Police in Savannah, Georgia, are looking for answers after a statue of a Revolutionary War general was defaced with “googly eyes.” The Atlanta Journal…
Police in Savannah, Georgia, are looking for answers after a statue of a Revolutionary War general was defaced with “googly eyes.”
The Atlanta Journal-Constitution reported Friday that local police were investigating after a query from city officials about the vandalism of Savannah’s Nathanael Greene Monument went viral earlier this week.
“Who did this?! Someone placed googly eyes on our historic #NathanaelGreene statue in #JohnsonSquare,” the official City of Savannah Government account wrote on its Facebook page in a post Thursday.
“It may look funny but harming our historic monuments and public property is no laughing matter, in fact, it’s a crime,” the post continued.
The post has racked up more than 16,000 shares in the past two days.
Bianca Johnson, a spokeswoman for the Savannah Police Department, told BuzzFeed News that authorities have been reviewing surveillance footage of the statue and said the vandalism would constitute trespassing.
“If we didn’t do anything this thing could get out of hand,” Johnson continued. “We want people to understand we don’t want to see this kind of thing happening. They need to know they can’t go around doing whatever they want to our statues.”
According to a Georgia law cited in the Atlanta Journal-Constitution, defacing, defiling or mutilating a grave marker, monument or memorial devoted to a deceased person who served in the military is considered criminal trespass, which is a misdemeanor offense.
Johnson confirmed that the googly eyes did not damage the statue.
Greene served as a major general in the Continental Army during the Revolutionary War and is buried in the city’s Johnson Square.
