Ex-NYPD Cop Busted For Spraying Swastikas At Jewish Center
One of the last things you’d expect a cop in the New York City Police Department to do is commit a hate crime, especially if that hate crime involves something as mindless and offensive as spray painting swastikas and other offensive racist slogans in a Jewish part of town.
Unfortunately, that very thing happened, as former NYPD cop, Michael Setiawan, aged 36, was caught on camera, and subsequently arrested in connection with a string of anti-Semitic graffiti in Brooklyn. Setiawan resigned from the department in 2007.
The former cop is accused of vandalism and racism after he spray painted Jewish centers, schools, businesses and even vehicles near to the Bnos Zion synagogue. He was arrested on Sunday morning after the anti-Semitic graffiti was found on Saturday evening in the Borough Park area of Brooklyn, an area which is predominantly orthodox Jewish.
In all, four buildings and 15 vehicles were vandalized with spray paint by the former cop who was arrested at his parent’s home in Queens, where he was living. His father, an immigrant from the predominantly Muslim country of Indonesia, told reporters that he was awakened on Sunday morning at 5 a.m. and told his son was in trouble.
Just a few minutes after that warning call to the suspect’s father, the police showed up and a team of officers arrested Setiawan and took him into custody. His father, Thomas Setiawan, told reporters: “I asked my son, ‘What’s wrong? What happened? Is anybody hurt?. He said ‘No, don’t worry, nobody’s hurt.'”
Assemblyman Dov Hikind, who represents the area, said that, in fact, people did get hurt by Setiawan.
“This was not a victimless crime,” said the Assemblyman. “We have many Holocaust survivors here, many elderly people and children who are appropriately frightened by unprovoked hate attacks upon their schools and community. … Hate attacks on our community will not go unpunished.”
According to Thomas Setiawan, his son suffers from mental health problems and neither he nor his wife knew the reason their son left the NYPD in 2007.
