A Jewish college professor was recovering today from head wounds suffered in an alleged attack by a 25-year-old bookstore owner who was accused of striking the teacher when the latter tore down a piece of anti-Semitic material from the bookstore window.
James Warner, operator of the Place Bookstore, was taken to the Ulster County jail at Kingston and released for appearance on charges of second-degree assault. Dr. Gerson Robison, 55, professor of mathematics at State University College of New Paltz, had eight stitches taken for a wound on his head he said was inflicted with a baseball bat.
Dr Robison said the altercation started when he passed the bookstore and saw a copy of “Common Sense, ” an anti-Semitic publication, posted in the window. That issue had a headline: “Judaism is Communism.” He said he entered the store and tore the newspaper off the window, precipitating an argument in which Warner allegedly called him a vile anti-Semitic name.
Warner than went behind the counter and returned, carrying a baseball bat and a newspaper called “The Thunderbolt, ” another anti-Semitic sheet. Dr. Robison said that Warner told him that if the faculty member tore down that one, Warner would hit him with the bat. State police testified that college students who gathered when the argument became heated said they saw the professor tear down the second sheet and Warner hit him on the back of the head with the bat.
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