A Christopher Columbus statue in Boston’s North End neighborhood was damaged Tuesday evening.
The head of the statue was reported severed to Boston police sometime before midnight, WCVB reports.
Statues have been a focus of protesters nationwide amid ongoing protests following the death of George Floyd. A statue of Columbus was torn down by protesters Tuesday evening in Richmond, Virginia.
The Richmond Times-Dispatch reports about 1,000 protesters used ropes to topple the statue before dumping it into a nearby lake.
“We have to start where it all began,” an activist told the crowd, the newspaper reported. “We have to start with the people who stood first on this land.”
The statue in Boston’s North End has been damaged several times in recent years. In 2015, the statue was dosed in red paint with “Black Lives Matter” spray painted onto its base. In 2006, the head of the statue was removed and remained missing for several days.
___
© 2020 MassLive.com
Distributed by Tribune Content Agency, LLC.
