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CONNECTICUT - Connecticut plans to crack down on incidents involving hangman's nooses, a potent symbol of racist lynchings and hatred of blacks in the United States, the state's governor said on Tuesday.
Miniature replica nooses have been found in recent weeks at construction sites in West Hartford and Stamford following two separate incidents earlier in the year involving nooses at the US Coast Guard Academy in New London, Connecticut.
"We simply will not tolerate it," Governor Jodi Rell told reporters, calling the nooses "repugnant".
"We're going to do what we can as a state. And if that means bringing in the department of public safety, our state police, and it means bringing in the chief state's attorney and the US attorney, that's exactly what we're doing," she said.
Several US cities and states have reported incidents in which blacks have been harassed with nooses this year, prompting a march by thousands of black Americans in Washington last month to protest against the criminal justice system.
In October, a hangman's noose was found on the office door of a black professor at Columbia University - one of at least four noose incidents in around New York City, an area known for its racial diversity.
The Coast Guard Academy said in September it was expanding training on race relations after two nooses were found on campus, the first in the bag of a black cadet and the second in a trainer's office.
Nationwide attention has been focused on Jena, Louisiana, where three nooses were found hanging from a tree at a high school last year, prompting tens of thousands of black Americans to demonstrate in the town in September.
"Whoever thinks this is funny, they've got to stop it," said Rell. "If we can find out who these individuals are, we will prosecute them and make sure they understand that we relate this to a hate crime."
- REUTERS
