George Floyd’s memorial bust in New York City’s Union Square is well on its way to being repaired, TMZ writes. According to the outlet, a group of people came together this weekend to clean up the statue after a vandal covered it with grey paint.
One person who stepped up to clean the bust was Eric Garner’s son, Eric Jr. TMZ writes that Garner became close friends with Terrence, Floyd’s brother, amidst the public agony his family faced last year in the aftermath of Floyd’s brutal murder. Others who joined in on the cleanup efforts included Lindsay Eshelman, co-founder of Confront Art, which helped Terrence establish the statue; and other local activists.
As reported by REVOLT, a man on a skateboard was caught throwing paint on the 6-foot-tall statue on Sunday morning (Oct. 3). The man appeared to be hanging around the area earlier in the day, where busts of the late Rep. John Lewis and Breonna Taylor were also erected. The other two statues were left unharmed.
According to surveillance footage, the perpetrator appears to be a white man who police say was wearing a green jacket, shorts and beanie. The man has not yet been caught by police, but the NYPD Hate Crime Task Force is investigating the incident.
Eshelman told TMZ that Confront Art is planning to organize a group of volunteers to continue to guard the statue, called the “keepers,” throughout its full installation, which will take another 30 days. The NYPD reportedly refused to staff officers to protect the bust from vandals, so the group is planning to stand by the structure during 7 a.m. to midnight shifts.
This is the second time the Floyd statue has been vandalized since it was first unveiled this summer in Brooklyn. At the time, it was defaced with a white supremacist organization’s logo.