Dismissal in Tombs Court by Magistrate Thomas A. Aurellio of the case against Samuel Evans, an employee of Aaron Chodorow, for violation of the Sabbath law was hailed yesterday as a victory by officers of the Jewish Sabbath Alliance in their campaign to permit Jewish shopkeepers to keep their establishments open on Sundays instead of Saturdays.
Evans, a clerk in Chodorow’s leather shop on 21 Mott street, was given a summons on Sunday for keeping the store open. The police officer making the arrest admitted under cross-examination by Herman Koenigsberg, attorney for the Alliance, that he had seen no actual sale made. The complaint was dismissed upon the grounds that the evidence was insufficient and that no prima facie case had been proved.
Koenigsberg brought out in the hearing that the defendant kept his store closed on Saturday and that no complaints were made by any of the residents in the neighborhood. The complaining officer testified that the arrest was made on a complaint received from some leather association. He did not disclose the name of the association.
Koenigsberg attempted to show that the complainant was the Metropolitan Leather and Findings Association, which, he charged, is less interested in seeing the Sabbath law observed than in bringing non-members into the association.
The Archive of the Jewish Telegraphic Agency includes articles published from 1923 to 2008. Archive stories reflect the journalistic standards and practices of the time they were published.
