Swift Justice: Murder and Vengeance in a California Town

by Harry Farrell

Book Overview

In 1933, a nightmare shook the quiet town of San Jose, California, when a young man named Brooke Hart was abducted while leaving his father's department store. In the days that followed, the Harts, local and state police, and J. Edgar Hoover's FBI scrambled to outwit the kidnappers, whose demands kept them at bay until they--and Brook Hart's murder--were at last discovered. Then the unthinkable: A band of vigilantes stormed the San Jose jail and hanged...

• Format: Hardcover
• Language: English
• ISBN: 0312070861
• ISBN13: 9780312070861
• Release Date: January 1992
• Publisher: St. Martin's Press
• Length: 320 Pages
• Weight: 0.75 lbs.
• Dimensions: 1.3" x 5.9" x 8.4"

Customer Reviews

Vivid

I'm not ashamed to stay I stayed up all night reading this book. I thought I'd read a few chapters before bed and...well, I just couldn't put it down. Brooke's murder is particularly brutal -- I could hear his final calls for help inside my head. The description of the lynching is so vivid you feel as if you're there, shouting and manning the battering ram with the rest of them. My only complaint was that the "after the lynching" section seemed to drag a bit. All in all a wonderful book, which I would highly recommend to any fan of true crime.

Fascinating

Farrell's book rises above the usual boilerplate standards of true crime writing. The style is literate, the narrative crisp, the results fascinating. I'm not surprised that this grisly episode has been hushed up for years in the san Jose area. I grew up close to the infamous Ludlow massacre of striking coal miners in Colorado circa 1913, and heard nothing about it. Civic pride can cover a multitude of crimes. What distinguishes this sorry episode is the generally respectable standing of the parties involved. Surprisingly, the kidnappers were local, middle-class non-itinerants, while the lynch mob - far from the usual redneck cast - comprised solid citizens of the day, including students from pious Santa Clara University. One wonders how many other gruesome murders occurred in that same area that failed to arouse even the passing interest of this same upstanding citizenry. Anyway, this is a worthwhile read for anyone interested in America's hidden past., and it should be noted that a riveting 1950 movie, "Try and Get Me", was based on the Hart kidnapping. It features perhaps the most dramatic lynch scenes ever staged by Hollywood, and is out on video.

A MUST read for San Joseans

While I grew up in San Jose in the 1960's and 1970's, I never heard of this "historic" incident. However, so many references acquired during my childhood came to life as I read this wonderful book, that I felt a great many puzzle pieces had fallen into place. I immediately purchased copies of this book to give to all my family members, as each had their own connection to various elements (including cited sources, streets, businesses, community groups, etc.).Not only does this book provide a gripping story that stands on its own, it also provides those who care about the local history of San Jose, the criminal justice system, and California politics with a much better understanding of society in the 1930's and beyond.Read this book--it is so good that you'll finish it too quickly, wishing for more.

A telling snapshot of the era

I'm a native of San Jose, and when I grew up there in the 1950's the tale of the Hart kidnapping and its aftermath was still fresh in people's memories -- but it was told only in whispers. (My mother, who was at church downtown on the evening of the lynching, vividly remembered the "feeling in the air" and the groups of men gathering on street corners, but always spoke of the lynching itself as something shameful.) So I found this book fascinating, not only for illuminating a dark corner of history, but for the vivid picture it paints of San Jose in an era when it was still, in essence, a small town. The fact that many of our most distinguished public figures shared a dark secret was, I'm sure, important in our civic psyche, and Farrell effectively conveys the repercussions of the lynching for the city as a whole. I knew him to be a good reporter and writer (having read his articles in the Mercury News all my life), but in this book he outdoes himself. This is not only a well-told story but a fine work of social history, and doubly important now that Silicon Valley has all but obliterated the traces of what San Jose used to be.

A well-written story,fascinating from cover to cover!

This book was interesting from cover to cover. The author lays out the story well and gives you the real feeling of being there. Those who have spent considerable time in the Santa Clara Valley will be impressed with the references to specific landmarks, roads and events. Harry Farrell describes the politics and lifestyle of the area so well that the reader receives a local history lesson as well as a great factual crime story. It is obvious that the author went to great lengths to obtain accurate details of the event. This no easy task considering the time that has elapsed since the event took place. I highly recommend the book for those who enjoy crime stories and particularly for those who are fascinated by San Jose's past. -John Spicer, San Jose, CA.