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Nude Free-Love-Cult Potheads in Harlem from Google Books "Jet Magazine" Oct 1958 p28-29 return to Kerista Home (POLICE?) NAB 7 DURING INTERRACIAL FREE LOVE FROLIC IN NYC Caught frolicking in the nude in an East Side New York apartment, the self-styled white leader of an interracial "free love cult" and six of his followers were arrested as police raided his home seeking narcotics. John Presmont, 35, who said he was the 'Prophet' of the 'Kerista' (free love society), was held along with two Negro men and four women - including two whites. When they entered Presmont's apartment, officers reported, they found two Negroes and a white woman in bed, all of them unclad. Presmont, his 21-year-old wife, Sunny, and another couple were lying disrobed on the living room floor, according to agents of the Narcotics and Special Service Squad. The Presmonts' four-month-old daughter, Nina, said one agent, was the only person in the apartment who was dressed. She wore a diaper. After entering through a rear window, off the fire escape, police said "Prophet" Presmont told them "we expected you, but not so soon." Officers said while they were in the midst of the unclothed 'free lovers', 22-year-old white Delores Deutsch entered, fully dressed, and was arrested for possession of indecent photographs. Lt. Arthur Grennan, who conducted the raid, said his squad went to the East Side address on the strength of grand jury warrants issued for the arrest of Presmont and an unidentified Harlem man believed to be involved in the sale of marijuana cigarettes. The Presmont round-up was conducted simultaneously with another raid in East Harlem, where police arrested a man charged with posssession of 14 pounds of marijuana valued at $200 a pound. The unidentified Harlemite was linked with Presmont in the sale of marijuana but not connected with the "free love cult". From all over Greater New York, the nude cultists included the Presmonts; William Swanston of The Bronx, George Beazer and his white wife, Ruth, Manhattan; Yvonne Frank, White Plains, and Mary Meyer of Greenwich Village. |