Evening star. [volume] (Washington, D.C.) 1854-1972, 1956-03-07
By HARRY BACAS


It was a damp. chilly Friday
night, March Is. 1855. The tail,
thin, 52-year-old man stepped
off the Rhode Island avenue
streetcar in Mount Rainier. Md.
and started up the steep Thirty
fourth street hill.
Ralph Reynolds was two and
q half blocks from home, 4014
Thirty-third street.
He usually arrived a little
after midnight from his job as
night communications super
visor at the Justice Depart
ment. Tonight he had left work
early. He wanted a good nights
sleep before getting up to go to
his part-time and Saturdays job
In a local hardware store.
The $29 a week the job paid
was going to finance some re-
pairs on his home.
Halfway up the hill, a car
with a group of boys in it had
stopped. One boy got out to
talk to two girls walking ahead
of Mr.. Reynolds. The boy ap-
parently was trying to persuade
the girls to get in the car.
AS MIR. Reynolds approached
he saw the boy standing alone
on the sidewalk. The girls had
kept on walking.
Attacked by Boy
He looked at the boy-a To-
year-old. well-built. blond hair
cut crew style, several inches
shorter than Mr.. Reynolds, but
heavier. He didn't notice the
heavy-soled shoes the boy wore.
Suddenly the boy grabbed him
by the coat collar and thrust his
face forward. blue eyes glaring
What do you think you're
doing?" he barked at Mr..
Reynolds. Are you following
those girls?"
Mr.. Reynolds said no. he was
Just walking home.
Without warning. the boy
swung a fist at him. Mr..
Reynolds ducked. The blow
glanced off his cheek, knocking
his glasses to the ground and
breaking them.
The boy swung again. catching
the man on the point of the
chin. Mr.. Reynolds fell to the
sidewalk. A moment later he
felt an explosion Of pain in his
right leg.
He was sitting with his left
leg bent under him and his right
leg stretched out in front Of
him. He started to rise on his
left leg, but the right leg would
not support him. He looked up
and saw the boy brace again
About to Kick Again
His foot was drawn back like
he was going to kick football, p"
he said later.
Don't" Mr.. Reynolds cried.
you've broken my leg" The
boy halted, wavered a moment
and then climbed into the wait
ing car. It drove away. Mr..
Reynolds lay in the mud near
the sidewalk until help came.
At the hospital doctors found
q l-inch segment of Mr.. Reyn-
ODDS shin bone, just above the
ankle, had been crushed. They
put a steel plate inside the leg
and pegged it to the bone with
metal screws.
Mr.. Reynolds left the hospital
after two weeks, with his leg in
O heavy cast from the bottom of
his foot to above the knee. He
was ordered to stay in bed.
He missed the two hearings in
Hyattsville Juvenile Court.
Attacker Arrested
The first was on March 30.
The boy, now II. and his four
teen-aged companions had been
identified and arrested. When
Trial Magistrate Theodore L.
Manga asked the boy why he
had beaten and kicked the man,
the boy could give no explana-
ton.
Judge Manga ordered juvenile
probation officers to study the
boys background.
At the second hearing on
April 20. probation officers re-
ported the boy was the oldest OF
three children, living with his
mother and stepfather in a new
Prince Georges County develop
ment. They had moved from the
District year before.
He was a junior in high school
and played a line position or
the Junior varsity football team
Except for several reported fights
at school, he had been in trouble
only once before-a disorderly
conduct charge involving another
boy and a teen-age girl. His