Clovis mosque vandalized

CLOVIS — Graffiti on the city's only Muslim house of worship prompted swift community response Monday and requests from police for public help in identifying a suspect.

The Golden Mosque, a one-story white rectangular building topped with brown tiles and three gold-colored hemispheres at the intersection of Mitchell and Ninth streets, was defaced during the weekend.

The damage consisted of the message "Happy Birthday Jesus Christ from a Real Christain [sic]" in red on the building's south-facing wall, "Christan [sic]" in red on a sign in the front lawn, and "Trump," twice on the east-facing front: once on the glass panes of the front door and again to the right of the entrance.

Clovis cardiologist Dr. Mahamadu Fuseini has overseen the mosque for about 10 years and said Monday this was the first such incident he knows about. Taking a few minutes from his patients to inspect the building, he seemed more concerned with monitoring water damage on the roof from past rains than with the messages painted outside.

"It's OK. Sometimes people just don't understand things," he said. "Intolerance runs deep. It doesn't bother me."

Fuseini walked quickly through the building interior to make sure there wasn't other damage. He said nothing inside appeared touched nor anything stolen, although there wasn't much to take from inside save for some prayer rugs and a couple copies of the Quran.

Although it may seem inactive much of the week, Fuseini said the mosque regularly hosts a small community of up to 20 Muslim families who worship there during Ramadan and also weekly, for short prayer services on Fridays.

Police said Monday the incident could be considered a hate crime, but declined to say so definitively pending further investigation.

"It can be (a hate crime), but it depends on what we learn," Clovis Police Department Capt. Roman Romero said Monday. "We all want to jump to hate crime ... but maybe this person is just the kind of human being that likes to divide a community."

"He or she picked something that would bring a lot of attention," he said.

Romero said he recognized characteristics of the mosque graffiti as resembling "gang style graffiti" he has seen on the west side of Clovis, noting the stylized letters T and N in particular.

"I think they picked a very large building that is easily seen," he said. "We want to figure out if they were doing it because they were just really horrible human beings or if they actually meant what they wrote."

Romero said the fact of the letter "a" being painted to resemble the common symbol for "anarchy" might have reflected an attempt to "start a fight that doesn't need to exist."

"What that person wrote doesn't need to be there," he added. "We have a pretty good community and hopefully somebody within that community knows who is doing this."

Romero said police would review external security footage from the nearby jail but also requested public assistance.

"If we can get anybody in the community who has an idea who this person is, give us a call," he said, noting tips can be made anonymously. "There are things that we cannot allow to have happen in our community, especially by someone who is just trying to stir a pot."

Romero also encouraged the public to not hesitate to report such graffiti as soon as they see it instead of assuming it was already reported.

"It was probably a day and a half before anyone called," he said.

The incident received widespread attention following a video outside the mosque shared online Monday morning by a neighbor returning from work.

"It was just out of line and disrespectful," said Toni Pop, who lives around the corner from the mosque.

"There's so much going on right now. You hear about a lot of incidents like this going on at different places, but you don't expect that in Clovis. You don't hear a lot about the Muslim community here but there is one."

"It's ... a place of worship and I don't think it should be disrespected like that."

After sharing her video online, Pop said she heard immediate responses from shocked community and local Air Force members offering assistance. She scheduled an event for Saturday to remove the graffiti but halted the effort after hearing of the city's plans to do the same.

City Manager Justin Howalt said the city has an environmental response team prepared to paint, wash or otherwise remove the graffiti from the mosque and any other buildings reported with defacement.

"It's sad that an individual would do that and we always want what's best for our community, so the city of Clovis will do everything that we can to get it cleaned up and get everything back to normal," Howalt said.

The mosque's former operator said he was discouraged by the news but heartened by the supportive response from the public.

"Well, it's unfortunate and it does happen every now and then," said Badie Alakech, who operated the Golden Mosque in 2007 and 2008, when it served a smaller group of about five Muslim families. "I don't have any negative feeling toward that at all. To the contrary, I feel very proud of Clovis and the support they have shown."

"It's sad to hear that somebody took their time to go and vandalize and send messages that are somehow meant to offend," he said. "When you say 'Happy birthday Jesus Christ,' how is that supposed to be offensive to me?"