Three men vandalized the Pride flag display at the Stonewall National Monument in the West Village over the weekend, the NYPD said Monday.
The group was walking past the monument in Christopher Street Park at 3 a.m. on Saturday, June 10 – just as Pride Month was getting underway – when they began to break multiple Pride flags that were attached to a fence there, police said. The NYPD released video of the three men walking near the monument, and confirmed the department is investigating the incident as a possible hate crime.
Another video obtained by the NY Post shows the men snatching the flags down from the display as they walk by.
Stephen Love Menendez is the creator of the more than 250 flag display and visits it daily to replace the occasional missing flag. But when he arrived on Saturday, he found 50 to 60 flags were taken off the fence.
“And since the flags were broken off and just left hanging there and thrown down on the ground, I realized it was an act of vandalism as opposed to someone trying to take a flag as a souvenir or something,” Menendez said.
Menenedez said he keeps a stock of flags and was able to immediately replace them, but the incident left him angry and upset.
“This is the sixth year that this installation has been going up and this has never happened before, and so it just kind for me, it’s kind of a statement about the climate right now towards the LGBTQ community with all the hateful political rhetoric that’s going on attacking the drag and trans communities especially,” he added.
Councilmember Erik Bottcher, who has been outspoken about hate crimes against the LGBTQ community and was the target of vandalism himself, tweeted pictures Menendez took of the broken flags on the floor, and a video of the fence showing the gaps between rainbow flags.
“I got a call on Saturday from the volunteer who puts these flags up every year, and he sent over photos of the flags, sticks, snapped in half on the ground, and my heart sank,” said…
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