It’s the first reported “whirlpooling” in three years – a terrifying crime in which girls in the city’s public pools are surrounded by rampaging boys who pull at their bathing suits, grope them and hold them virtual prisoners in the water.
More importantly, it may be the first whirlpooling indicted as a felony in nearly 10 years.
A grand jury yesterday indicted three young Manhattan men for allegedly surrounding three girls at the pool at Marcus Garvey Park in Harlem on Saturday, June 28 – only a day after Mayor Bloomberg, in bathing trunks, staged a photo op there to announce the opening of city pools.
The three young men – and as many as seven more who are still being sought – allegedly held and sexually groped the three girls, aged 15 to 18.
The men now face up to seven years in prison on charges of first-degree sexual abuse. They also face misdemeanor charges of unlawful imprisonment.
Law-enforcement sources said Manhattan prosecutors sought felony charges because each of the three young men had prior records for drugs or violence – and because of the serious nature of the crime.
Accused ringleader Dellroy Jones, 18, of 112 East 128th St., is being held without bail because he was on the lam for a Manhattan drug-possession charge to which he’d pleaded guilty but never showed up for sentencing.
Keith Short, 20, of 60 E. 135th St., was released on $2,500 bail. He was on probation after pleading guilty to beating another man in the face.
The third arrested, Mitchell McPhee, 16, of 112 East 128th St., was out on $1,000 bail. He had a prior sex-abuse case as a juvenile.
In a statement, the Parks Department applauded the DA’s get-tough attitude.
“Parks and Recreation has a zero-tolerance policy toward criminal acts and misbehavior on any level at the city’s pools,” the statement said.
Whirlpooling peaked in 1993, with more than a dozen cases were reported in city pools. Most of the cases involved boys in their mid-teens and were prosecuted as misdemeanors.