NEW JERSEY: The Trenton Six

The State of New Jersey had no reason to feel proud of its solution of the murder of aged William Homer, Trenton junkman. For five days in February 1948, the Trenton police turned the heat on six young Negro suspects, finally.got all but one to sign confessions that they were parties to robbing old man Horner in his shop, and to beating him to death with a pop bottle.

During the 55-day trial the prosecution refused to say whose fingerprints were found on the murder bottle (apparently the evidence would have helped the defense), and was upheld by the trial court. The six were found guilty, sentenced to die in the electric chair.

The Communist Party and the party-line Civil Rights Congress went to their rescue with rallies, demonstrations and screaming Daily Worker headlines calling it “a northern Scottsboro case.” Non-Communist liberal groups joined in, and the case was carried to New Jersey’s highest court.

Last week Jersey justice redeemed itself. The New Jersey Supreme Court found that the Trenton Six had been convicted without getting their due rights under the law, set aside their sentence and ordered a new trial.