NYPD opens hate crime investigation after car rams into Chabad headquarters building

By Karina Tsui, Sarah Dewberry, John Miller, Diego Mendoza, CNN

(CNN) — A driver rammed a car repeatedly into the Chabad Lubavitch World Headquarters building in Brooklyn, New York, Wednesday, prompting a hate crime investigation and additional security at places of worship throughout the city, officials said.

The driver was quickly arrested and there were no reported injuries, New York Police Commissioner Jessica Tisch said at a news conference.

The suspect is being treated as an emotionally disturbed person, CNN affiliate WABC reported, citing authorities.

Shortly before 9 p.m., a gray Honda sedan entered the driveway of the Hasidic Jewish site in the Crown Heights neighborhood, crashed into the doorway, backed up and crashed into it again several times, a law enforcement official told CNN.

Video from the scene shows the car crashing into a set of doors at the end of the driveway. As bystanders watched the incident unfold, the car rammed the doors repeatedly until one came off its hinges.

As two people cautiously approached the car, the suspect emerged dressed in a jacket, shorts and boots, the video shows. At one point he yells to a person in the crowd, “It slipped!” Two officers then arrive and take the man into custody.

The driver, whose name has not been released, has been cooperating with police and told officers it was not an attack, the law enforcement official said.

The NYPD bomb squad did a sweep of the vehicle and no explosive devices were found, Tisch said. She added that she wasn’t aware of any weapons recovered at the scene.

The car ramming comes amid a succession of attacks on members of the Jewish community–– in Brooklyn and across the world.

In December, a man was charged with a hate crime after police said he made antisemitic remarks and stabbed a man in Crown Heights, WABC reported. And earlier this month, two teenagers were arrested on suspicion of spray painting swastikas at a playground in Brooklyn.

The incidents in predominantly Jewish areas of New York came after 15 people were killed in a mass shooting at Sydney’s Bondi Beach during a celebration of the first night of Hanukkah in December.

The Chabad-Lubavitch headquarters was established in 1940 and is considered one of the most well-known Jewish buildings in the world, according to Chabad.org. Replicas of the red-brick synagogue with its distinctive facade can be found across the world.

Wednesday marked the 75th anniversary of Rabbi Menachem Mendel Schneerson being chosen as the leader of the faith.

“Today is a significant day on the Chabad calendar, with thousands of young rabbinical students in the neighborhood,” Yaacov Behrman, head of public relations at the headquarters, told CNN over email.

“We believe that it was not a coincidence that he chose today to drive his car into the synagogue,” Behrman said.

Behrman said he spoke with a group of rabbinical students who interacted with the suspect roughly an hour before the car ramming.

The suspect asked the students about when the Hasidic gathering was happening, and they told him: “It’s also tomorrow, but mainly tonight.”

Details about what investigators learned or suspected about any motive in the incident were not immediately released. When asked at the news conference whether investigators knew whether the incident was intentional, Tisch said: “Unfortunately, investigation is preliminary and we’ll have more to say as it unfolds.”

New York City Mayor Zohran Mamdani said he was “relieved that no one was injured in this horrifying incident.”

“This is deeply alarming especially given the deep meaning and history of the institution to so many in New York and around the world,” Mamdani said at the news conference.

“Any threat to a Jewish institution or place of worship must be taken seriously,” Mamdani said. “Antisemitism has no place in our city.”

New York Attorney General Letitia James, who was also at the news conference, said her office will be working with NYPD to investigate the incident.

Police mobilized additional crowd control as members of the Chabad community gathered on the scene, and have enhanced security at places of worship across all five boroughs, Tisch said.

“You will see an enhanced uniformed presence, specialized patrols, counterterrorism resources and bomb squad deployment when appropriate,” she added.

This story has been updated with additional information.

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