Biography
Ben "Boots" Schapiro joined the August 14, 1932 demonstration demanding freedom for Tom Mooney at the closing of the Los Angeles Olympic Games. The demonstrators ran around the stadium track with the demand written on their clothing before police arrested them. Their trial began on August 19 before Judge Thurmond Clarke, with Leo Gallagher conducting the defense. The jury convicted them of disturbing the peace and disturbing a public meeting. Clarke imposed the maximum sentence of 270 days in jail and raised bail pending appeal to $1,000. The International Labor Defense appealed the convictions.
Labor Defender, October 1932 (PDF page 15): The Olympic-trial report identifies Ben “Boots” Schapiro as one of the arrested August 14 protesters and describes the August 19 trial, ILD lawyer Leo Gallagher and Judge Thurmond Clarke. Its continuation reports a guilty verdict, 270-day nominal sentences and appeal bail raised from $500 to $1,000. The report says six but prints only five names; Boots is an alias, not a sixth person. No new custody interval is inferred. Source: https://www.marxists.org/history/usa/pubs/labordefender/1932/v08n10-oct-1932-LD.pdf#page=15
Separate 1934 Jefferson Square detention
The November 1, 1934 Western Worker, in a San Francisco dispatch dated October 29, names Ben Boots among eight workers arrested at a Jefferson Square election meeting the previous day, October 28. It reports vagrancy charges, describes Boots speaking from a tree, and says he was beaten after coming down. The November 8 issue, in a November 6 dispatch, specifically names Boots, Abe Berg and William Ensign as still jailed under $500 cash bail each. This account is associated here through the existing Ben “Boots” Schapiro alias; it is a separate 1934 episode, not part of the 1932 Los Angeles Olympic demonstration case. The paper does not establish an exact physical jail-admission or release day or completed custody total. No date or duration in the existing case is changed.
Western Worker, November 1934 issues, original PDF pages 1, 2 and 5
