The police have released two men, pictured, wanted for spraying a racist slur across the front of an Astoria restaurant last month (Photos: The suspects (l.) via NYPD and Sunrise Chinese Restaurant, pictured in Sep. 2022, via Google Maps)
March 6, 2022 By Michael Dorgan
Police have arrested two men on hate crime charges for allegedly spraying a racist slur across a restaurant in Astoria last month.
Christopher Ordonez, 18, and Zlatko Basic, 20, were arrested Sunday, March 5, and each charged with one count of criminal mischief as a hate crime, making graffiti, and possession of a graffiti instrument, after they allegedly scrawled the N-word on a Chinese restaurant, according to police.
The pair allegedly sprayed the racist epithet across a roller gate at Sunrise Chinese Restaurant, located at 33-20 Broadway, at around 3:30 a.m. on Friday, Feb. 17, police said.
Ordonez, of Steinway Street in Long Island City, and Basic, of 37th Street in Astoria, used green-colored spray paint to plaster the word across the front of the restaurant. The hateful graffiti was around 16 feet wide and 14 feet high, cops said.
The alleged vandals then fled the scene on foot in an unknown direction.
Police had called on the public’s help in tracking the pair and had released photos of the duo.
The NYPD’s Hate Crime Task Force has been investigating the incident with cops nabbing and arresting the duo Sunday morning.
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