VOL. CLXVII . . . No. 57,977 © 2018 The New York Times Company NEW YORK, TUESDAY, MAY 29, 2018

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The Staten Island Memorial Day parade, which began in 1918 during World War I, set off Mondayon Forest Avenue with a contingent of R.O.T.C. cadets from the Air Force, top, and Navy midship-men, middle, and of course a marching band, above, from Port Richmond High School.

PHOTOGRAPHS BY GARETH SMIT FOR THE NEW YORK TIMES

Stars and Stripes and Trombones

Purdue Pharma, the companythat planted the seeds of the opi-oid epidemic through its ag-gressive marketing of OxyContin,has long claimed it was unawareof the powerful opioid painkiller’sgrowing abuse until years after itwent on the market.

But a copy of a confidential Jus-tice Department report showsthat federal prosecutors investi-gating the company found thatPurdue Pharma knew about “sig-nificant” abuse of OxyContin inthe first years after the drug’s in-troduction in 1996 and concealedthat information.

Company officials had receivedreports that the pills were beingcrushed and snorted; stolen frompharmacies; and that some doc-tors were being charged with sell-ing prescriptions, according todozens of previously undiscloseddocuments that offer a detailedlook inside Purdue Pharma. Butthe drugmaker continued “in theface of this knowledge” to marketOxyContin as less prone to abuseand addiction than other prescrip-tion opioids, prosecutors wrote in2006.

Based on their findings after afour-year investigation, the pros-ecutors recommended that threetop Purdue Pharma executives beindicted on felony charges, includ-ing conspiracy to defraud theUnited States, that could havesent the men to prison if con-victed.

But top Justice Department of-ficials in the George W. Bush ad-ministration did not support themove, said four lawyers who took

Opioid’s MakerHid KnowledgeOf Wide Abuse

Saw Early Evidence ofTrouble, Report Says

By BARRY MEIER

Continued on Page A18

The question went out late onenight on a private message chainof insurgent female candidates forCongress: Do you really attack afellow Democrat?

“I feel like I’ve been pullingpunches,” wrote Alexandria Oca-sio-Cortez, who is challenging alongtime Democratic incumbent,Joe Crowley of New York, in a pri-mary. “Do you ever get any push-back from voters, or those whodon’t want ‘party infighting?’”

Within the hour, peers fromTexas, Washington State andNorth Carolina had weighed in:Keep up the fight.

“We’re not trying to ask permis-sion to get in the door,” Ms. Ocasio-Cortez, a 28-year-old organizer onBernie Sanders’ presidential cam-paign, said in an interview.

As Democratic women run forHouse, Senate and state offices inhistoric numbers this year, manyare bucking the careful and cau-tious ways of politics. As StaceyAbrams showed last week, a blackwoman can win the Democraticnomination for governor in Geor-gia by running a proudly liberalcampaign, for instance. For doz-ens of these candidates, con-fronting President Trump andwinning seats and offices forDemocrats are not the only goals:They want to run and win on theirown terms. Some are coming fortheir own party. And many are notwaiting their turn, as past genera-tions were mostly content to do.

Like Ms. Abrams, many of thesechallengers are women who leanleft, and many are women of color,raising pointed questions for aDemocratic Party wrestling withits relationship to identity politics.Some are mounting primary chal-

Gloves Off,Women Spar

In ’18 RacesBy SUSAN CHIRA

and MATT FLEGENHEIMER

Continued on Page A16

WASHINGTON — As a candi-date, Donald J. Trump claimedthat the United States govern-ment had known in advanceabout the Sept. 11 attacks. He

hinted that An-tonin Scalia, aSupreme Courtjustice who died inhis sleep two years

ago, had been murdered. And foryears, Mr. Trump pushed thenotion that President BarackObama had been born in Kenyarather than Honolulu, makinghim ineligible for the presidency.

None of that was true.Last week, President Trump

promoted new, unconfirmedaccusations to suit his politicalnarrative: that a “criminal deepstate” element within Mr. Oba-ma’s government planted a spydeep inside his presidentialcampaign to help his rival, Hilla-ry Clinton, win — a scheme hebranded “Spygate.” It was thelatest indication that a presidentwho has for decades trafficked inconspiracy theories has broughtthem from the fringes of publicdiscourse to the Oval Office.

Now that he is president, Mr.Trump’s baseless stories of se-cret plots by powerful interestsappear to be having a distincteffect. Among critics, they havefanned fears that he is erodingpublic trust in institutions, un-dermining the idea of objectivetruth and sowing widespreadsuspicions about the governmentand news media that mirror hisown.

“The effect on the life of thenation of a president inventingconspiracy theories in order todistract attention from legitimateinvestigations or other things hedislikes is corrosive,” said JonMeacham, a presidential histori-an and biographer. “The diabol-ical brilliance of the Trump strat-egy of disinformation is thatmany people are simply going tohear the charges and counter-charges, and decide that theremust be something to thembecause the president of theUnited States is saying them.”

The effects were evident inWashington on Thursday, whenthe Justice Department held apair of unusual briefings withlawmakers to share sensitiveinformation about the special

TRUMP EMBRACESSHADOWY PLOTS,

ERODING TRUST

THEORIES FROM FRINGES

Agencies Undermined byClaims of ‘Spygate’

and ‘Deep State’

By JULIE HIRSCHFELD DAVISand MAGGIE HABERMAN

Continued on Page A14

NEWSANALYSIS

Sometime before dawn onApril 14, David Buckel left hissmall brick house on the edge ofProspect Park in Brooklyn,pulling a shopping cart. He passedthe magnolia tree in the garden,the stone sculptures he had made.Then instead of walking to work,as he usually did on Saturdays, hewent into the park.

He turned onto the road thatloops around the meadows andball fields, and after less than aquarter of a mile, he veered ontothe grass. The place he chosewould surprise people later, whenthey came with flowers: It wasn’ta plaza or a spot where crowds

gathered — just a stretch ofpatchy lawn on the shoulder of theroad.

It’s not clear how long Mr.Buckel stood there, or when hedoused himself with gas, but at5:55 a.m., as the light began togather before sunrise, he sent anemail to the news media explain-ing what he was about to do. Thefirst 911 call came at 6:08 a.m.:man on fire.

When responders arrived, theflames were going out. Mr. Buckel,a prominent civil rights lawyerturned environmental advocate,

Seeking to Divine What DroveA Defender to Set Himself Afire

By ANNIE CORREAL

Continued on Page A20

Nine months after the Islamic Statewas driven from Mosul, the Iraqi city isshowing verve and energy. PAGE A8

INTERNATIONAL A4-10

Signs of Life in Mosul

Liberal evangelicals held a revival nearLiberty University to protest Jerry Fal-well Jr.’s ties to the president. PAGE A11

NATIONAL A11-18

Moral Objection to Trumpism

De Beers is getting into the lab-createddiamond business with a new line ofaffordable fashion jewelry. PAGE B1

Diamonds Made Whenever

Paul Krugman PAGE A22

EDITORIAL, OP-ED A22-23

ROME — He’s been called“gray,” “invisible” and “gentle tothe point of seeming fragile.” Sil-vio Berlusconi, the former primeminister, once compared him to “amonk.”

But on Monday, Italy’s quiet,white-haired president, SergioMattarella, emerged as the mostcontentious figure in Italian andEuropean politics. His refusal toconfirm a euroskeptic economistas a government minister set offthe collapse of a populist coalitionhours before it was expected totake control of the European Un-ion’s fourth largest economy.

Mr. Mattarella’s defendershailed him as the courageous pro-tector of Italy’s democracy, insti-tutions and financial health, whilefuming populists sought to make

the usually revered figure of theItalian head of state the country’spublic enemy No. 1. They calledfor his impeachment, saying hehad overstepped his constitu-tional bounds with delusions ofgrandeur, blocked the will of thepeople and destroyed Italian de-mocracy.

In response, Mr. Mattarella pri-vately plugged along.

On Monday morning, as mar-kets rose and fell with the whip-lashing events in Italy, Mr.Mattarella gave a new mandate toform a government to CarloCottarelli, a respected economist,former International MonetaryFund official and Italian govern-ment appointee, who told report-

Italian President Sinks CoalitionTo Extinguish Anti-Euro Flames

By JASON HOROWITZ

Continued on Page A6

PARIS — The 4-year-old boyseemed to be suspended from abalcony. An adult standing on anearby balcony seemed power-less to help. Disaster seemed theonly possible outcome.

Then, to the nimble rescue onthe streets of Paris on Saturdayevening, came a young manwhom some French people havestarted to call the Spider-Man ofthe 18th, referring to the arron-dissement of Paris where theepisode unfolded.

With a combination of grit, agil-ity and muscle, the man hauledhimself hand over hand from onebalcony to another, springingfrom one parapet to grasp the nextone up. A crowd that had gatheredbefore he began his daring exploiturged him ever upward, accord-ing to onlookers’ video that was

shared widely on social media.Finally, after scaling four bal-

conies, the man reached the childand pulled him to safety. And sud-denly, an act of individual courageand resourcefulness began to playinto Europe’s fraught and polar-ized debate about outsiders, im-migrants and refugees.

The man, identified asMamoudou Gassama, 22, is a mi-grant from Mali, a troubled formerFrench colony in northwest Af-rica, who journeyed throughBurkina Faso, Niger and Libyabefore making the dangerousMediterranean Sea crossing to It-aly and arriving in France in Sep-tember, without documentation.

On Monday, after his heroic res-cue of the boy, he met with Presi-dent Emmanuel Macron. Now, hewill get the requisite documenta-tion to live legally in France.

“I told him that in recognition of

Migrant ‘Spider-Man’ Rescues 4-Year-Old and Wins Paris’s HeartBy AURELIEN BREEDEN

and ALAN COWELL

Mamoudou Gassama’s daring rescue on Saturday in Paris.TAREK DANDACH, VIA REUTERS

Continued on Page A7

Starbucks is under fire over its biastraining. It’s not perfect, but it’s a start,Andrew Ross Sorkin writes. PAGE B1

BUSINESS DAY B1-5

Skepticism for Starbucks

Doctors in San Francisco treated a fetuswith an often fatal blood disorder. Thechild survived, but the long-term prog-nosis is still uncertain. PAGE D1

SCIENCE TIMES D1-8

A Life Saved Before Birth

It could take up to 15 years, an expertsaid, to be sure the rogue state no long-er has nuclear weapons. PAGE A10

Disarming North Korea

Officials in Wildwood, N.J., put a park-ing lot for cars (four-wheel-drive only)directly on the sand. PAGE A19

NEW YORK A19-21

Parking on the Beach

Trailing at halftime, Golden State re-bounded to beat the Rockets and winthe Western Conference finals. PAGE B6

SPORTSTUESDAY B6-12

Now It’s Warriors vs. Cavaliers

At Sotheby’s, the rapper ASAP Rockyput himself in a glass booth and, amongother things, dunked his head in icewater. Why? Well, it was a metaphor forsomething or another. PAGE C1

ARTS C1-6

Sinking Inside the Box

Revived again, the series eventuallyre-approaches the manic pleasures ofthe show’s heyday, James Poniewoziksays. But it takes time getting there,and doesn’t stay long. PAGE C1

It’s ‘Arrested Development’

Late EditionToday, clouds then some sunshine,noticeably warmer, high 87. Tonight,partly cloudy, low 66. Tomorrow,clouds and sunshine, not as warm,high 75. Weather map, Page B8.

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