Editor’s note: This article contains details about the usage of racial slurs. 

The Syracuse Police Department is not leading a criminal investigation into a racist verbal attack reported Saturday along College Place. 

A large group of people that included members and guests of a fraternity reportedly yelled the N-word at a black woman student on the street late Saturday, according to the Department of Public Safety. 

The incident led Chancellor Kent Syverud to suspend all fraternity social activities until the end of the fall semester. The Alpha Chi Rho fraternity, “Crow,” was also suspended. Crow is the only Greek organization to be suspended at Syracuse University following the verbal attack.

“The individuals involved have been identified and will be held appropriately accountable to the Code of Student Conduct and to the full extent of the law,” Syverud said in a campus-wide email early Sunday. “We are working with the Syracuse Police Department and we intend to bring this investigation to a swift and successful conclusion.”

But SPD Chief Kenton Buckner said Tuesday there is no city police-led criminal investigation of the College Place incident. DPS is handling the case.

“As far as the charges, whether they be administrative or the university, or criminal on the part of the police department, that depends on what evidence we’re able to collect,” Buckner told The Daily Orange at a press conference. 

“We will present a file to the District Attorney’s Office, and then there will be determinations,” he said.

Alleged violations of SU’s Code of Student Conduct are adjudicated through the university’s internal judicial system. They are not prosecuted in court.

Syverud said Sunday that DPS had assembled “substantial evidence” regarding the incident, including security camera video, eyewitness accounts and interviews. 

A university spokesperson on Tuesday said the case has been referred to SU’s code of conduct system. 

Buckner said there are only two SPD-led criminal investigations underway related to the string of 11 racist and anti-Semitic incidents reported at or near SU since Nov. 7.

City police are investigating a swastika found stamped into snow last Thursday near The 505 on Walnut apartment complex. They are also investigating the spread of a white supremacist manifesto that was allegedly sent to several students’ cellphones in Bird Library early Tuesday morning. 

Published on November 19, 2019 at 11:24 pm

Contact Sam: sfogozal@syr.edu | @SamOgozalek