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

"Plan to Indict More in Riots," New York Evening Journal, March 23, 1935, 5.

In the New York Evening Journal

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August Miller killed Around midnight, August Miller, a fifty-six-year-old white handyman, suffered a head injury in the midst of a crowd at 126th Street and Lenox Avenue. A cab driver took him to the Joint Disease Hospital, according to the police complaint report. It was 12:30 AM when Dr. Millbank attended Miller, so likely around midnight when he collapsed in the crowd. Millbank diagnosed him as suffering a possible skull fracture "received in some unknown manner during disorder," according to hospital records, and admitted him for treatment. However, after Miller died on March 22, the medical examiner conducted an autopsy which he reported showed that the cause of death was a cerebral hemorrhage, “a natural cause, nothing suspicious.”

Miller appeared in three of the seven newspaper lists of the injured published on March 20, those in the New York Evening Journal, New York Post, and New York American, among those the New York Herald Tribune reported still in hospital on March 21, and among those listed as injured in the Atlanta World on March 27. His death was widely reported on March 23, in some cases with information on how he had been killed. The most direct explanations came in stories published in the New York Herald Tribune, New York Evening Journal, and Times Union, and in the Associated Press story, which reported Miller had been "beaten by rioters." The Home News offered the additional detail that Miller was "struck by several bricks, knocked down and kicked around by the mob." The New York Times and New York Sun did not attribute Miller's death to anyone, only going as far as saying Miller was "in the midst of rioters" when injured, while the Brooklyn Daily Eagle even more obliquely said his death came "during the height of the disorders." The New York Post implied he had been assaulted in a different way. Noting where he had been injured, the story added that, "He was one of the half a dozen white men seriously hurt during the disturbance." Lists of those killed in the Daily News and stories in the New York Herald Tribune and in the Black newspapers the New York Age and New York Amsterdam News, as well as the lists of those killed published in the Afro-American and Norfolk Journal and Guide and Pittsburgh Courier simply listed Miller's injury, a fractured skull.

Miller himself never described what happened to him. It was the taxi driver who brought him to the hospital who provided the information on where he had collapsed to the nurse to whom he delivered Miller, according to the detective who investigated the case. Soon after Miller arrived in the hospital, he briefly regained consciousness. Patrolman Anthony Kaminsky, who had been called when the injured man was admitted, was able to question him. After asking his name, address and age, the officer told a hearing of the MCCH that he asked "how he received his injuries?" As Miller started to answer, he lost consciousness again. He died on March 22 without again regaining consciousness.

Detective John O'Brien was assigned to investigate Miller's injury at 2:00 AM; at the time he was in the midst of investigating the shooting of Lloyd Hobbs. He visited the location where Miller had been injured, questioning business owners, residents, and taxi drivers without finding witnesses to what had happened or locating the taxi driver who had brought him to the hospital. As a result, O'Brien was unable to establish the circumstances of Miller's injury. The detective also visited Miller's home, 1674 McCombs Road in the Bronx, and spoke with the superintendents of the building who employed him as a handyman. They had seen him there about midnight. There was also no information on why he traveled to Harlem, but he must have collapsed almost as soon as he arrived, likely by subway. His employers did report Miller had been “acting peculiar for some months previous.” His family were in Germany, so his employers identified the body. Confusingly, when O'Brien testified at a public hearing of the MCCH on April 20, he mentioned speaking to Miller's sister, who had seen him around 10:00 PM, a meeting not recorded in police records. When the medical examiner reported that he had not died as a result of a fractured skull or suspiciously, O'Brien closed his investigation on March 24.

The version of the case reported to Arthur Garfield Hays by Hyman Glickstein, the lawyer from his law firm working to gather evidence for the MCCH subcommittee on crime, gave the police a greater role that clearly raised their suspicions about the circumstances of Miller's injury: "According to police report [Miller] died of natural causes and was merely picked up by the police in a dead or dying condition." Once testimony in the public hearing put a taxi driver in the place of police in delivering the injured man to the hospital, little basis remained for holding them responsible for Miller's injuries. However, ILD lawyers who questioned Detective O'Brien when he testified about his investigation at a hearing of the MCCH remained unconvinced that Miller died of natural causes. Rather, they suggested he had been struck by police, and his injury had not been accurately reported to prevent officers from being charged. Eventually, Hays cut off their questioning of O'Brien, saying it had no basis unless somebody could "provide evidence how Miller came by his injuries."

Miller was included in lists of those killed in the disorder published on March 23 and 24, and in Black weekly newspapers on March 30, without mention of the autopsy. On March 31 the Home News also included him in its count of those killed in the disorder even while noting that Miller's death "was later found to have been due to heart disease, probably aggravated by exertion and excitement." The Daily News, New York American, Daily Mirror, Times Union, the Associated Press, Afro American, and Chicago Defender reported the death of Lloyd Hobbs on March 30 as the fourth death resulting from the disorder without specifying the other three individuals killed. None of those newspapers included Edward Laurie among those killed, so they also still included Miller after the autopsy, along with James Thompson and Andrew Lyons. So too did the New York Herald Tribune, which identified Hobbs as the fifth death resulting from the riot. (The Daily Worker initially reported Hobbs as the fourth death, on April 1, but a week later referred to him as the third death, while the New York Times reported his death without reference to how many others had been killed).
In Harlem court on March 22 (18) Only the stories in the New York Times and Daily News described the scene at the courtroom on March 22. Police searched several who entered courtroom for weapons, according to the former story, and turned away those who “bore indications of connection with the Young Liberators, the Communist organization which fomented the disorder” according to Daily News. Neither of those stories indicated that police had to control a crowd like that which had gathered two days earlier. However, the Daily Mirror reported that "several hundred Colored persons" "thronged" outside the court. That story was discounted given that reporters from other publications had noted the presence of crowds earlier in the week, so it was likely that they would have again on this day if they had been present.

The Daily Mirror story did provide a context for the day's proceedings, that "Magistrate Renaud began yesterday the work of cleaning his calendar of the remainder of 85 cases growing out of the Harlem riots." Only the New York Times explicitly offered a similar framing, that Renaud had "disposed of the cases of Negroes accused in the rioting and looting Tuesday night and Wednesday morning." The number of cases in the Daily Mirror story does not fit the legal records. No newspaper story identified all those who appeared in the court. The Home News, as it did on other dates, mentioned the largest number, ten of the seventeen. Its story described the charges against three of those convicted, Elizabeth Tai, Arthur Davis, and Herbert Hunter and reported testimony by the storeowner whose business Daughty Shavos and Clifford Mitchell had allegedly looted. Tai, Davis, and Hunter's convictions were the hearings reported most widely and in the most detail, also mentioned in the New York Evening Journal, Daily News, and Daily Worker. Mitchell and Shavos, appearing in the Magistrates Court for the first time and sent to the grand jury, were also mentioned in the New York Evening Journal, Daily News, and Daily Mirror.

The three men discharged and rearrested as they had been indicted by Dodge's grand jury, James Hughes, Charles Saunders, and Isaac Daniels, are identified in the Home News and are the only individuals whose appearance was reported by the New York Post. Only Hughes and Saunders are mentioned by the Daily Worker, which describes them simply as held for the grand jury, omitting any reference to their discharge. Of the five additional men Renaud sent to the grand jury, Amie Taylor and Arthur Merritt are mentioned in the Home News, New York Evening Journal Daily News, and Daily Worker. No newspaper mentioned the appearances of the other three men sent to the grand jury, James Williams, John Henry, and Oscar Leacock (although the Home News had reported that morning that Henry and Leacock would appear, they were not in its story on the hearings published the next day, March 23).

Nor did any publication mention the four men sent to the Court of Special Sessions, William Jones, Henry Goodwin, Frederick Harwell, and Jackie Ford. Ford, the third man to appear in court for the first time on March 22, with Shavos and Mitchell, was not mentioned in any of the stories on the day's hearings, although his arrest that day was reported by the New York Post, New York World-Telegram, and La Prensa. Paul Boyett, remanded a second time, also did not appear in stories about the day's hearings.

According to stories in the Daily Mirror and the Home News, police also brought Daniel Miller and the three Young Liberators to Harlem court on March 22. They did not appear before the magistrate, according to the Home News, because just before the hearing began, police found out that they had been indicted by Dodge's grand jury. The Daily Mirror reported only the consequence of that news, that they waited for a bench warrant to be served that would allow them to be discharged and rearrested as Hughes, Saunders, and Daniels had been. By the next day, March 23, several newspapers reported that process would occur at a later hearing, on March 25.

The uneven coverage of these hearings is a further example of the incomplete and unreliable nature of newspaper stories about legal proceedings. That the mix of cases the stories reported included convictions and referrals of those charged with felonies but not any of those sent to the Court of Special Sessions suggests newspapers focused only on the more serious allegations. That focus is also evident in how the Home News emphasized the charges against Tai, Davis, and Hunter, notwithstanding that the outcome of the prosecution and short sentence indicated that they had been involved in less serious acts. The story reported their arrest for "stealing groceries" and that they had been found guilty of disorderly conduct and sentenced to five and ten days in the Workhouse, before noting that the original charge of burglary had been reduced by the court without addressing the implications of that change.
Elizabeth Tai arrested Sometime during the disorder, Detective Phillips of the 28th Precinct arrested Elizabeth Tai, a twenty-eight-year-old Black resident of 1654 3rd Avenue, for allegedly stealing groceries from a store at 340 Lenox Avenue. She may have reached into an already broken window, as a story in the Home News specified that Tai's alleged offense occurred "after the windows had been smashed." The store's address was mentioned only in that story. Both the story in the Home News and one in the Daily Worker reported that Tai had allegedly taken groceries. At the same time, Detective Phillips also arrested Arthur Davis, a thirty-six-year-old Black man, for allegedly taking groceries from the store. The arrests likely occurred around 12:30 AM.

Tai appeared in the list of those charged with burglary published in the Atlanta World, Afro-American, and Norfolk Journal and Guide, and the list published in the New York Evening Journal. The 28th Precinct police blotter also recorded the charge against Tai as burglary, with the note "Burglarised store during riot." Her home was some way from Harlem, on the east side of Central Park between 92nd and 93rd Streets.

Tai was arraigned in the Harlem Magistrates Court on March 20 with Arthur Davis and another individual arrested by Detective Phillips, Herbert Hunter, also charged with burglary and arrested with them, according to the Home News. However, that story did not directly state that Hunter was charged with looting the same store. Magistrate Renaud remanded all three to appear again in court (he sent two others arrested by Phillips who appeared at the same time charged with malicious mischief, Charles Wright and William Norris, to the Court of Special Sessions). The docket book recorded only Phillips' name and precinct; the stories in the Home News and Daily Worker identified him as a detective.

When Tai appeared in court again, on March 22, the docket book recorded that the charge had been reduced to disorderly conduct, the original charge crossed out. The "court" reduced the charge, according to the Home News, doing the same in the cases of Davis and Hunter. Had the police presented evidence Tai had stolen merchandise, she would have been charged with either burglary or larceny; had they presented evidence that she had broken windows, the charge would have been malicious mischief. The charge of disorderly conduct suggested that she may only have been part of a crowd near the store. Magistrate Renaud found Tai guilty, an outcome reported in the stories in the Daily Worker, Daily News, and New York Evening Journal as well as the Home News. He also found Davis and Hunter guilty. Tai was one of only three women charged with looting in the disorder.

Renaud sentenced Tai to pay a fine of $25 or serve five days in the Workhouse, according to the Harlem Magistrates Court docket book, as he did Davis. The magistrate gave Hunter a longer sentence of ten days without the alternative of a fine. Tai was unable to pay the fine, according to the Home News, so was sent to the Workhouse, a sentence also recorded in the 28th Precinct police blotter and stories in the Daily News, New York Evening Journal, and Daily Worker.

Tai was the name recorded in the docket book, and in the lists published in Atlanta World, Afro-American, and Norfolk Journal and Guide, and the New York Evening Journal. It was recorded differently in other sources less reliable than the legal record: as Tae in the Home News and 28th Precinct police blotter, as Pae in the Daily News and New York Evening Journal, and as Cay in the Daily Worker. If it was recorded correctly by the court clerk, Tai was a common last name among Chinese living overseas, suggesting that Elizabeth was married to a Chinese man. Given it was an unusual last name for a resident of Harlem, the arrested woman may be the Elizabeth Tai who died in Harlem Hospital on April 20, 1945. She had been born in Louisville, Kentucky in 1905, and was a widow at the time of her death, with her husband's name transcribed as "Hawley Tai." That Elizabeth Tai had been a domestic worker, who lived at 124 West 135th Street at the time of her death.
Arthur Davis arrested Sometime during the disorder, Detective Phillips of the 28th Precinct arrested Arthur Davis, a thirty-six-year-old Black resident of 42 West 126th Street, for allegedly stealing groceries from a grocery store at 340 Lenox Avenue. Davis may not have broken the store windows, as a story in the Home News specified that Davis' alleged offense occurred "after the windows had been smashed." The store's address was mentioned only in that story. Both the Home News and the Daily Worker reported the Davis had allegedly taken groceries. At the same time, Detective Phillips also arrested Elizabeth Tai, a twenty-eight-year-old Black women, for allegedly taking groceries from the store. The arrests likely occurred around 12:30 AM.

Davis appeared in the list of those charged with burglary published in the Atlanta World, Afro-American, and Norfolk Journal and Guide, and the list published in the New York Evening Journal. The 28th Precinct police blotter also recorded the charge against Davis as burglary, with the note "Burglarised store during riot."

Davis was arraigned in the Harlem Magistrates Court on March 20 with Tai and another individual arrested by Detective Phillips, Herbert Hunter, also charged with burglary, and arrested with them according to the Home News. However, that story did not directly state that Hunter was charged with looting the same store. Magistrate Renaud remanded all three to appear again in court. (He sent two others arrested by Phillips who appeared at the same time charged with malicious mischief, Charles Wright and William Norris, to the Court of Special Sessions). The docket book recorded only Phillips' name and precinct; the stories in the Home News and Daily Worker identified him as a detective. Both the docket book and 28th Precinct police blotter gave Davis' age as thirty-six years; both lists and all the newspaper stories gave his age as thirty-two-years.

When Davis appeared in court again, on March 22, the docket book recorded no change in the charge against him, but a story in the Home News reported that "the Court" had reduced the charge from burglary to disorderly conduct, as it had for both Tai and Hunter. In Tai's case, the docket book did record that the charge had been reduced to disorderly conduct. Had the police presented evidence Davis had stolen merchandise, he would have been charged with either burglary or larceny; had they presented evidence that he had broken windows, the charge would have been malicious mischief. The charge of disorderly conduct suggested he may only have been part of a crowd near the store. Magistrate Renaud found Davis guilty, an outcome reported in the stories in the Daily News and New York Evening Journal as well as the Home News. He also found Tai and Hunter guilty.

Renaud sentenced Davis to pay a fine of $25 or serve five days in the Workhouse, according to the Harlem Magistrates Court docket book, the same sentence he gave Tai. He gave Hunter a longer sentence of ten days without the alternative of a fine. Davis was unable to pay the fine, according to the Home News, so was sent to the Workhouse. The sentence also recorded in the 28th Precinct police blotter and stories in the Daily News, New York Evening Journal, and Daily Worker.
Arthur Merritt arrested At about 1:30 AM, Officer George Nelson of the 15th Precinct was “on duty” near Sol Weit and Isaac Popiel's grocery store at 343 Lenox Avenue when he saw a group of about five people gathered around the store, he later told a Probation officer. As he watched, Arthur Merritt, a forty-two-year-old Black painter, allegedly broke the store window with a hammer. The group then climbed through the windows and took groceries — although likely not all 126 pounds of butter, 90 dozen eggs, eight cartons of cigarettes, a ham, and other food products, as well as $14 from the cash register, the owners reported had been taken. By the time Nelson got to the store, the group had run back out, according to the Magistrate's Court affidavit; he told a Probation officer he arrested Merritt “a short distance away.” He found two cans of beans, a can of milk, and a can of tuna in Merritt's possession, as well as a hammer. Those details of what was allegedly found on Merritt are not included in the affidavit, although that evidence is crucial to the charge made against him. Notes on the affidavit did record the total stock lost, with calculations that seem to be an effort to establish the value of that stock.

Merritt denied looting the store or participating in the disorder, telling a Probation officer he was on his way home after visiting his sister, Pauline. She lived at 108 West 130th Street; he lived at 134 West 121st Street. Both address were between 7th and Lenox Avenues, so his route home could have taken him down Lenox Avenue. He would been walking through the blocks north of 125th street that saw the most extensive reported looting of the disorder, much of which occurred around the time Nelson arrested him. As Merritt was the only one of the group Officer Nelson claimed he saw who was arrested, it was likely he was on his own or with another officer. That Nelson saw the attack on the store without being able to prevent it suggests he was some distance away, most likely on one of the corners of Lenox Avenue and West 127th Street, allowing some possibility that he misidentified Merritt among the crowds milling about.

Arthur Merritt appeared in the Harlem Magistrate’s Court on March 20. A lawyer, Albert Halperin, represented him; only seventeen others arrested in the disorder had lawyers appear for them. No information could be found on the lawyer. Merritt was in the list of those arrested in the Atlanta World, Afro-American, and Norfolk Journal and Guide, and the list in the New York Evening Journal. His criminal record showed an arrest for grand larceny in 1920, which resulted in a suspended sentence, so Magistrate Renaud ordered him held without bail. Returned to the court on March 22, Merritt was sent to the grand jury, an appearance reported in the Home News, Daily Worker, Daily News, and New York Evening Journal. After the grand jury indicted him on April 9, he agreed to plead guilty to petit larceny on April 12. Ten days later, Judge James Garrett Wallace sentenced him to three months in the workhouse, an outcome recorded in the 28th Precinct police blotter as well as the Probation Department case file.

Born in New Jersey, Merritt had lived in Harlem for fifteen years, likely arriving after his discharge from the US Army in 1919. His Probation Department case file provides fragmentary information on his life. He had married twenty-one-year-old Blanche Morris two months before arriving in the city, in Newport News, Virginia, where he was stationed. Blanche had a six-year-old son, Charles. At the beginning of 1920, Merritt started work as a porter for Weingarten Bros., at 151 West 30th Street, living at 434 Lenox Avenue. After nine months, he lost that job when he was caught stealing dresses from his employers; twenty-four dresses worth $700 were found in a trunk in his apartment, but he allegedly stole clothing worth $2,000. No other details of the alleged theft are recorded by the probation officer, but Merritt and his wife pled guilty to petit larceny and received a suspended sentence, a lenient punishment for a theft of that scale. The probation investigation recorded May 1922 as the date of arrest, but based on the criminal record, that appears to be the date the couple were discharged from probation. There was no mention that they had jobs during those years, but their first daughter was born in 1922.

Around 1923, Merritt began working as a painter and as a janitor at 1027 Avenue St. John in the Bronx until 1926, living in the building, according to the Probation Department case file. However, the family appeared in the 1925 New York State census living at 906 Intervale Avenue, in a large household that now included three children, as well as Arthur's sister and brother-in-law, and two of Blanche's brothers, aged nineteen and twenty years. After the janitorial job ended, Merritt and his wife and children relocated first to 200 West 128th Street, and then to 109 West 144th Street, where a census enumerator found them in 1930.

Later in 1930, Arthur and Blanche separated, a result of his heavy drinking, according to the Probation Department investigation. For three years, the three children lived with Merritt, in apartments at 2170 7th Avenue for two years and then 34 West 132nd Street. He worked sporadically as a painter for a contractor based at 160 East 116th Street. However, in 1932 he was discharged as they had insufficient work for him. Several months later, Merritt found work for a real estate agent, but it was seasonal. By the beginning of 1934 he was evicted from his apartment after falling two months behind in the rent, and became unable to support his children. Found to be neglected children, they were put in their mother's care, after which Merritt appeared to have had limited contact with them and did not contribute to their support. He moved to a furnished room at 112 West 113th Street, leaving after a year for the room at 134 West 121st where he lived at the time of the disorder. Merritt remained in Harlem, and estranged from his family, after the disorder. When he registered for the draft, he gave his sister's address as his home, and an employer in the Bronx.
Clifford Mitchell arrested At 5:40 PM a day after the disorder, March 21, Detective Mark Redmond arrested Clifford Mitchell, a forty-six-year-old Black laborer, in 363 Lenox Avenue. He allegedly found "wearing apparel" worth "about $20" in Mitchell's possession, goods identified by Louis Levy as having been stolen from his dry goods store at 374 Lenox Avenue. There is no mention in the affidavit of why Redmond went to that address, or why Mitchell was there. Mitchell lived across the street, in an apartment in 362 Lenox Avenue, the building next to the one in which Levy's store was located. It would seem more likely that he was arrested at that address, rather than at 363 Lenox Ave, with the clerk mistakenly recording the building number. The other man charged with looting Levy's store, Daughty Shavos, was arrested at his home ten blocks to the south, at 40 West 119th Street around an hour later by another detective. There was also no mention of how police found him.

A note on the Magistrate's Court affidavit recorded the value of the goods found on the men as $50; the typewritten narrative on the form noted that the goods found on Mitchell were worth "around $20," so those found on Shavos would have been worth around $30.

Mitchell and Shavos are two of only nine men identified in the sources as having been arrested away from the stores they allegedly looted, a group making up one third (9 of 27) of the arrests for which that information is known (27 of 60).

Mitchell and Shavos were charged with burglary in the Harlem Magistrates Court on March 22, the last individuals arrested during the disorder to be arraigned in that court. The magistrate sent both to the grand jury, which on April 4 dismissed the charges against Mitchell and sent Shavos to the Court of Special Sessions to be charged with a misdemeanor. That outcome indicated that the grand jury had declined to charge Shavos with burglary, a felony, likely because of a lack of evidence he had broken into the store. Given that goods had been found in his possession, the charge against him would have been petit larceny, a misdemeanor, as the goods allegedly found in his possession had a value less than $100. There is no evidence of the outcome of that prosecution. Shavos' criminal record included an arrest as a disorderly person in Jersey City in June 1932, with no recorded disposition, while Mitchell had no record. While his record could conceivably have influenced how Shavos was treated, it would not explain the charges against Mitchell being dismissed. That outcome likely indicated a problem linking the clothing allegedly found with Mitchell either to him or to Levy's store.

The only newspaper coverage of the looting are stories in the Home News, New York Evening Journal, Daily Mirror, and Daily News reporting Mitchell and Shavos' appearance in the Magistrates Court. The stories in the Home News and Daily Mirror identified Levy and the store; the other two stories simply noted that the men had been held for the grand jury.
Louis Levy's dry goods store looted Around 11:00 PM, Louis Levy locked up his dry goods store at 374 Lenox Avenue and left for the night, likely going to his home at 636 West 174th Street. When he returned to the store around 3:00 AM, he found the window broken and $10,000 worth of textiles, clothing, and sundries stolen, the store "entirely cleaned out of its stock," according to the Daily Mirror. The owner of the jewelry store next door at 372 Lenox Avenue, Benjamin Zelvin, locked up his store around thirty minutes after Levy, so the store was likely attacked soon after that time. The Magistrates Court affidavit recorded Levy closing the store on March 18, the night before the disorder, and returning on March 22, two days after the disorder. It was likely that those dates are mistakes, and that he closed the store on March 19 and returned in the midst of the disorder, as several storeowners did on hearing what was happening in Harlem. But it was possible that Levy had been away from the store for some reason, as the two men charged with looting his store did not appear in court until March 22, among the last of those arrested to do so. Both Clifford Mitchell, a forty-six-year-old Black laborer, and Daughty Shavos, a twenty-one-year-old Black peddler, had been arrested the previous evening, a day after the disorder, at two different locations, in possession of "wearing apparel" with a combined value of $50 that Levy identified as part of his stock. How police found the men was not mentioned in the sources.

Levy appeared in Harlem Magistrates Court on March 22 to charge Mitchell and Shavos with burglary. The Magistrate sent both men to the grand jury. They dismissed the charges against Mitchell and sent Shavos to the Court of Special Sessions to be charged with a misdemeanor. There was no evidence of the outcome of that case.

The only mention of the looting in the press were stories in the New York Evening Journal, Daily Mirror, and Daily News that reported the appearance of the two men in the Magistrates Court. The story in the Daily Mirror identified Levy and the store and the value of the goods stolen; the other two stories simply noted that the men had been held for the grand jury.

Despite the scale of the damages claimed, Levy appeared to have continued to operate the dry goods store. In the second half of 1935, a white-owned dry goods store was recorded at 374 Lenox Avenue in the MCCH business survey. "L. Levy" was also visible on the signage for the storefront in the Tax Department photograph taken between 1939 and 1941.
Amie Taylor arrested Officer Harmon of the 18th Division arrested Amie Taylor, a twenty-one-year-old Black butcher, near Mario Pravia's candy store at 1953 7th Avenue around 11:30 PM. Harmon and at least one other police officer, Detective Harry Wolf of the 28th Precinct, reported seeing Taylor throw a stone at the store window and take merchandise from the window display. Wolf appeared as a witness on the Magistrates Court affidavit and an arresting officer with Harmon on Taylor's criminal record. Taylor was also not alone. "About 5 others" threw stones at the store and took merchandise at the same time, while Pravia and his wife watched from inside, but police managed to arrest only Taylor. Harmon allegedly found eighteen packets of chewing gum, valued at three cents each, in his possession. The Home News reported that a total of $200 of merchandise was taken from the store.

The New York Evening Journal identified a different officer as making the arrest, Deputy Chief Inspector John Ryan, in a vignette within the paper’s narrative of the disorder:
Deputy Chief Inspector John Ryan, in charge of all Manhattan detectives, figured in another incident in which police were forced to draw their revolvers, although no shot was fired. While speeding to the trouble zone, Ryan saw a group of men looting a store at 1952 Seventh ave. The detective chief, with his chauffeur, swung into action and attempted to round up the thieves. there was a terrific battle, but Ryan emerged from it with Amie Taylor, 21, as his prisoner.
No other sources support that account. The story's framing of the incident in relation to the force used by police did direct attention to the unremarked upon means by which police made arrests. The New York Evening Journal was one of several white newspapers that claimed that police showed restraint in responding to the disorder, and did not shoot at crowds until the after midnight, when looting became widespread. If police drew their revolvers but did not fire them in this "terrific battle," they likely used the gun butts as clubs, as they are in several photographs taken during the disorder.

Crowds had moved down 7th Avenue from West 125th Street around 10 PM. This event was the first this far south on the avenue. Taylor may have come from the opposite direction. He lived south of the store, at 1800 7th Avenue, next to Central Park, in an area home to Black, white, and Spanish speaking residents. Taylor's first name caused confusion about his identity. In the 28th Precinct police blotter, the name is "Annie," and he is identified as female, information likely responsible for Annie also being used in the list of those arrested in the Atlanta World, Afro-American, and Norfolk Journal and Guide, and the list in the New York Evening Journal. While the Harlem Magistrates Court docket book identifies Taylor as male, the clerk recorded the name as Annie on his examination, and on the back of the Magistrates Court affidavit, where it is struck out and Amie written underneath.

When Taylor appeared in Harlem Magistrates Court on March 20 charged with burglary, Magistrate Renaud remanded him to appear again on March 22. Reporters from the Home News, New York Daily News, New York Evening Journal, and Daily Worker were in court when Taylor appeared again; the Daily Worker somehow misreported his name as Annie. Renaud sent Taylor to the grand jury, who on April 3 transferred him to the Court of Special Sessions, which as it adjudicated misdemeanors, means they must have reduced the charge from burglary to an offense such as unlawful entry or petit larceny. Two weeks later, on April 17, the judges acquitted Taylor, according to the police blotter. Given the low value of what Taylor allegedly stole — a total of 54c — it would not have been surprising to see him receive a minor punishment; but to acquit him the judges would have had to find fault with the evidence against him provided by Officer Harmon and Detective Wolf. The sources are silent on what alternative account of events Taylor offered, but others arrested in the disorder claimed to have been bystanders mistakenly grabbed by police trying to pick offenders out of crowds. It could also be that prosecutors could not prove that the chewing gum found on Taylor had been taken from the store; it was a common enough item, in a large but not inexplicable quantity, that he could have obtained it legitimately elsewhere.
Daughty Shavos arrested At 7:00 PM a day after the disorder, March 21, Detective Frank McKenna arrested Daughty Shavos, a twenty-one-year-old Black peddler, at his home at 40 West 119th Street. He allegedly found "wearing apparel" in Shavos' possession, goods identified by Louis Levy as having been stolen from his dry goods store at 374 Lenox Avenue. There is no mention in the affidavit of why Detective McKenna went to Shavos' address. He had lived at the address, in an area with a mix of Black and Puerto-Rican residents, for about four months. The other man charged with looting Levy's store, Clifford Mitchell, was arrested just over an hour earlier ten blocks to the north, at 363 Lenox Avenue, across the street from Levy's store (or perhaps the clerk misrecorded the address and Mitchell was in his home, 362 Lenox Avenue, in the building next to the store). There is also no mention of how police found him.

A note on the Magistrate's Court affidavit recorded the value of the goods found on the men as $50; the typewritten narrative on the form noted that the goods found on Mitchell were worth "around $20," so those found on Shavos would have been worth around $30.

Mitchell and Shavos are two of only nine men identified in the sources as having been arrested away from the stores they allegedly looted, a group making up one third (9 of 27) of the arrests for which that information is known (27 of 60).

Mitchell and Shavos appeared in the Harlem Magistrates Court on March 22, the last individuals arrested during the disorder to be arraigned in that court. The Magistrate sent both to the grand jury, which on April 4 dismissed the charges against Mitchell and sent Shavos to the Court of Special Sessions to be charged with a misdemeanor. There is no evidence of the outcome of that case. There is no difference between the two cases in the district attorney's case file that would explain those different outcomes. Shavos' criminal record included an arrest as a disorderly person in Jersey City in June 1932, with no recorded disposition, while Mitchell had no record. However, while that could conceivably influence how Shavos was treated, it would not explain the charges against Mitchell being dismissed.

The only newspaper coverage of the looting are stories in the Home News, New York Evening Journal, Daily Mirror, and Daily News reporting Mitchell and Shavos' appearance in the Magistrates Court. The stories in the Home News and Daily Mirror identified Levy and the store; the other two stories simply noted that the men had been held for the grand jury.
Herbert Hunter arrested Sometime during the disorder, Detective Phillips of the 28th Precinct arrested Herbert Hunter, an eighteen-year-old Black resident of 56 West 126th Street. At the same time Phillips arrested Elizabeth Tai and Arthur Davis for taking groceries from a store at 340 Lenox Avenue, according to a story in the Home News. However, that story did not directly state that Hunter was charged with looting the same store, so that was not identified here as the location he alleged looted. The arrests likely occurred around 12:30 AM. Hunter was not included in the lists of those arrested published in the Afro-American, Atlanta World, and Norfolk Journal and Guide and in the New York Evening Journal. It is not clear why he was omitted.

The 28th Precinct police blotter also recorded the charge against Hunter as burglary, with the note "Burglarised store during riot." The Daily Worker more precisely described his alleged offense as "stealing groceries." Hunter did not appear in the lists of those arrested published in the press.

Hunter was arraigned in the Harlem Magistrates Court on March 20 with Elizabeth Tai and Arthur Davis, all charged with burglary. Magistrate Renaud remanded all three to appear again in court (he sent two others arrested by Phillips who appeared at the same time charged with malicious mischief, Charles Wright and William Norris, to the Court of Special Sessions). The docket book recorded only Phillips' name and precinct; the story in the Daily Worker identified him as a detective.

When Hunter appeared in court again, on March 22, the docket book recorded no change in the charge against him, but a story in the Home News reported that "the Court" had reduced the charge from burglary to disorderly conduct, as happened to both Tai and Davis. In Tai's case, the docket book did record that the charge had been reduced to disorderly conduct. Had the police presented evidence Hunter had stolen merchandise, he would have been charged with either burglary or larceny; had they presented evidence that he had broken windows, the charge would have been malicious mischief. The charge of disorderly conduct suggested that he may only have been part of a crowd near the store. Magistrate Renaud found Hunter guilty, an outcome reported in the stories in the Daily News and New York Evening Journal as well as the Home News and Daily Worker. He also found Tai and Davis guilty.

Renaud sentenced Hunter to serve ten days in the Workhouse, according to the Harlem Magistrates Court docket book, 28th Precinct police blotter and stories in the Home News, Daily News, New York Evening Journal, and Daily Worker. Renaud gave Tai and Davis a lesser sentence, a fine of $25 or five days in the Workhouse. Unable to pay the fine, according to a story in the Home News, both were sent to the Workhouse.