinhold Ulrickson, whom they kicked and punched to death. Mittman later commented that their goal had been to "clean the streets of bums". Koslow, who read comic books, saw himself as a crime-fighting hero and believed that his actions would help the police to restore "law and order". The four boys roamed the streets of Brooklyn, assaulting girls and beating up vagrants. During the summer of 1954, the crackdown in Manhattan had intensified and many "undesirables" – among whom gay men, homeless people and alcoholics – had sought refuge in Brooklyn, which inspired Koslow and his friends to take action. Jack Koslow, who was later identified by AP reports as the 'brains' of the group, admired the crackdown that commissioner Francis Adams was conducting at the time in Manhattan against " social undesirables", and thought similar actions were needed to " cleanse" the streets of Brooklyn. The four members of the gang were teenagers who belonged to Brooklyn's Jewish community: It also fueled the controversy over comic books, which were accused at the time of causing sexual perversion and juvenile delinquency. The case attracted considerable media attention in the United States. The Brooklyn Thrill Killers were a gang of teenage boys who, during the summer of 1954, killed two men (one by drowning, the other by beating) and committed acts of assault and torture against several other people in Brooklyn, a borough of New York City. The boys, handcuffed, alongside the corpse of Willard Mentor. 1954 New York City teenage gang Three of the boys standing before the district Attorney, who holds up the bullwhip used in one of the attacks.
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