###

White supremacist graffiti was written at at least two separate locations in Eureka recently, apparently by two separate people.

Both of the graffiti have since been eradicated, and the Eureka Police Department has assigned a detective from the Problem Oriented Policing division to investigate.

“Hate has no place in our community and will not be tolerated,” said Eureka Police Chief Steve Watson today. “Crimes motivated by racism and hate will be aggressively investigated, and we will work with DA to prosecute them to the fullest extent of the law.”

One of the two incidents — pictured above — defaced a building at Highland Park. It included the number “2316,” which is white supremacist code. The graffiti was eradicated yesterday, as soon as it was discovered, according to Eureka Community Development Services Director Miles Slattery.

The other incident was near the corner of Fairfield and Henderson Streets, and was documented by artist/photographer KM Ross in a post that was shared widely on Facebook:

Ross told the Outpost this afternoon that while he doesn’t see racism this blatant every day in Humboldt County, casual white supremacy is pretty common in his life.

“A quote I often use to illustrate my experience is, ‘I wake up every day knowing that at some point someone is going to remind me that I’m black,’” Ross said.

Ross said that he drove down to Eureka to photograph the graffiti after someone told him about it. He said there’s a lot he’d like to see happen to bring about greater equity in Humboldt County — more support minority-owned businesses, more diversity in local government, more people being honest about their biases. At least the racist graffiti writer had that going for themselves, Ross said.

“In a way the honesty is appreciated more than the hundreds of people trying to justify it — admitting the problem, versus denying it,” Ross said. “Instances like this bring our community closer together and make us stronger. We’re not going anywhere.”

According to the police, the owner of the property arranged for the graffiti to be power-washed away shortly after it was discovered. The style of this piece of graffiti — formal cursive — is very similar to a “Fuck the Police” tag scribbled onto the side of Advance Security over the weekend, as documented by Supervisor Rex Bohn.

If you have any information about either graffiti incident, the Eureka Police Department asks that you contact their office — (707) 441-4066.