New Haven Register (New Haven, CT)
Man charged with hate crime, assault
STAMFORD — City police have charged a Stamford man, who was caught on video berating a group of young Black and Latino men at Cove Island Park last month, with a hate crime and multiple counts of assault.
Steven Mike Dudek, 57, who police say sprayed four of the men with pepper spray, was videoed shouting at the group and then calling police to report he was being harassed by a “bunch of Black men.”
One of the men allegedly pepper sprayed was an offduty Bridgeport police officer.
On Thursday Stamford police charged Dudek with four counts of second-degree assault, first-degree intimidation based on bigotry or bias and falsely reporting an incident to police, according to Stamford Police Capt. Richard Conklin and Lt. Tom Scanlon.
Dudek turned himself over to police after becoming aware that they had obtained an arrest warrant in his name and was released after posting a $25,000 court appearance bond, according to authorities.
Police said Dudek approached the group of men at about 4 p.m. on Saturday June 20 and accused them of wanting to use the boat ramp at the park even though they were not authorized to do so. City rules allow only those who have purchased seasonal slips at the park to launch their motorboats there.
The men had a motorboat hitched to a pickup truck parked in the lot. It was was not backed up to the ramp. An attorney for the the five younger men has said they had planned to launch their boat from West Beach, where anyone, provided they have a pass, can launch a motorboat.
Dudek’s comments included racial connotations and escalated into an assault in which Dudek used a chemical spray against four of the men, police said.
The video that was widely shared on social media does not show Dudek using a spray. But a circulated still photograph that appears to be from the same incident allegedly shows him using one.
Dudek’s Stamford criminal defense attorney Steven DeLeo said because the case is still under investigation and he has been told police are still talking to witnesses, he declined comment. A message left for Dudek was not immediately returned. He has not returned several messages left for him in recent weeks.
Attorney Darnell Crosland, who is representing the five younger men, called the incident a “hate filled attack” and said, “Stamford is better than that.”
“The arc of the moral universe may bend towards justice, but only if we bend it that way. What happened to George Floyd has sparked a flame in all of us that enough is enough when it comes to injustices based on race,” said Crosland. “To say ‘I’m not racist’ is not enough. We have an affirmative duty to speak out for justice, to work to bring it into being and to confront and actively oppose racism in all its forms.”
The video shows Dudek angrily shouting at the group, and calling Stamford police to report he was being harassed.
The clip begins with Dudek yelling that the men can not launch their boat on the park’s ramp.
“I’ve been down here my whole (expletive) life. I live here,” he says at one point, while walking up to one of the younger men.
“What are you going to do to me?” Dudek asks him while holding a phone up to
his ear.
“I’m being harassed by a bunch of Black men down here,” he says into the phone. A moment later, Dudek continues: “Is this the Stamford Police Department? There are people trying to put a boat in the water that is illegal. I have a boat down here. I have a legal right to put my boat in the water. They do not.”
“How do you know that?” one of the younger men asks. “Who said we are putting the boat in the water? No one said that. We are hanging out.”
One of the men asks for his name and Dudek replies,
“My name is God.”
“A bunch of Black guys are harassing me,” he repeats. “Yes, harassing me. White lives matter too.”
One of the younger men confronted by Dudek said last week he believes he and his friends, who are Black and Latino, were singled out because of the color of their skin.
“What happened to us is a perfect example of this man weaponizing the police department and as a Black man who grew up in America, this happens far too often,” said Tarae Frazier, 24, of Stamford.
His cousin, Tyshawn Frazier, said the day before the incident was his birthday. That date, June 19, is commemorated as Juneteenth, the day in 1865 on which the last remaining slaves in in the United States were liberated — more than two years after the Emancipation Proclamation was enacted.
“We went to the beach on Juneteenth to have a good time, to have a great threeday weekend. And he put up to us with an issue. And that shouldn’t happen,” said the Norwalk resident. “We shouldn’t go out our doors and, you know, be fearful like that. We are all equal. We are all human beings.”
Stamford Police Chief Tim Shaw last week said the two sides involved in the incident told very different stories following the altercation, and police took time to investigate.
“While this case deals with a person who has complained about other individuals illegally using the boat ramp, we do believe that in this specific case, based on the totality of the information we have collected so far, the event escalated into a racial incident,” Shaw said last week.