Wethersfield police officers responding to a vandalism complaint on Valley Crest Drive at around 5:39 a.m. on Sept. 20 found a vehicle defaced with a swastika and antisemitic writing, the first sign of what would turn out to be a sprawling overnight spree. By the time officers finished canvassing the neighborhood, they had found more vandalized vehicles, defaced residential fencing and damaged street signs. Hours later, at roughly 10:40 a.m. that same morning, officers discovered similar vandalism at the Mill Woods Park skate park.
According to Newport Dispatch, which first reported the arrests, investigators ultimately identified eight vandalized locations scattered throughout Wethersfield. At Mill Woods Park, a 122-acre facility run by the Wethersfield Parks and Recreation Department that includes a skate park, outdoor swim center, dog park and athletic fields, vandals defaced concrete skateboarding structures, picnic tables and an outbuilding with slurs, symbols, homophobic statements and sexually explicit images, per the same account.
Spree Crossed Into Neighboring Rocky Hill
The vandalism wasn't confined to Wethersfield. Four similar bias-related incidents were reported in neighboring Rocky Hill during that same overnight stretch of Sept. 19 into Sept. 20, according to FOX 61. Rocky Hill sits directly south of Wethersfield in Hartford County, meaning the spree touched two adjoining towns in a single night.
The Wethersfield Police Department's detective bureau leaned on surveillance footage, witness interviews, cellphone location data and physical evidence to build its case, the Dispatch reported. That footage captured two individuals vandalizing the Mill Woods Park property, and police later released portions of it to local media and on social media in hopes of identifying them. Tips from community members helped detectives zero in on the suspects, and both individuals reportedly acknowledged their involvement in the vandalism once detectives interviewed them.
Charges Filed After Suspects Turn Themselves In
With probable cause established, detectives obtained arrest warrants for both suspects, who surrendered voluntarily to Wethersfield police once the warrants were issued. One of the two, 18-year-old Dante Roma, lives in Montville, a town roughly 40 to 45 miles southeast of Wethersfield in New London County — meaning at least one suspect traveled a significant distance into the Hartford area to take part in the spree, per the Dispatch. The second suspect is a 17-year-old male whose identity is being withheld because Connecticut law requires that juveniles' identities be protected in juvenile proceedings.
Each suspect faces an identical set of charges: seven counts of intimidation based on bigotry or bias in the third degree, one count of criminal mischief in the first degree, seven counts of criminal mischief in the second degree, and three counts of desecration of property. Under Connecticut General Statutes § 53a-181l, intimidation based on bigotry or bias in the third degree is a Class E felony that carries a mandatory minimum fine of $1,000 for defacing property with bias-motivated intent, according to FindLaw.
Community Pushes Back With Cleanup and Signs
In the days after the graffiti was discovered in late September, local church volunteers and community members in Rocky Hill and Wethersfield organized public distributions of “Hate Has No Home Here” signs and pitched in on cleanup efforts, FOX 61 reported. The grassroots response unfolded even as police worked to piece together surveillance footage and tips into a case against the two suspects.
New Hate Crime Law Took Effect Days Before Arrests
The arrests come just weeks after Connecticut overhauled its hate crime statutes. Governor Ned Lamont signed Public Act 26-77, known as Senate Bill 90, on June 8, consolidating the state's various hate crime laws into a single dedicated chapter of the penal code, according to the Office of the Governor of Connecticut. That law took effect Oct. 1, roughly two weeks before the two suspects surrendered to Wethersfield police.
The case also lands amid a documented statewide climb in bias-motivated incidents. Figures attributed to the Anti-Defamation League and reported by CT Mirror show reported hate incidents statewide jumped from 91 in 2020 to 682 in 2024, a roughly 650% increase over four years. Anti-Defamation League records cited in the same report show antisemitic incidents in Connecticut rising from 24 in 2020 to a high of 184 in 2023, remaining elevated at 159 in 2024. Separately, U.S. Department of Justice hate crime reporting data for Connecticut indicates property-related offenses make up about 40% of all reported bias crimes statewide.
State officials launched a centralized reporting portal, ReportHate.CT.gov, in June alongside an awareness campaign titled “Hate Is More Than a Word... It May Be a Crime,” according to the University of Connecticut Institute for Municipal and Regional Policy. It remains unclear how prosecutors will handle the juvenile suspect's case given state privacy requirements, and whether municipalities or private vehicle owners will seek restitution for cleanup costs.
