{"id":109204,"date":"2026-01-22T23:46:08","date_gmt":"2026-01-22T23:46:08","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ny\/109204\/"},"modified":"2026-01-22T23:46:08","modified_gmt":"2026-01-22T23:46:08","slug":"cops-arrest-two-teens-for-drawing-dozens-of-swastikas-all-over-playground-in-heavily-jewish-nyc-neighborhood","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ny\/109204\/","title":{"rendered":"Cops arrest two teens for drawing dozens of swastikas \u00a0all over playground in heavily Jewish NYC neighborhood"},"content":{"rendered":"

Police arrested two 15-year-old boys for allegedly scrawling dozens of swastikas all over a playground<\/a> in a heavily Jewish Brooklyn neighborhood two days in a row. <\/p>\n

One of the teens was charged with two counts of aggravated harassment and two counts of hate crime criminal mischief for the two-day spree. The other boy, who police said was the main graffiti artist, was charged with 41 counts of aggravated harassment.<\/p>\n

The swastikas were painted across slides, handball courts and other equipment at Gravesend Park in Borough Park, which gets crowded with Jewish school children each day. The back-to-back vandalism unfolded earlier this week at the large playground at 56th Street and 18th Avenue.<\/p>\n

Gravesend Park, often frequented by Orthodox Jewish children, was defaced with swastikas earlier this week. @StopAntisemites \/ X<\/p>\n

On Tuesday evening, officers responded to a 911 call and found roughly 16 swastikas scrawled in red in the playground and handball court area.<\/p>\n

By late Wednesday morning, police answered another 911 call and discovered about 57 more swastikas in red, blue and yellow in the same part of the park, triggering the hate-crime probe and public outrage.<\/p>\n

The antisemitic scribbling had been painted over by Thursday.<\/p>\n

The teens are being charged as juveniles after officers, aided by a field intelligence officer, reviewed their social media accounts and picked them up at their homes, cops said. <\/p>\n

Both boys had no criminal history. Police will not be releasing their names because they are underage, according to police sources.<\/p>\n

Two teens are in police custody for the offensive drawings. Gregory P. Mango for NY Post<\/p>\n

City Council Speaker Julie Menin called the vile vandalism in the neighborhood \u201cdisgusting,\u201d \u201cdeplorable,\u201d and \u201cunconscionable\u201d when she and other community leaders visited the park Thursday.<\/p>\n

\u201cWhen we hear about a young person painting 57 swastikas, then we need to make sure that the schools in New York City and the city government is doing its job to educate young people about hate,\u201d Menin said.<\/p>\n

Security cameras outside the park helped detectives identify the young suspects, but Menin said more security cameras are needed inside the park.<\/p>\n

The NYPD\u2019s Hate Crimes Task Force was still investigating, according to Assistant Chief Charlie Minch, commanding officer of Patrol Borough Brooklyn South.<\/p>\n

Speaker Julie Menin called the hateful drawings \u201cdisgusting,\u201d \u201cdeplorable,\u201d and \u201cunconscionable.\u201d Gregory P. Mango for NY Post<\/p>\n

Billy Soto, 14, was in the playground with his friends on Thursday afternoon and condemned the hateful graffiti.<\/p>\n

\u201cI think a lot of kids nowadays are in the wrong mindset. Some people think it\u2019s OK, but it\u2019s not funny,\u201d Soto said.<\/p>\n

Menin said the case underscores the urgency of her antisemitism legislative package<\/a>, which includes requiring schools to address antisemitic and other discriminatory misinformation.<\/p>\n

Her five-point plan, which she unveiled last week, would also expand Holocaust education, restore protest perimeters around schools and houses of worship, fund security training and support for Jewish institutions and create a dedicated antisemitism reporting hotline with data tracking to guide future policy.<\/p>\n

Menin plans to move the legislation quickly through the Council. She expects the bills will be introduced next week on Jan. 29 and voted on Feb. 12.<\/p>\n

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While only about 10% of New York City\u2019s population is Jewish, antisemitism accounts for roughly 57% of reported hate crimes, the speaker said, calling the disparity an \u201curgent crisis\u201d and saying education is the key to stopping hate before it starts.<\/p>\n

\u201cIt is disgusting, it is deplorable, it is unconscionable. And we\u2019re not going to sit by and let this continue to happen,\u201d Menin said.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"Police arrested two 15-year-old boys for allegedly scrawling dozens of swastikas all over a playground in a heavily…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":109205,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[8],"tags":[3862,7544,98,57,9,24,55,54,56,18377,58,5614],"class_list":{"0":"post-109204","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-new-york-city","8":"tag-antisemitism","9":"tag-borough-park","10":"tag-brooklyn","11":"tag-metro","12":"tag-new-york","13":"tag-new-york-city","14":"tag-new-york-city-headlines","15":"tag-new-york-city-news","16":"tag-ny","17":"tag-swastika","18":"tag-us-news","19":"tag-vandalism"},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ny\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/109204","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ny\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ny\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ny\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ny\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=109204"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ny\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/109204\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ny\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/109205"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ny\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=109204"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ny\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=109204"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ny\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=109204"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}