Biography
Peter Lynch was an IWW delegate organizing agricultural laborers around Calipatria, in California's Imperial Valley. In September 1919, according to an IWW report, local ranchers pressured the town marshal to arrest him. The marshal reportedly anticipated mob violence and warned Lynch — but a group of ranchers obtained keys and entered the jail around midnight, removed Lynch from custody, drove him into the desert, beat him, and robbed him of his clothing, shoes, money, jewelry, union dues books and about one hundred dollars in IWW dues stamps. His detention was therefore both an arrest and an extrajudicial kidnapping from the jail itself. No legitimate criminal charge, court proceeding or formal release is documented.
Peter Lynch is a common name, and no reliable connection to a census, birth or death record has been established.
