The Department of Public Safety’s union denied allegations of protester abuse and intimidation during the #NotAgainSU protests in a letter released Thursday.

The Syracuse University DPS Officers Union claims in its letter that #NotAgainSU protesters have created a negative and inaccurate image of DPS that goes against the department’s mission to maintain a safe campus at SU. The union addressed the letter to Chancellor Kent Syverud.

“The lack of respect towards law enforcement being fostered by SU is tragic,” the letter reads. “The DPS officers can no longer tolerate being treated this way.”

#NotAgainSU, a movement led by Black students, has now occupied Crouse-Hinds Hall since Feb. 17 to continue its ongoing protest of at least 30 racist, anti-Semitic and homophobic incidents that have occurred at or near SU in early November.

The movement has criticized the way DPS officers have interacted with organizers throughout the Crouse-Hinds occupation. Organizers continue to call for the resignations of DPS Chief Bobby Maldonado and Associate Chief John Sardino.

DPS officers have acted under orders from Syverud and senior SU administration throughout the protest, the union said

“At no time did any DPS Administrators or officer make any decisions for how to handle the protest,” the letter states.

The Crouse-Hinds sit-in has made it difficult for DPS officers to maintain the department’s mission because SU has not allowed them to fully carry out their duties throughout the protests, the union said.

SU placed more than 30 #NotAgainSU organizers under interim suspension the morning of Feb. 18 for remaining inside Crouse-Hinds after its 9 p.m. closing hours. The student protesters received letters of suspension from a DPS officer, an organizer said. Syverud announced that the interim suspensions had been lifted the next day.

DPS also sealed Crouse-Hinds off as of Feb. 18, with more than 30 #NotAgainSU organizers choosing to remain inside. Outside food and medicine were not allowed inside until Wednesday afternoon. The university provided two meals to organizers Tuesday and breakfast Wednesday. Crouse-Hinds later reopened Feb. 20.

Syverud said to #NotAgainSU protesters on Friday that he doesn’t know which university officials were responsible for SU’s handling of the Crouse-Hinds protest, but he would find out. Amanda Nicholson, interim deputy senior vice president for enrollment and the student experience, said in a Thursday meeting with #NotAgainSU that she was one of the officials who made decisions last week.

The union’s letter also challenges claims that DPS officers were unnecessarily physically aggressive.

In a video posted to social media, Sardino is seen physically struggling with a protester at the entrance of Crouse-Hinds. Sardino reaches for his gun holster at one point in the video. Sardino was holding the door under orders from SU administrators, Nicholson said on Monday.

Parents criticized how DPS officers treated protesters in Crouse-Hinds in a letter released Monday. The parents’ letter overlooked the verbal and physical abuse that DPS officers received while they worked at Crouse-Hinds during the protests, the union said in its statement.

Student protesters directed a racial slur at Black DPS officers and used force against Sardino in attempts to disarm him, the union said.

“This type of behavior by the students demonstrates a depraved indifference to law and order, and has created not only an unsafe work environment for the officers, but also an unsafe environment for the SU community as well,” the union said.

Student protesters would be arrested if such behaviors occurred outside of SU, the letter states. Allowing the behavior of student protesters to continue could create a hostile, volatile campus environment, it states.

“To ignore such student behavior or by allowing it to continue unchecked rises to the level of gross negligence,” the union said.

Sarah Scalese, senior associate vice president for university communications, said in a statement that the university “deeply appreciates” DPS officers’ and acknowledges their concerns.

DPS has attended multiple bias training sessions, including a July presentation from Professor Biko Mandela Gray about the history and future of policing, according to the union.

The union criticized Gray’s active involvement with #NotAgainSU and vocal support of the movement on Twitter. Gray said in a tweet Feb. 18 that he never wants to hear about building trust between law enforcement and communities.

“If you’re one of the #Notallcops people, I don’t want to hear it. We’re literally watching the formation of a police state occur,” Gray’s tweet reads.

Gray’s message “only serves to destroy the bridges we (DPS) have tried to build between the DPS and the SU community,” the union said.

The union’s letter was written in bad faith, and unfairly targeted him as a Black, untenured professor, Gray later said in a tweet Thursday. The letter doesn’t take any responsibility for the violence DPS enacted against organizers, he said.

The union’s letter concluded with a call for Syverud to let DPS officers do their jobs “to keep SU and ourselves safe.”

“As always, we stand with our Chief and remain ready to follow his decisions and orders,” the union said.

Published on February 27, 2020 at 10:47 pm

Contact Marnie: ammunozc@syr.edu