Inquirer Gives D.A. Krasner A Pass On Release Of U-Haul Hacker

By Ralph Cipriano
for BigTrial.net

On Valentine's Day, The Philadelphia Inquirer just planted a big sloppy wet kiss on a guy they've been sweet on for a long time.

In a story about the arrest of Taray Herring, the U-Haul Hacker, the Inquirer blatantly suppressed court records that show District Attorney Larry Krasner's prominent role in allowing Herring, a registered sex offender with more than a dozen arrests on his rap sheet, to be released last June from jail without having to post any bail.

On June 9, 2020, after the public defender filed a motion on Herring's behalf to modify his bail, Judge James DeLeon ruled that instead of $10,000 monetary bail, where Herring would have had to post a 10% deposit, or $1,000, he would set Herring's bail at $10,000 unsecured, meaning that Herring didn't have to post a cent to get out of jail. 

According to court records, the D.A.'s office went along with the public defender's request. "By agreement of the Commonwealth," court records say, with a pandemic on, the D.A.'s office agreed with the public defender's motion to let Herring get out of jail free, so he wouldn't be in danger of catching the virus behind bars.

Last week, Herring told police that he didn't kill Peter Gerold, a 70-year-old licensed massage therapist, but he did dismember his body. According to police, Herring told the cops that after he hacked up the victim with an electric saw and a hacksaw, he deep fried various body parts, wrapped them in plastic, and disposed of them in various dumpsters.

On Saturday, Herring was arrested and charged with a half-dozen crimes, including burglary, abuse of a corpse, and tampering with physical evidence; he's being held without bail.

Herring told police that another man murdered Gerold, but homicide detectives aren't buying it. According to knowledgable police sources, Herring, even though he hasn't been charged with murder yet, remains the prime suspect.

In the Inquirer's story today about the arrest of Herring, the newspaper not only doesn't mention that the D.A.'s office agreed to Herring's release, but they also don't mention the repeated breaks Krasner's office gave Herring in the past two years, as detailed in online court records.

As Big Trial has previously reported, in 2019, the D.A.'s office in a plea bargain allowed Herring to plead guilty to a misdemeanor and granted him probation in a plea bargain for stealing a car, when the D.A. could have prosecuted Herring on two felony charges that he was arrested for, and kept him in jail. 

In both 2019 and 2020, Herring, with a lengthy rap sheet, was accused of violating parole, with both the 2019 arrest for stealing a car, and an arrest for burglary last year. But both times the D.A.'s office gave Herring a pass and let him back out on the street without having to suffer any penalties.

Last June, as Big Trial has previously reported, the D.A.'s office did one more favor for Herring: they asked a judge to waive a detainer filed by the county Probation Department against Herring that would have kept him in jail without bail until a hearing on the probation violation would have been held. The detainer was lodged after Herring violated probation by getting arrested for burglary.

All of these above facts are mentioned in court records and known by knowledgeable official sources, but not one of these facts is mentioned in the Inquirer story written by three reporters. In fact, in the entire story you won't find one mention of the district attorney's office, or District Attorney Larry Krasner, even though there's a reelection campaign going on right now, and a big campaign issue is Krasner's culpability for surging crime and murder rates.

Gabriel Escobar, editor of the Inquirer, did not respond to a request for comment. In Escobar's defense, he was probably busy holding another newsroom self-flagellation session to cleanse his newspaper of systemic racism. 

Last year, the city recorded 499 murders, the highest total in 30 years. In January, the city recorded 50 murders, the highest total in history. This month, we've had 14 murders over the first 13 days, a 42% increase over last year's near-record total. 

People are getting shot and murdered at record rates; the D.A.'s progressive polices are a major reason why, and the city's paper of record continues to cover for Larry Krasner. In the Inquirer's Progressive version of reality, the U-Haul Hacker mysteriously reappeared on the street, thanks to a judge's decision to lower bail, and Uncle Larry and the D.A.'s office, which is supposed to protect the public, didn't have a thing to do with it.

As it turns out, Krasner was more worried about the U-Haul Hacker catching a virus in jail than he was worried about what harm a registered sex offender with more than a dozen arrests could do if Krasner used the pandemic as an excuse to allow the hacker to resume his criminal career.

Krasner, of course, has declined comment to Big Trial on his role in the release of Herring. And thanks to the work of the Inquirer, he won't have to answer questions from anyone else. 

On May 18th, Krasner is up for reelection in the Democratic nomination for D.A. He's opposed by Democrat Carlos Vega, a former homicide prosecutor in the D.A.'s office who's made Krasner's lenient prosecutions of violent criminals a main campaign issue.

By not printing the facts about Krasner's role in the release of Herring, the only daily newspaper in town is not only suppressing the news, they're also censoring Krasner's political opponents. So they can get Krasner reelected, by not telling readers about the blood on Krasner's hands.

Because every time the Inky's "journalists" write about Krasner, they wash the blood off his hands.

If Krasner wins the May 18th Democratic primary, he'll face Chuck Peruto Jr., a career criminal defense lawyer and Republican, in the November general election. 

 When he announced he was seeking the Republican nomination for D.A., Peruto told this reporter that Krasner's office is so incompetent it's a joke. He said that since Krasner got elected, he's won every one of a dozen cases he's tried against Krasner's inexperienced and/or incompetent prosecutors, including two murder trials.

"You don't even get the thrill of victory that you used to get if you win, because if you don't win, you stink," Peruto told Big Trial.

The Inquirer has a long history of protecting Krasner, a fellow progressive who's allegedly out to reform the criminal justice system, except he has a bad habit of letting violent criminals out of jail, like Herring, so they can commit more crimes.

Here's another recent example of the Inquirer's blatant pro-Krasner bias.

Last month, Adriano Coriano shot and killed his ex-wife, Gladys. When the Inquirer wrote about that story, they never got around to mentioning the fact that on Jan. 14th, police sought an arrest warrant for Adriano Coriano, for violating a protection order by repeatedly stalking, harassing and assaulting his ex-wife.

But, as Big Trial previously reported, for six straight days, the charging unit of the District Attorney's office sat on that request for a warrant to arrest Coriano, and did nothing.

Finally, at 8:40 p.m. on Jan. 20th, an assistant district attorney from the charging unit sent an email to the cops stating that the D.A.'s office was declining to issue the arrest warrant, because they needed more information.

Specifically, the D.A.'s office wanted to know the husband's email address, cell phone number, and date-of-birth. The D.A.'s office also wanted to change some language in the arrest warrant. Such as in the arrest warrant, police had referred to Coriano's "former wife of seven years;" the D.A. wanted to change that to the "former wife of defendant."

There was only one problem -- two hours earlier that day, Adrian Coriano drove over to his ex-wife's house and shot Gladys Coriano multiple times. An hour after the D.A. notified the police that they were declining to approve the arrest warrant for her husband, Gladys Coriano, 52 was pronounced dead at Jefferson Hospital.

Some honest reporting would have turned up the heat on Krasner. But once again, instead of reporting the news, the Inquirer was covering for Larry Krasner. 

The newspaper where I used to work is quite simply a disgrace to journalism.