A statue depicting Jackie Robinson with fellow teammate Pee Wee Reese has been vandalized with racial slurs and images outside the Brooklyn Cyclones baseball stadium, CNN reports.
At some point between the Cyclones game on Tuesday night and 7 a.m. Wednesday morning, vandals marked the statue of the famed baseball player with a swastika, "anti-Semitic comments," and the N-word, according to a spokesperson from the New York City Police Department.
No arrests have been made.
Glenn Schuck, reporter for 1010 WINS, tweeted several pictures of workers trying to remove the graffiti and police surrounding the area. By noon, the base of the statue had been covered.
The NYPD has labeled the matter as a possible bias incident and is being handled by the department's Hate Crimes Task Force. Billy Harner, Direct of Communications for the Brooklyn Cyclones, said he hopes that security camera footage provided to officials will lead them to the culprit(s).
"The statue is a symbol of tolerance," Harner said. "It's an absolute tragedy that someone would deface it the way they did."
Harner mentioned the Parks Department has already removed a majority of the graffiti but were unable to eliminate what's left on the base, which is made of stone.
The Brooklyn Cyclones is a minor league club team associated with the Major League Baseball's New York Mets franchise.Their stadium is located on Coney Island.
Robinson was the first African American baseball player to join a major league team, the Brooklyn Dodgers, in the modern era -- a move that is associated with the Civil Rights Movement.
His jersey number, 42, was retired in 1997 but is still worn today by New York Yankees closer Mariano Rivera. Warner Brothers produced the movie "42" which told the story of Robinson's career and premiered in April, grossing $95 million to date.
