Hallandale Beach PD: Jeffrey Fleming Arrested For Shouting Anti-Semitic Slurs, Dumping Human Feces At Chabad Of South Broward
HALLANDALE BEACH (CBSMiami) – The Hallandale Beach Police Department has announced the arrest of a man wanted for hurling anti-Semitic slurs and dumping a bag of feces outside a synagogue.
Jeffrey Fleming is being charged with stalking with an enhancement for a hate crime and for littering human waste.
The Chabad of South Broward said they're beefing up security following the acts of hate.
One man who attends the Hallandale Beach synagogue told CBS4 he has been the target of hate at this same location in the past.
"He actually greeted us by saying, 'Shabbat shalom' and we were like, 'Shabbat shalom,'" said Joe Messa. "When we got 10 feet away from, he goes, 'Even though I'm a Nazi,' he screams to us, 'And I want to kill you all one by one.'"
Messa said acts of hate towards himself and others in the Jewish community are a harsh and perpetual reality.
According to Hallandale Beach police, officers responded to the Chabad of South Broward on Saturday.
The woman who called police said she saw a man dump a large bag of human feces on the sidewalk and shouted, "Jews should die."
CBS4 was first to obtain surveillance camera footage of an incident earlier that day which shows the same man spitting at the Menorah in the parking lot.
He was dressed in all white and riding an electric bicycle.
Across the nation, a surge of anti-Semitic attacks against the Jewish community are happening.
This as tensions rise over the Israeli-Palestinian conflict.
The recent attacks on the Jewish community are despicable, and they must stop. I condemn this hateful behavior at home and abroad — it's up to all of us to give hate no safe harbor.
— President Biden (@POTUS) May 24, 2021
"It is terrifying, frankly, as a Jew and an American to see this kind of hate," said Jacob Solomon, with the Greater Miami Jewish Federation. "I've had so many discussions lately with people who are afraid to eat outside at a restaurant in a Jewish neighborhood or people who are afraid to wear their yarmulkes in public."
The Anti-Defamation League tracks incidents of hate.
Their data shows that Florida saw a near 40% increase in anti-Semitic incidents between 2019 and 2020.
The ADL also said Florida is one of the top states for these kinds of acts.
"To not go to synagogue or to not participate in Jewish life as a result of this is essentially to give a victory to the terrorist and a victory to the haters and the anti-Semites and that is intolerable," said Solomon.