These days, 927 Broadway is known as Enrique’s Unisex Salon, the storefront a burst of rainbow colored signage. But in 1973, it was John and Al’s Sports, as it had been since the 1930s. That sporting goods store was founded by a man named Speilberger who eventually died after being hit in the head by robbers in 1967. A pair of employees, Samuel Rosenblum and Jerry Riccio, took over. 

Jan. 19, 1973, was a cold, rainy Friday; the window display cases at John and Al’s were packed with hiking boots and small tinsel Christmas tree decorations leftover from the holidays. Four men entered and browsed the merchandise, joining around a dozen or so other shoppers spread throughout the place. Their names: Shulab Abdur Raheem, Dawd A. Rahman, Yusef Abdallah Almussadig and Salih Ali Abdullah, all in their early-to-mid twenties. After a few minutes, they drew their weapons – a sawed off shotgun and three handguns.

Robberies were a regular occurrence at the store — “It had been robbed at least once every three months, as had almost every other store on the block,” noted Harvey Schlossberg, the police psychologist who will play a pivotal role in the coming events. But this one was different. The gunmen were Sunni Muslims performing, in their view, a hastily organized liberation of weapons for revolutionary self defense.