Anti-Police Graffiti Should Be A Hate Crime: Hempstead Officials

TOWN OF HEMPSTEAD, NY — Hempstead town officials, the Nassau County Police Benevolent Association and a state lawmaker unveiled legislation Monday that would classify anti-law enforcement graffiti as a hate crime.

Don Clavin, the Hempstead Town supervisor, joined Jim McDermott, the Nassau County police union president, and state Assemblyman Ed Ra to announce the legislation, which comes in response to recent incidents of anti-police graffiti in Bellmore and Levittown. Hempstead Town Councilman Christopher Carini of Seaford also expressed his support for the legislation at the announcement.

The proposal also comes amid months of nationwide protests against police brutality and systemic racism, in addition to activist calls to defund or abolish the police. The demonstrations came in response to the killing of George Floyd, an unarmed Black man who died in Minneapolis police custody, in addition to police killings of other Black people such as Breonna Taylor and Tony McDade.

“Our police have been under assault in this country and state because of a clear and dangerous bias against them by both groups and individuals,” Clavin said. “Recent graffiti, which has appeared in multiple town locations actively encourages violence against the fine men and women of law enforcement. Clearly, it is time to update New York State’s Hate Crimes statute to include anti-police graffiti and other acts against law enforcement officers as acts of hate.”

In New York, a hate crime is defined as "a traditional offense that is motivated by bias." A person commits a hate crime when "one of a specified set of crimes is committed targeting a victim because of a perception or belief about their race, color, national origin, ancestry, gender, religion, religious practice, age, disability or sexual orientation, or when such an act is committed as a result of that type of perception or belief," according to the State's Anti-Hate Crime Resource Guide. Hate crimes can target an individual, a group of individuals or public or private property.

Article 485 of New York’s Penal Law states: “Crimes motivated by invidious hatred toward particular groups not only harm individual victims but send a powerful message of intolerance and discrimination to all members of the group to which the victim belongs. Hate crimes can and do intimidate and disrupt entire communities.”

While the Town of Hempstead is addressing recent graffiti with increased fines, enforcement and prosecutions, Clavin said, anti-police graffiti should require greater criminal penalties at the state level. The graffiti, which Clavin believes targets cops based on bias, should thus be classified as a hate crime, he said.

Ra signed on to sponsor the anti-police hate crimes legislation to add the job of law enforcement to the list of protected groups and identities under the State’s hate crimes statute. This would grant police officers the same protections as the other groups outlined in the law from crimes deemed to be motivated by bias.

But not everyone feels police should receive the protections.

The Levittown Coalition of Change told Patch in a statement it rejected the idea that police should be a protected class of citizens.

"To make anti-cop graffiti a hate crime would not only be an infringement on our First Amendment rights, but a confirmation to us that our local legislators are more committed to protecting law enforcement than they are to hearing their constituents' concerns and stories of abuse from law enforcement," the group said.

The organization said law enforcement officers are civil servants, and that the people they're charged to serve have a "responsibility to themselves and their community to hold these servants accountable for their actions."

Clavin and Ra described recent acts of graffiti that they believe to be motivated by hatred of law enforcement. Clavin highlighted two recent acts of anti-police graffiti, in which "Kill All Cops" was spray-painted in locations in Bellmore and Levittown.

McDermott also described other acts he said were motivated by bias against police officers, including the refusal of certain retail establishments to serve officers in uniform and "unprovoked hate-fueled speech directed at police."

"I served as a police officer for [21] years and have never seen the anti-law enforcement climate that we are seeing today," Carini, the councilman, wrote in a Facebook post Monday. "You turn on the news and nightly we are seeing police vehicles being torched and police officers being assaulted. It is time we defend those who defend us! Call your local Assemblyman/Assemblywoman and State Senator to get behind this legislation! Let's stand up for our Law Enforcement and stand up to those who want to defund our police!"

While some protests across the nation have turned violent, most demonstrations against police brutality, including those on Long Island, have been peaceful. Videos and photos from protests have also documented violence instigated by law enforcement.

According to data released by the Federal Bureau of Investigations, across the country, 48 police officers were killed feloniously last year. From 2016 to 2019, police nationwide shot and killed nearly 1,000 people each year.