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Arthur Bennett arrested
A story in the Home News was the only evidence that connected Bennett and James Bright to 339 Lenox Avenue. Bennett appeared in lists of those charged with disorderly conduct published in the Atlanta World, Afro-American, and Norfolk Journal and Guide, and in the New York Evening Journal. Inexplicably, the 28th Precinct police blotter recorded "Annoyed pedestrians" as the charge against him; no one else arrested during the disorder other than Bright was charged with that offense. Bennett appeared in the Harlem Magistrates Court on March 20 charged with disorderly conduct, with Detective Perretti recorded in the docket book as the arresting officer. He alleged that Bennett had thrown "stones through the window of the store at 339 Lenox Ave.," according to the Home News story on those proceedings. However, if police had evidence of such an attack Bright would have been charged with malicious mischief. Charging him instead with disorderly conduct generally indicated that they only had evidence that he had been in the crowd around the store when the windows were broken. Magistrate Renaud convicted Bennett of disorderly conduct. He returned to the court for sentencing on March 23, and received a term of one month in the workhouse "for breaking windows" from Magistrate Renaud in proceedings reported in the Afro-American, New York Age, New York Daily News, and New York Times. None of those stories gave an address for the store whose windows Bennett had allegedly broken.
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This page references:
- "Transcripts of Police Blotter - Precinct 28, March 19 & 20, 1935," MCCH - Juvenile Delinquency - 1935-36, Departmental Correspondence. Box 34, Folder 1 (Roll 171), Records of Mayor Fiorello H. La Guardia, 1934-1945.
- New York Penal Law, § 722-724: Disorderly Conduct
- "Blamed for Riot, Harlem Girl Fined. Disorders Fatal to Three Laid to Her Screaming in Store Where Boy Stole Knife. 5 MEN GO TO WORKHOUSE. Dodge Expects Arrest of Red Leaders," New York Times, March 24, 1935, 19.
- Harlem Magistrates Court docket book
- "Riot Deaths Mounting Daily as Fourth Victim Succumbs. Extra Police Still on Duty; Many Sentenced to Workhouse Terms," New York Age, March 30, 1935, 1.
- "Dodge Plans War on Reds," Daily News, March 24, 1935, 4.
- "Harlem's Third Rioter is Dead; Many Are Fined," Afro-American, March 30, 1935, 12.