Aug. 23, 2017 By Tara Law
Assemblyman Joseph Lentol is calling on the NYPD Police Commissioner to step up its presence around McGolrick Park following a spate of recent crimes.
Last week, a swastika was taped to a park table—days after the Charlottesville protests. Then on Friday, playwright George Carroll, 42, was stabbed to death while walking near the park with his wife.
Lentol penned a letter to Police Commissioner James P. O’Neill Monday calling on the NYPD to allocate more resources to the 94th Precinct so it can better monitor the park. Since the incidents, he said, several residents have contacted him via email and social media calling for action.
“Constituents have contacted my office and expressed their fear while walking through this park…,” Lentol wrote. “North Brooklyn is a collegial community. We are not a place of hate or violence. Please help us.”
In 2013, following incidents of vandalism and fire, the police installed a camera in the park and frequently stationed a police car nearby. A community organization, McGolrick Park Neighborhood Association, came together to draw more resources to the park.
According to Edward Baker, a spokesman for Lentol, the police have stopped parking the patrol vehicle near the park. Lentol would like the police to consider returning the police car and instituting other changes such as a police bike patrol and additional security cameras.
“After [last week’s] vandalism, it would have been common sense to make sure that it wouldn’t happen again,” Baker said. “The lack of attention to the security of the park was pretty evident.”
On Wednesday morning, Lentol reached out to the commissioner again to ask whether their was any footage obtained from the park’s camera pertaining to the recent incidents. The police have reportedly had difficulty getting good video, Baker said.
On Monday, locals gathered in the park for a “love and unity gathering.” The event was planned as a response to the hate crime, but after the stabbing the focus shifted to a call for increased policing.
Crime and McGolrick Park by Queens Post on Scribd
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2 Comments
It’s also pitch black at night. I was followed by a livery can Saturday night. I had to jump into the hall of some old friends fearing I was being stalked.
This was late Saturday night, August 19th.
Never in my entire life did I ever fear Winthrop. I’m 54 years old.
Born and raised in the neighborhood, still here and I am a homeowner. The swastika is a despicable symbol but by no means is it a testament of what the neighborhood is turning into. By bringing more attention to it instead of just removing it like you would have 15-20 yrs ago feeds into the perpetrators goal, Disruption. You have now given them attention.
In regards to the tragic event of the man getting stabbed by someone who isn’t from our neighborhood it was a senseless act but again not a regular occurrence. The neighborhood is not even close to the danger it was in the late 80s and 90s.
It is sad that Mr. Lentol and the man who I refuse to name and is publicly running on the Anti Trump band wagon this upcoming election cycle are using these events as ways to promote their visibility. Mr. Lentol supposedly lives on the corner of Winthrow ( real greenpointers know the name) Park. It would be wonderful if he actually walked to the corner and witnessed the filth the bums are leaving in the park.
Upwards of 20-30 vagrants live in the park and the children entering the Nassau Ave side of the park have to run the gauntlet everyday through their half naked, filthy stank bodies. Or how the upkeep of the park, such as garbage, non manicured grass and bushes is a travesty. Walk on the park side of the street on russel st. They want to give fines to homes for cracked sidewalks but the city owned property has cracks and dangers worse then anywhere.
These are the real and present issues not the random duct tape swastikas or the man who for all descriptions of being a man’s man in the local papers may have opened his mouth to the wrong people. No way does he deserve to be dead, but let’s wait for all of the facts of his interactions with the group, neighbors, landlord etc..