Help with Russian sentence

[Loren A. Billings]

Dear colleagues:

I need help with the following sentence.  Unlike my earlier queries, where
I asked whether a particular phrase or sentence was possible in the
language, this one is attested (reportedly from A. Tolstoi's _Sestry_);
I wish to determine what it means:

Oni  veli       arestovannykh desiat' chelovek gorodovykh
they led        arrested      ten     people   police
NOM  (V)PAST.PL (ADJ)GEN.PL   NOM/ACC GEN.PL   (ADJ)GEN.PL

The third line, in all caps, represents the morphological status of each
word.  I am aware that at least one of the words, thought adjectival, is
functioning syntactically as a noun.

Kindly answer the following questions:

1.  Who arested whom (hence the "NOM/ACC" under _desiat'_)?
2.  Is _Oni_ the police?
3.  Can anyone who knows this literary work provide a larger context?
4.  Since this was written last century, does anyone find it unacceptable
    in 20th-century Russian?

A translation into English would also be appreciated.

Feel free to write directly to me at either address below; I will post a
summary to this list when I get sufficient responses.

Best,
Loren Billings

billings at princeton.edu
billings at pucc.bitnet