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Rivers Wright arrested
Only one source provided any details of the circumstances of his arrest. The Home News reported on March 21 that Wright was arrested "after he and a number of others are said to have attacked a white man at 125th St and Lenox Ave." Wright appeared in lists of those arrested during the disorder in the Atlanta World, Afro-American and Norfolk Journal and Guide, the New York American, New York Evening Journal, and Daily News. His sentencing several days later is also reported in the Afro-American, New York Age, Daily News, and New York Times.
Among the first arraigned in the Harlem Magistrates Court on March 20, Wright was charged with disorderly conduct, not assault, as was the case with half of those arrested for assault. The attack cannot have resulted in significant injury if the charge was disorderly conduct: the applicable section of the statute applied only to a person who used "offensive, disorderly, threatening, abusive or insulting language, conduct or behavior." It could also have been the case that police did not have evidence that Wright participated in the assault; he may have been part of a crowd nearby, caught up in police efforts to arrest those responsible for the assault. Those circumstances fitted the definition of the offense. Disorderly conduct was also an offense that could be adjudicated in the Magistrates Court. Magistrate Renaud convicted Wright and remanded him for sentence on March 23. On that date, he sent Wright to the Workhouse for 10 days.
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- New York Penal Law, § 722-724: Disorderly Conduct
- "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
- "Police Guard Against New Uprising as Mayor Acts to Probe Race Riot," Home News, March 21, 1935, 1.
- "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
- "Harlem Riot Prisoners and Charges," New York American, March 20, 1935, 4.
- "Dodge Plans War on Reds," Daily News, March 24, 1935, 4.
- "Jailed for Rioting," Daily News, March 20, 1935, 4.
- "Harlem's Third Rioter is Dead; Many Are Fined," Afro-American, March 30, 1935, 12.