Brooklyn Will Get Its Own Hate Crime Task Force, DA Says

BROOKLYN, NEW YORK -- Brooklyn will get its own hate crimes task force after a wave of anti-Semitic, racist and homophobic attacks hit the borough.

Brooklyn District Attorney Eric Gonzalez will form a Hate Crimes Bureau staffed by senior-level prosecutors to following hate crime investigations from beginning to end, he announced Tuesday.

"Protecting everyone in Brooklyn is my highest priority," Gonzalez said. "It is simply unacceptable that members of certain protected groups are fearful to walk the streets of our borough."

The group of assistant district attorneys, led by Chief of the Hate Crimes Bureau Kelli Muse and deputy chief Ari Farkas, will assist NYPD officials at crime scenes and during witness interviews, as well as prosecuting hate crimes, Gonzalez said.

The team will also help educate vulnerable communities on how to protect themselves from biased attacks, Gonzalez stated.

The Brooklyn District Attorney's Office's Hate Crimes Unit, which will be absorbed into the the new bureau, handled more than 70 cases in the past two years, prosecutors said.

Recent cases include a Bed-Stuy man who wrote "Die Jew Rats" in a Brooklyn synagogue, a subway attacker who screamed "black b----" as he stabbed a woman with a screwdriver, and the Queens man who beat two men into unconsciousness outside a Williamsburg gay bar.

The Hate Crimes Bureau's jurisdiction will include crimes motivated by race, color, national origin, ancestry, gender, religion, religious practice, age, disability or sexual orientation of the victim, according to the Brooklyn District Attorney's office.

Anyone who wishes to contact the Brooklyn DA's Hate Crimes Hotline can call 718-250-4949.

Photos show an anti-Semitic attack in Midwood, teens throwing a pipe through a Bed-Stuy synagogue window, the suspect who stabbed a woman he called a "black b----" with a screwdriver, and swastikas scrawled on a Brooklyn Heights garage. Photos courtesy of the NYPD, Kathleen Culliton and Molly Cooper, used with permission.