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

John Kennedy Jones arrested

Around 12.30 AM, Patrolman James Lamattina of the 66th Division allegedly saw "large number" of people gather in front of William's Shoe Store at 333 Lenox Avenue. Then John Kennedy Jones "motioning with his hand, said to the others "come on," and threw a rock that "broke the plate glass window" of the store. Other people in the crowd also threw "stones and sticks" at the window, Lamattina alleged in his Magistrates Court affidavit. At some point Lamattina arrested Jones, a twenty-four-year-old Black laborer; the affidavit made no mention of the circumstances of the arrest. No other members of the crowd were arrested. The shoe store had been attacked at least twice earlier in the disorder. A display window had been smashed and merchandise stolen sometime between 9.45 PM and 11.20 PM, and another window allegedly kicked in and three shoes taken at 11.20 PM, when a patrolman arrested Julian Rogers. In the half hour before Lamattina arrested Jones, other police officers arrested three men for breaking windows near West 126th Street and Lenox Avenue, Leon Mauraine and David Smith at 318 Lenox Avenue and Bernard Smith at 317 Lenox Avenue. Multiple arrests by different officers indicated that a number of police were stationed at the intersection at that time. All three of the arresting officers came from precincts outside Harlem.

Jones lived at 135 West 119th Street according to the information he gave in his examination in the Harlem Magistrates Court. Some distance from the shoe store, this block between Lenox and 7th Avenue was in an area south of 125th Street with a mix of Black and white residents.



Jones appeared in the lists of those arrested and charged with "inciting to riot" published in the Atlanta World, Afro-American and Norfolk Journal and Guide, and in the New York Evening Journal. Similarly, the 28th Precinct Police Blotter recorded the charge against him as "inciting to riot. When Jones was arraigned in the Harlem Magistrates Court on March 20, the docket book recorded the charge against him as riot for leading others in the crowd to attack the store. Crossed out was an additional charge of malicious mischief for damage to the store window. That charge did appear on the Magistrate Court affidavit in a handwritten note that also listed the forms of riot being charged. Reporting the proceeding in the Magistrates Court, a story in the Home News mixed the two charges together to describe Jones as having "urged the crowd to smash windows," but being held for the Grand Jury "on a charge of malicious mischief" for which urging a crowd was not relevant. That garbled account likely indicated that Jones faced both charges, as did the six other men who allegedly both urged crowds to break windows and broke windows themselves. Only two of those men, Leroy Brown and Bernard Smith, had both charges recorded in the Harlem Magistrates Court docket book.

On March 20, Magistrate Renaud held Jones for the grand jury and set bail at $1000. A week later, when Jones appeared before the grand jury, they decided to transfer him to the Court of Special Sessions for trial on misdemeanor forms of the charges (as the malicious mischief charge was not recorded in the docket book Jones was not categorized as being charged with that offense). The judges convicted Jones and on April 1 gave him a suspended sentence, recorded in the 28th Precinct Police Blotter.

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