1973: Cleveland Mayor Is Arrested

Two policemen waited outside the office of their employer, looking sheepish. Then they entered the office and did their duty.

“Your honor, we have a warrant for your arrest,” one said.

Cleveland Mayor Ralph Perk took the warrant, for assault and battery. He read it.

“What do I do?” Perk asked.

“You have to come with us to the clerk’s office at the police station,” the officer replied.

“Let’s go. I’m ready,” said the mayor.

The two officers led their mayor out of City Hall and down the steps to a waiting police car. At police headquarters, the mayor was booked and released. He was charged with pushing an off-duty police officer, Arnold Hovan, after a city council meeting in which the council upheld Perk’s veto of enhanced insurance for officers. Perk alleged Hovan pressed charges at the behest of his political enemies and the Cleveland Police Patrolmen’s Association.

Less than two months later, Perk was acquitted of the charge. Five officers and a fireman backed up Hovan’s account of the altercation at the trial. But newsreel from WEWS showed no shoving match. That put the matter to rest.

“I went through this because I didn’t want to be treated any differently than any other citizen,“ Perk said to the press at City Hall, beaming. Later that year he won another term.