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Investigations (April 6-April 19)
Whatever plans Hays had for continuing the investigation of the killing of Lloyd Hobbs, they were disrupted when he read in the press that the district attorney had presented the case to the grand jury on April 10. They decided not to indict Patrolman McInerney. Having listened to the testimony of the eyewitnesses, Hays clearly found that decision surprising. He immediately wrote to the district attorney, asking if those witnesses had testified before the grand jury and who else had given evidence. He told the district attorney he was anxious to have any other witnesses appear in a MCCH hearing to publicly present all the evidence "so that if there was any justification for the shooting, the public may know it." Dodge replied the next day that "the District Attorney's office called every witness who knew anything with reference to this case against McInerney." That list included all those who had testified in the public hearing. Those who had not appeared were Louis Eisenberg, the owner of the store allegedly looted, Detective O’Brien, who had conducted the police investigation of the shooting, and McInerney and Watterson. The MCCH could now hear the testimony of the three police officers, as the grand jury's decision meant that the district attorney’s restriction on officers involved in legal proceedings testifying no longer applied to them.
Tartar also continued to gather information about the killing of Lloyd Hobbs, as well as three other cases about which the MCCH still had to hear testimony. He interviewed the storekeepers on the block where Lloyd Hobbs was shot, gathered records from the 23rd Precinct about the cases of Thomas Aiken and Edward Laurie, and interviewed Aiken and the aunt of James Thompson, the other Black man known to have been killed by police during the disorder.
Adding to the backlog of witnesses, the MCCH learned of additional incidents of police brutality. By the time the MCCH met on April 19, the subcommittee had decided “there were far too many” cases for all of them to be investigated in public hearings, Villard reported. “Some other investigations” would be made of the other cases. (They later approached the Harlem Lawyers Association to take on that task.) For the public hearings, the focus remained the cases that the MCCH had begun investigating the previous week.
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- James Tartar's investigation of the killing of Lloyd Hobbs
- Arthur Garfield Hays to William Dodge, April 11, 1935, "Harlem, Mayor's Commission on Conditions in," Box 26, Folder 1, Arthur Garfield Hays Papers (Princeton University).
- “Report of the Secretary, Meeting of April 19th, 1935," Subject Files, Box 383, Folder 10 (Roll 184), Records of Mayor Fiorello H. La Guardia, 1934-1945 (New York City Municipal Archives).
- Dodge to Arthur Garfield Hays, April 12, 1935, "Harlem, Mayor's Commission on Conditions in," Box 26, Folder 1, Arthur Garfield Hays Papers (Princeton University).