Biography
Michael Hagopa was an unemployed Armenian member of the Needle Trades Workers Industrial Union. E. Lansky’s letter in New Masses, May 29, 1934, states that police seized him after breaking up a July 5, 1933 Union Square demonstration against fur-industry racketeering. It alleges repeated police beatings and says he needed fifteen scalp sutures and two weeks in Bellevue prison hospital. He was indicted for felonious assault and convicted by a jury of third-degree assault, with a recommendation of leniency. Judge Corrigan’s hostility to release petitions is described, but the ten-year figure is the maximum exposure on the indictment, not an established sentence. The letter explicitly says he remained in jail; no actual discharge or complete custody duration is supplied. Source: https://www.marxists.org/history/usa/pubs/new-masses/1934/v11n09-may-29-1934-NM.pdf#page=37 (printed page 24).
Labor Defender, June 1934: A prison letter signed M. Hagopa thanks the ILD for two dollars and says he heard the May First celebration but could not join the march. The initial and surname align with the existing May 1934 jailed needle-trades worker record; no additional arrest, institutional location or completed term is asserted. Source: https://www.marxists.org/history/usa/pubs/labordefender/1934/v10n06-jun-1934-orig-LD.pdf#page=18
Labor Defender, July 1934: The notice names Hagopa among five prisoners actually released or paroled that month. It supplies completed release, beyond his preceding prison letter, but no individual release mechanism, exact discharge day or total served. Source: https://www.marxists.org/history/usa/pubs/labordefender/1934/v10n07-jul-1934-orig-LD.pdf#page=27
PDF page 4 reports that Judge Corrigan imposed three years after Hagopa was beaten and arrested at a Needle Trades demonstration on a first-degree-assault accusation. It attributes to the judge a wish to make an example and stop protest telegrams. This supplements the earlier account that did not state a term; the charge-level descriptions differ across sources and are preserved. Three years is imposed, not actual completed custody. Source: https://www.marxists.org/history/usa/pubs/labordefender/1935/v11n01-jan-1935-orig-LD.pdf
