- Page 390 →On December 7, 1950, two New York City police officers shot and killed John Derrick, a discharged soldier, on the streets of Harlem. Eyewitnesses claimed that the police had acted without provocation and had planted a gun on Derrick’s body. When Mayor Vincent Impelliteri ignored requests to investigate the murder, rallies all over Harlem demanded that he “end police murders.” Some were organized by leaders of the NAACP and Congressman Adam Clayton Powell, Jr.; others were put together by the women and men of Harlem. At these demonstrations, the largest of which attracted 10,000, angry New Yorkers demanded a range of reforms, in addition to the investigation of the Derrick murder. These included more minority appointments to the police force, the abolition of Jim Crow policies in the army, and the end of price gouging in Harlem. After several months, two grand juries acquitted the police officers on the grounds of insufficient evidence.
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