Two Staten Island women were arrested after they painted over the Black Lives Matter mural outside the Trump Tower in Manhattan, only to be seen on video hours later dumping paint on two other murals in Brooklyn and Harlem.
Bevelyn Beatty, 29, and Edmee Chavannes, 39, both Black residents of Stapleton, were taken into custody after they allegedly smeared black paint across the bright yellow letters which read “Black Lives Matter” on Fifth Avenue in Manhattan, police said.
During the act, which was posted by Beatty on Facebook, she can be heard saying: “Black Lives Matter, right? … For the Black people. This is for the Black people. They’re destroying business for Black people. They’re looting for Black people.”
“No,” Beatty says as she dumps black paint onto the mural. “No. We’re not standing with Black Lives Matter. We want our police. Re-fund our police.”
Beatty and Chavannes were both charged with criminal mischief, given desk appearance tickets and released shortly afterwards.
A statement from At the Well Ministries, an organization that has posted videos of Beatty denouncing abortion, said the two women were “treated like royalty” by cops after their arrests.
“This was the BEST experience they have ever had with any police department,” the statement read, adding that police expressed their “HIGH APPRECIATION for what Bevelyn and Edmee stood up for today.”
While responding to the incident, a cop slipped on the paint that was poured on the mural — slamming his shoulder and head into the pavement. The statement said the officer is “doing very well and fine.”
“More to come,” the statement continued, “But we are taking our country back NOW!”
A short while later, in the late hours of Saturday night, Beatty posted another video on Facebook entitled, “Harlem Drive-by Painting,” in which she and others pour paint out of the back of a minivan as it rolls past the Black Lives Matter mural on 7th Avenue and West 125th Street.
“Jesus matters,” they can be heard saying, as other cars rolled along the Harlem street behind Beatty — who was wearing the same outfit she was seen in outside the Trump Tower earlier on Saturday.
“Before anything else can matter, Jesus got to matter,” Beatty said as she poured the black paint onto the brightly-colored mural.
As the cars crept down the street, an onlooker began accosting the group.
“What’s wrong with you? You’re a Black woman,” the person can be heard saying. “What the f–k is wrong with you? You’re a Black woman.”
As the caravan of cars pulls away, empty paint cans can be seen being hurled towards the group.
The NYPD said an investigation into the incident remains ongoing.
However, less than two hours later, Beatty and others were on Fulton Street in Bedford-Stuyvesant in Brooklyn early Sunday, video posted to her Facebook page showed.
“Jesus matters, we are taking our country back,” Beatty said during the video. “The police need our help — they can’t stand alone. Don’t just sit by idly and watch your country go to the ground. Stand with your police force, vote for Trump, vote Republican, vote for Christians.”
Then, Beatty and another woman splashed paint across the Black Lives Matter mural and used paint rollers to spread it across the letters.
Several people are seen in the video approaching the two women to confront them about painting over the mural. Several verbal encounters quickly became terse.
The group then piled into nearby cars and drove off.
The NYPD said the department is aware of the incident and the investigation remains ongoing.
In a video following the incidents posted on Sunday, Beatty said: ”We did an all-nighter. Let me tell you something. Yesterday was epic,” adding that President Donald Trump “needs the American people behind him.”
The Daily News reported Beatty and Chavannes were both arrested last month for protesting outside Planned Parenthood’s New York headquarters, and were also charged with disorderly conduct in Fort Myers, Florida, when they disrupted a council meeting.
“We’re Black women, but we do not support Black Lives Matter because they’re hand-in-hand with Planned Parenthood that kills African-American babies,” Beatty told Fox News last month. “They’re fraudulent hypocrites…”
This is not the first time the Black Lives Matter mural outside the Trump Tower has been painted over.
The NYPD said surveillance video revealed three individuals poured and smeared paint across the midtown-street art on Friday, July 17, just before 4 p.m.
Juliet Germanotta, 39, of Manhattan; Luis Martinez, 44, of Brooklyn; and Morgan D’Anna, 25, a Queens resident, were arrested and charged with criminal mischief and released with a desk appearance ticket, the NYPD said in a written statement.
A fourth person, a 64-year-old female, was issued a criminal court summons for illegally posting fliers at the scene, the NYPD said.
Last week, the New York Post reported that a man walked up to the mural and poured red paint over it before fleeing the scene.
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