Protesters have defaced the “Black Lives Matter” mural in front of President Trump’s namesake tower in New York City four times in the past week, police told The Hill Sunday.
Two incidents involving alleged vandalism of the mural on Fifth Avenue outside of Trump Tower occurred on Saturday afternoon, resulting in arrests, a New York Police Department spokesperson said. Two women were arrested and charged with criminal mischief after pouring black paint on the mural at about 3 p.m.
Bystander video showed police attempting to detain one of the women spreading black paint on the mural, while she shouted “refund the police.” The clip also shows an officer slipping on the paint and receiving head and arm injuries, police told The Associated Press reported.
At about 5:45 p.m., another person threw black paint on the mural and was arrested and charged with criminal mischief, the spokesperson said.
These arrests came a day after three people were arrested for throwing blue paint on the street, police said. Surveillance video caught the people spilling the blue paint while a woman threw flyers that discussed the shooting death of a 1-year-old in Brooklyn, the AP reported.
The three were found with blue paint on their hands and clothing, police told the AP. Video of the incident showed one of the protesters wearing an “All Lives Matter” shirt and pro-Trump merchandise.
The woman who distributed the flyers was given a criminal court summons for illegally posting them. The flyers showed a picture of 1-year-old Davell Gardner Jr., next to the words “I wasn’t killed by a cop. I was killed by a Black person. Where’s BLM?”
The original vandalism incident on the mural took place on Monday, when a man was captured on video throwing red paint on the mural. The NYPD spokesperson said there has been no arrest for that incident yet.
The Black Lives Matter mural was painted as calls for racial justice spread across the country after George Floyd’s death in Minneapolis police custody.
New York City Mayor Bill de Blasio helped paint the mural in front of Trump’s hotel, prompting the president to condemn the mural as “denigrating” the “luxury avenue.” The president has referred to the mural as a symbol of hate.