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Harlem in Disorder: A Spatial History of How Racial Violence Changed in 1935

Frank Wells arrested

Sometime during the disorder, Officer Eppler of the 48th Precinct arrested Frank Wells, a twenty-six-year-old Black man, for allegedly "hurling an automobile hub through a cafeteria window on 125th Street," according to a story in the New York Herald Tribune. It is possible that it was windows in the Willow Cafeteria that Wells allegedly broke; it is the only one of the four businesses on West 125th Street identified as cafeterias in the MCCH business survey that was reported as having broken windows, with the other three also located on blocks east and west of those on which disorder was reported damaged. However, that is not certain enough evidence to link Wells to that location. Wells lived near 125th Street at 155 West 123rd Street, near the corner of 7th Avenue, so could have been drawn to the noise and crowds around Kress' store early in the disorder, when store windows on 125th Street were broken.

Wells was likely arrested in the early hours of the disorder; that was the time of the arrests of the handful of others mentioned with him in the New York Herald Tribune story. That story reported him "locked up at West 123rd Street station," the charge against him "to depend on value of the window." Malicious mischief, the offense involving damage to property that was the charge most often made against those alleged to have broken windows, was a felony if the damage was more than $25. Only the New York Daily News list of those arrested reported that charge against Wells. The charge was inciting a riot in the list published in the Afro-American, Atlanta World, Norfolk Journal and Guide, assault in the list published in the New York Evening Journal, and disorderly conduct in the list published in the New York American. Wells does not appear in the 28th Precinct Police blotter, perhaps because of how early in the disorder he was arrested. On March 20, when Wells appeared in the Harlem Magistrates Court, one of the last arraigned after being one of the first arrested, the charge recorded in the docket book was disorderly conduct. He appears to have been one of a small number of those arrested to be represented by a lawyer: "Ed Kuntz, 100 5th Ave." is recorded in the docket book as his attorney. Edward Kuntz, a lawyer with the International Labor Defense, also represented Daniel Miller, Sam Jamison, Murray Samuels and Claudio Diabolo, the men arrested for picketing in front of Kress's store immediately before the disorder began, in the Court of Special Sessions, and questioned witnesses in hearings of the MCCH commission.

Investigating the case against Wells took an unusually long time. He returned to court on March 26, at which time his bail was set at $500. A note on the docket book appears to indicate that someone put up that bail, which did not happen with any of the others arrested during the disorder. Wells returned to court a further five times, according to the docket book, on April 9, 12, 17, 18, and finally on April 20, when he was convicted and sentenced to thirty days in the Workhouse.

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