Until 1895 Police Justices heard
cases ranging from petty theft to murder.
The system was changed that year and the job was turned over to City
Magistrates who held sway in sometimes difficult physical conditions. Among these was the Third District
Magistrates’ Court, familiarly called the Essex Market Court House on Second Avenue.
Perhaps the first hint of the obsolete
and inadequate conditions appeared in the Annual Report of the Board of City Magistrates
of 1905. It showed that the Third
District Court had disposed of 18,536 cases that year. The report complained “It is certainly not
hyperbole to say that there must have been at least 90,000 people in the court
in the year in the cases in which defendants were arrested, giving an average
of five to each case, and remembering that they come into court with counsel,
witnesses, family and kin.”
Factoring in persons who came in
for legal advice, the writer estimated that “at least between 150,000 and
175,000 human beings, an average of 500 a day” were inside the courthouse. The report summarized the conditions saying “Every
dictate of prudence, sanitation and hope for a decent administration of justice
requires that a new court house should be there constructed.”
In June 1910 the Board of Estimate
submitted a recommendation to the Board of Alderman for the “construction of a
new Court House and Prison” on the site of the old Essex Market Court House at
a proposed cost of $23,000.
A year later no action had been
taken, to frustration of Chief Magistrate William McAdoo. In his annual report for 1911 he did not hold
back. “Some of the worst dens in the
City of New York were the courts. They
were dirty, squalid, ill-ventilated foul, dingy caverns.”
Finally, replacement of the old
facility was approved and in April 1913 Chief Magistrate McAdoo chose the site—not
far from the old Essex Market Court House—at the southeast corner of Second
Avenue and 2nd Street. On
April 7 The Sun advised, “The site is said to be an ideal one for light and air.”
McAdoo told reporters that “the
plans will not be completed until an architect is selected” but he anticipated “a
building of three or four stories would be erected and he hoped it would be
completed by next fall.”
Ten architects submitted plans. When the design by Alfred Hopkins was
accepted in December, McAdoo’s expectation of a “three or four” story building
had flown out the window. Working with
an increased budget of $350,000 (more in the range of $863,000 in 2015), the
architect’s proposed building rose 10 stories.
“The successful design shows a simple façade in
the style of the Italian Renaissance,” said the Real Estate Record and Builders’
Guide. The ten-story stone structure
would enable the city to consolidate three outdated facilities—the Essex Market
court and jail, the municipal court on Madison Street and the Ludlow Street
jail.
 |
| Hopkins' original plans called for a lofty stone structure -- Real Estate Record & Builders' Guide, December 6, 1913 (copyright expired) |
Hopkins was no stranger to this
type of municipal project. After
studying at the Ecole des Beaux Arts in Paris, he had submitted plans for
several reformatories and prisons, and designed the prison in Buffalo, New
York.
Hopkins had lofty ideas for his
courthouse-jail building. He visited 20 European
prisons and incorporated modern concepts into the Second Avenue structure. Among his innovations was a roof-top exercise
area. The New York Times, on September
6, 1914, reported “It is stated that it will be the first jail in New York State
to have provision for roof exercise by prisoners.”
He also designed “outside cells”
to hold the prisoners. Rather surprisingly
today, the American jail cells—more like cages--were set about 12 feet back
from the walls. Inmates had no privacy,
ventilation or sunlight. Hopkins told a
Times reporter that he had been told in Europe, “You cage your prisoners like
monkeys in America.”
The newspaper explained “As many cells
will be made outside cells as the conformation of the site permits, and this
will mean a large proportion.” With this
new arrangement, cells would have three walls and a window, and only one set of
bars at the front.
With the added features the city
now estimated the cost of the building to be around $1 million, according to The
New York Times.
But the grand plans were not to
be. Two years later construction had
still not commenced and on September 25, 1916 Joseph Haag, secretary of the
Board of Estimate and Apportionment sent a letter to the Board of Alderman. In it he announced that the 1912 resolution
had been amended by “reducing said amount to $150,000.”
It was no doubt a crushing blow to
Alfred Hopkins, who was sent back to the drawing board. On December 22, 1917—a full four years after
he won the commission—his revised plans were announced. Hopkins had chopped eight stories off his
design and vastly cut back on both the facilities and the modern innovations.
 |
| The revised sketch was released December 21, 1917. Real Estate Record & Builders' Guide (copyright expired) |
The Record and Guide put a
positive spin on the changes, saying “This structure will be an imposing one…and
will greatly enhance the neighborhood in which it is to be built.”
On the afternoon of April 29, 1919
18-year old errand boy David Levine appeared before Magistrate Charles E. Simms
in the old Essex Market Court House. He
was charged with the theft of jewelry valued at $140. Following his arraignment on $2,000 bail, workmen swarmed into the courtroom “tearing
down the partitions and moving the records, tables, benches, and railings.”
Simms's was the last case heard in the old courthouse.
Simms's was the last case heard in the old courthouse.
The following morning, at 9:00, the
new courthouse was opened “with a celebration and speeches,” according to The
Times. In his address, Borough President
Frank L. Dowling commented “I hope crime decreases and the court never will be
crowded.”
Officially called the “Court House
and Prison of Courts of Inferior Jurisdiction,” the scaled-down building was
faced entirely in brick. Hopkins’
original all-stone design was a victim of affordability. All the trim—even the cornice—were deftly
executed in variegated brown brick. The
heavy Renaissance Revival structure was nearly the antithesis of Hopkins’
original light and airy design. Although
handsome, it had a foreboding, fortress-like appearance.
 |
| Close inspection reveals terra cotta tiles among the variegated brick framing of the arched openings. |
The second floor courtrooms were
flooded with light from the large arched openings. The prisoner cells on the first floor,
however, had expectedly-small windows.
They were paired and framed by clever brickwork that
gave them the appearance of perforated postage stamps.
The magistrates heard cases
ranging from the petty disturbances to the worse of crimes. On June 9, 1919 Judge Marsh listened
patiently while Lizzie Berman and her husband Henry plead their cases.
When he asked Lizzie, who appeared
with a baby in her arms, about her complaint, she replied “He roughs things up
and hits me.”
Henry explained “She makes me no
supper.”
The judge dug deeper. Doesn’t she stay at home?”
Henry admitted she did, “but all
the time she talks with the neighbors and doesn’t have time to get my meals.” He then added “And then I get thrown out of
the house by the neighbors. An’ now she
is just getting into court to show me something.”
Henry insisted to Magistrate Marsh
that he had done nothing wrong and the neighbors ejected him from the apartment
building simply so they could continue talking with his wife. Marsh saw through the argument. “You shouldn’t be fighting when you have a
baby to take care of…Now go home and behave yourselves.”
The Evening World reported that “The
pair accepted His Honor’s suggestion and the parade formed. Lizzie and the little Berman nonchalantly in
the lead with Henry stalking doubtfully at a safe distance in the rear.”
The following year, on October 8,
1920, Magistrate William A. Sweetser heard another odd case. Rachael Toback was charged with unlawful
entry, but the circumstances surrounding the 50-year old woman’s crime were
mind-boggling.
Rachael had entered the apartment of
Harry Abrams on East Houston Street while the family was out. She packed their belongings and hired moving
vans to haul the furniture and boxes away.
The New-York Tribune reported “The Abrams family had been out and
arrived in time to halt the van workers.”
Rachel’s relatives testified to
the judge that she was not thinking clearly.
They said “that she had been forced to move at least six times within
the last year, and declared that her unpleasant experiences had preyed on the
woman’s mind.” The family added that “she
had entered several apartments in the same way before.”
The judge committed Rachel, with
her compulsive desire to move people, to Bellevue Hospital for observation.
 |
| Relentlessly-chasing terra cotta dogs along with chains were perhaps intended to symbolize the pursuit of criminals. |
Many of the cases heard here were
of a serious nature, however. And
perhaps the most infamous incident at the Third District Courthouse was the gangland
execution of Nathan Kaplan, alias “Kid Dropper” and “Jack the Dropper,” on
August 28, 1923.
The 32-year old racketeer and
extortionist was well-known by law enforcement.
Since his release from prison in 1918 he had been involved in “labor
slugging,” providing thugs whose violent beatings and threats provide an advantage
to one side or the other in labor strikes.
On this day Kaplan appeared in
court to answer a charge of felonious assault made by Jacob Shapiro. Fifteen of his gang members were there as
well, “variously charged with knowledge of the same crime,” said The New York
Times. But according to the newspaper “Kaplan had a
way of convincing those who were to appear against him that it was to their
best interests to forego their testimony.”
Shapiro, who had earlier
positively identified “Dropper” as one of three men who had fired shots at him
from an automobile on August 1, was suddenly “certain that he had made a
mistake in accusing Kaplan.” Magistrate
H. Stanley Renaud was forced to dismiss the case.
The police anticipated problems
between Kid Dropper’s gang and the rival “Little Augie” gang. “Late Monday night Captain Willemse received
word that members of the rival gangs would be on hand ‘ready for trouble’ when
Kaplan went to court,” explained The Times.
Outside the courthouse were two police captains, 15 detectives and 10
uniformed patrolmen. They were joined by
the detectives who had been in the courtroom.
As Kaplan emerged from the
courthouse, his wife Veronica joined him.
A taxicab was waiting at the curb with its engine running. “The police closely watched the crowd which
had been driven away from the immediate vicinity of the taxicab,” said the
newspaper.
As Kaplan slid into the cab, an “undersized,
emaciated man broke through the crowd and approached the cab on a run.” He pulled out a revolver and fired three
shots. The first hit Kaplan in the back
of the head. The second shot hit the
driver just behind the ear and the third hit the hat of police Captain
Willemse.
Veronica Kaplan jumped onto Louis
Cohen, the shooter, clawing at his face and screaming “Don’t shoot him!”
The Times reported “Cohen
succeeded in throwing her to one side and then, knocking away part of the pane
of glass in the cab which had not been shattered by the first three bullets, he
fire again in a downward direction. This
bullet passed through Kaplan’s head.”
 |
| Nathan Kaplan was gunned down in front of the main entrance on 2nd Street -- photo New York Department of Records, Municipal Archives |
The Magistrate’s Court operated in
the building until March 6, 1946 when it was transferred to the Lower Manhattan
Court at No. 300 Mulberry Street. Within
two years, however, the move proved short-sighted. On July 26, 1948 overcrowding of the Mulberry
Street facility resulted in the reopening of Essex Market Court House. Renovations were still in progress upon the
opening.
But ongoing work was not the
problem that afternoon. On July 27 The
New York Times reported “Ten minutes after the old Essex Market Court House
reopened yesterday a prisoner escaped from the building.”
Detective Jacob Rosenfeld had
brought in 60-year old Joseph Ametrano who was accused of stealing a tire from
the trunk of a parked car. He left his
prisoner in the fingerprint room while he checked papers related to the case in
the second floor courtroom. When he
returned there was no trace of Ametrano.
The reopened building was now
known as the Lower Manhattan District Court and it would remain in the building
until 1979. That year it was taken over
by the Anthology Film Archives. The
organization was founded in 1970 by Lithuanian artist Jonas Mekas and four
others.
A $1.45 million renovation was
overseen by architects Raimund Abraham and Kevin Bone to convert the building
into two motion picture theaters, a reference library, offices, a gallery, and
a film preservation area. The
two-screen theater was opened in 1988 “for daily screenings of avant-garde and
classic films.”
Although the renovations required
the nearly-total bricking up of four of the large arched courthouse windows on
the 2nd Street side, Hopkins’ design—no doubt a crushing personal
disappointment to him—survives otherwise intact.
photographs by the author
photographs by the author
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