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PATROL IN THE OLD
4TH PRECINCT
Patrolman John
Timothy, 4th Precinct had a fighter's mug. He was one tough looking
guy. He had a couple of years on the job at the time, but he still felt
closer to the newer guys than the old-timers. We were working a late tour
together when we got a call of a "fight with a knife" on
Greenwich Street inside what was then called "The Washington Street
Market". It was 1964 and Manhattan's lower West Side has undergone
many changes since then.
 The
Washington Market was packed with tractor-trailer trucks arriving from
Florida, California and other States with everything from oranges to
potatoes. After the tractor-trailers would be unloaded into the various
dealerships, the pallets of produce would be stacked to the first floor
ceilings. Then, the local delivery trucks would line up to purchase
quantities of foodstuffs for delivery to their customers. The narrow
streets of Washington Street, Greenwich Street, from West Houston Street
south to Fulton Street were choked with trucks. Once a sector car
responded to a job in the Market, the cops had all they could do to get
their car back out again.
John and I were forced to park the radio car on Franklin Street just off
Hudson and run to the scene of the knifefight. We could hear the roar of
the crowd of onlookers who had formed a circle around the two men locked
in a death struggle. We ploughed into the crowd and shouldered our way
into the interior of the circle. John charged the bigger of the two
fighters and hit him with a shoulder block knocking him back. The shocked
fighter dropped the knife, which looked like a linoleum knife with a
hooked blade. The other guy immediately indicated his submission by
dropping his knife and raising his empty hands as I shoved him back
against the ring of shouting men. Some of the crowd of workers were
disappointed that we had ended the fight, but many others were relieved
that we had prevented what could have been a homicide.
The Washington Street Market was a busy area during the late tour.
The "ABC laws" governed the hours when bars and grills could be
open for business. The hours were different for the ginmills in the
Market area. They could remain open beyond the 4AM closing times of other
sections of the City. This was done to accommodate the hundreds of
truckers and employees of the produce markets who worked throughout the
night while the rest of the City slept. The all-night Market enabled the
thousands of restaurants and produce stores throughout the City to have
their foodstuffs delivered each morning. Years later, the Washington
Street Market was relocated to the Bronx in the Hunt's Point section. Back
in the l960s, the old Washington Street Market attracted hundreds of
unemployed workers looking for a night's work. It also was a good
place for a guy on the lam to keep a low profile while working odd jobs.
Many times, a routine arrest for disorderly conduct would became a
homicide or robbery arrest when the fingerprints came back showing the
prisoner was wanted. Stopping to question a so-called
"derelict" could be a dangerous move for a cop on patrol in this
area.
The cops that worked in the old 4th Precinct went unrecognized for their
efforts. It was considered a "slow" precinct and most new cops
didn't want to be assigned to a quiet precinct. Yet, there were many
experienced cops working in that command. The NYPD would often
punish an experienced detective or former plainclothes officer by demotion
and transfer back to patrol. Such officers were bitter to a certain
extent, but patrol in Manhattan's 4th Precinct wasn't the worst way to
finish up a career. It was still in the "Big Apple" and the
excitement of working in Manhattan still had its compensations. It would
be many years later before people would give names such as "Soho"
and "Tribeca" to the old 4th Precinct. Today, "Soho"
is filled with art galleries and restaurants. In l963, the streets were
deserted after the fabric jobbers and wholesalers closed for business. It
was also a section of Manhattan that had witnessed some horrific incidents
in the past.
The area north of Canal Street was filled with old loft buildings. The
cast iron façade buildings of the 19th century were plentiful here. Some
were used by textile jobbers who sold all types of fabric for the
manufacture of clothing or household goods. When we would handle police
incidents in those buildings, it wasn't unusual to see the lofts filled to
the ceilings with gigantic bolts of fabric. Most of those buildings
with the cast iron facades were only six stories.
On March 25, l9ll, there was a deadly fire in the Triangle Shirtwaist
Factory a few blocks north of West Houston Street in the 6th Precinct. The
factory building had 12 stories. The exit doors were locked and there were
inadequate fire escapes for the hundreds of young women toiling at their
work. A fire broke out on the 8th floor and trapped many of the women
inside. Many jumped from the upper floors to their deaths. A
total of 146 women lost their lives in that tragedy. They called
those factories "sweatshops". The women who died in that
fire were mostly young Jewish immigrant women. There were many such shops
still in operation in the area, and it seemed the lessons of the past had
gone unheeded.
On a hot summer day, I responded to a report of a "cardiac" in a
sweatshop located on Broadway near Spring Street. My radio partner
was Patrolman Ralph Vega who was fluent in Spanish. We climbed the
stairway to the second floor where a burly security guard unlocked the
gate and admitted us to the work area. A man needing a shave and dressed
in a white shirt seemed to be the supervisor. He urged the women to
continue their work despite the presence of the police. The air was filled
with the noise of scores of sewing machines. The heat was oppressive as
the women toiled at their workstations. Their black shoulder length
hair was matted with sweat and their dresses clung to their bodies. Most
of them were young Puerto Rican women. There were piles of fabric
everywhere. The electric cords for the sewing machines and the overhead
lighting were strung haphazardly. A small cluster of the workers
stood near an older woman lying on the floor. After checking the
condition of the woman, we could see that she was a victim of heat
exhaustion. We applied cool compresses to her forehead and she was
recovering quickly as we waited for the ambulance. As we waited in the
smothering heat, some of the women at the sewing machines were shouting
remarks in Spanish. Officer Vega was smiling from ear to ear. Then he
burst into laughter and spoke to some of them in Spanish. They
blushed visibly and their eyes dropped in embarrassment. Vega
later told me that they were talking about me and how they liked my butt.
We helped carry the woman out to the ambulance and the security guard
slammed the gate behind us as we started down the stairway. The sweatshop
supervisor shouted commands in Spanish and the whirring of the sewing
machines increased in intensity. The hot interior of the radio car didn't
seem so uncomfortable anymore. I thought of the workers inside the
sweatshop and the miserable conditions that they worked under. The locked
gate and the number of women in that factory was formula for disaster.
Patrolman Tom Dolan was a veteran of the old 4th Precinct. Tom had been
assigned for a number of years to plainclothes duty. When I was a
rookie, I filled in for his regular partner who had taken the tour off.
Tom looked me over and just shrugged his shoulders as we pulled away from
the curb to patrol the north end of the precinct. Tom was a big guy and I
didn't think my 150 pounds impressed him. We didn't talk much during
those first few hours on patrol.
When the radio dispatcher called for us to respond to a burglary run, I
learned a lesson in police work. We were patrolling on West Houston Street
and he told me to turn onto Mercer Street and shut off the headlights. I
pulled the radio car onto the sidewalk and kept as close to the buildings
as I could. We sat in the darkened car and watched in the direction
of Prince Street. The streetlights reflected off the old paving blocks
worn smooth by decades of traffic. The facades of the old buildings stood
in silence with their tiers of rusted fire escapes.
Seconds later, a furtive figure hustled across Mercer Street on Prince
headed east. He was carrying a load of clothing over his shoulder.
Tom's face lit up with a knowing smile as I turned on the headlights and
pulled the car alongside as he walked. Tom greeted him cheerfully
and inquired about the "swag". The suspect was obviously a
derelict and the "swag" was expensive clothing and various
personal belongings. We tossed him for weapons and after a few
evasive answers, Tom handcuffed the suspect to a wrought iron lamppost.  Today,
there are still some of those old iron lampposts around.
They have a
distinctive look. We threw the clothing into the sector car and proceeded
to the address of the radio run. The caller was an artist in
residence or "AIR". In those days, artists had discovered the
buildings below West Houston Street were ideal for their studios.
Eventually, over the years, many other artists would follow these pioneers
and the area would become known as "Soho" (south of Houston
Street). When we talked to him, he was very annoyed with the lack of
police protection. He had returned home to find an unidentified male
ransacking his studio. The suspect fled to the roof with his
belongings. His description matched that of the suspect we had
cuffed to the lamppost. When we returned the suspect to the scene,
the artist was overjoyed to find we had arrested the burglar and recovered
his property. I must admit that Tom's methods were unorthodox, but very
effective.
As a rookie cop, I walked foot posts in the 4th Precinct and
"flew" to division and borough details throughout the Borough of
Manhattan. There were only four sector cars that worked the precinct in
those early years, so most of the platoon walked foot or flew to outside
commands. There was no overtime paid back in 1963, and portal-to-portal
pay was in the future. Often, when I would prepare my monthly
activity report, I would find that I had worked only a few tours in the
4th Precinct. The rest of the time, I had worked details outside my
Command. "Flying" was an expensive proposition. However, after a
few years of it, a street cop got pretty good at improvisation.
Truck drivers and most motorists would be only too glad to give a ride
uptown or cross-town to a uniformed cop. When assigned to a demonstration
up in Times Square or a parade detail on Fifth Avenue, it was a breeze to
thumb a ride downtown on Seventh Avenue.
The veteran cops of the old 4th Precinct knew that a rookie cop had to
learn the job quickly. The desk officers and patrol sergeants took matters
into their own hands. They would instruct the sector cars to have the new
cops issue their first summons. They knew that the actual issuance
of a ticket to an angry motorist would be a new experience for rookies.
Next, they would get the new cop his first collar. In my case, I was
walking foot post on Greenwich Street near Park Place when a sector car
picked me up and brought me to the scene of a burglary nearby. The owner
of a food distributing company had caught a young burglar in the act as he
was stealing produce from the building. I interviewed the owner and the
suspect. The sector car transported me and the prisoner into the precinct
with my first felony arrest. After I processed the collar in the precinct,
Lieutenant Fulton told me to cuff up my prisoner and walk him the few
blocks to the courthouse at 100 Centre Street. Today, such a
practice would be frowned upon. He assigned an experienced cop to help me
with the arraignment procedures. Processing that first felony collar
was good on the job training. It showed a new cop how to handle an arrest
and eventually gain experience testifying in court.
The arrest procedure at that time involved taking the prisoner to the
detective squad office for process. While the arresting officer
prepared arrest cards, the detective on duty would debrief the prisoner
and prepare a DD 19 Pedigree and M.O. form. The DD19 was a full
description of the prisoner and manner in which the crime had been
committed. That was before the landmark Miranda Decision, and the
detective would interrogate the prisoner. Many times, the prisoner
would make incriminating statements and the detective could clear other
cases as a result of the interrogation. It was amazing to watch a veteran
detective conduct a skilled interrogation of a prisoner. The
"Mutt and Jeff" routine was classic. The good guy-bad guy
method often got quick admissions by prisoners. Miranda ended all those
time-honored methods. There was one thing about the DD 19 that I found
personally offensive. There was a category entitled: "unusual
peculiarities". Physical imperfections such as a scars,
tattoos, physical deformities, and left-handedness were listed. As a
southpaw, I resented that. The detectives also fingerprinted and
photographed the prisoner. Arrests made on the evening and late tours
required that part of the arrest procedure was to transport felony arrests
and serious misdemeanors as listed in section 552 of the Code of Criminal
Procedure to the Line-up Room at 240 Centre Street.
At 7
AM, lines of patrolwagons from various precincts would pull into Centre
Market Place behind headquarters and strings of prisoners would be led
from the wagons into the basement entrance. Prints would be dropped
off at the old Bureau of Criminal Investigations (BCI) at 400 Broome
Street. When the "yellow sheets" would come back with the
prisoner's criminal record, they would take a "stand-up" photo.
Finally, the prisoner would stand in a line-up on a stage while a
detective would read the details of the arrest aloud. The lineups
were monitored by all the detective squads via closed-circuit television.
This was before the Supreme Court had rendered the famous "Wade
Decision" that set guidelines for line-ups. The old Line-up
Room is an anachronism of the past, but it was an experience to see those
detectives work a room full of suspects.
Patrolman Charlie Schmidt, 4th Precinct, worked the Warren Street post in
the Market. Warren Street between West Broadway and Greenwich Street
was the site of a number of unemployment agencies. The post was only one
block long, but it was more than most cops could handle. These
agencies were filled with unemployed workers seeking day jobs. Most of the
listings were for menial type work such as dishwashers or porters. Men
were hired for part-time or on a daily basis. Here too, criminals wanted
on warrants, fugitives from justice, or just plain drifters, could support
themselves with work and not be asked too many questions.
On any day, there would be disputes between disgruntled men in the large
crowded rooms of the agencies. The interior of those rooms was not
air-conditioned and the stench of the sweating bodies of hundreds of
aggravated jobseekers filled the fetid air and smothered the lungs. When a
job would come over the radio of a fight on Warren Street, you could bet
it would be inside one of the agencies. On a hot summer day, your dark
blue uniform shirt would be saturated with sweat from sitting in those
sweltering radio cars. I would always be glad when I would find "Mr.
Charlie" on the scene of those fights.
Charlie was the guy who could handle this post as no other cop
could. Charlie was a man with eyes that penetrated into your skull. He was
an infantryman in Europe during World War II. He had seen a lot of action.
The Warren Street post was a piece of cake to him. He was a cop that the
downtrodden men who frequented Warren Street could trust. They knew he
could keep a confidence. Many times, Charlie would take one of the
denizens of the street into his "confessional box". The arrests
that he made based on information provided by the least of them would
amaze the cops of today. He had better sources of information than the
detective squad. When he went sick or took vacation, I would sometimes be
assigned to the Warren Street Post. Believe me when I tell you, it was a
long tour of duty for me.
Patrolman Bernard Miller was the "old hand" of the 4th Precinct.
He was a mature and seasoned cop. There was a reason why he was so
steady in the street. He had spent his young years fighting World
War II. He saw years of combat in Europe assigned to an Armored
Reconnaissance Unit of the 102nd Cavalry. His unit and others like it
spearheaded the advance of the American Army. He spent most of his time
manning a .37 MM cannon and a .50 Caliber machine gun in some of the
toughest campaigns of the war. When he was discharged, he and 100.000
other veterans took the test for Patrolman, PD. He was appointed in
1946, and spent his entire career in the old 4th Precinct. Back in l965,
Bernie and I were assigned the same detail for the visit of Pope Paul
VI. We were assembled in ranks with the detail of hundreds of
cops. The detail sergeants took roll call and we were assigned. Our
sergeant was an old-timer who peered over his glasses and sized up his
detail. "Who got a whistle?" he drawled. Not a cop
stirred although the regulation white whistle dangling from every gunbelt.
After a pregnant pause, I responded that I had one. The entire detail
broke into laughter. I had been had. "OK, kid, your post is the
roof of this here building" said the sergeant. I spent the tour on
the windy roof of an office building. I didn't get to see the Pope, but I
learned how to keep my mouth shut in formation.
©Copyright
l999 Edward D. Reuss
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