Contractors restarted work again May 27 on a giant Amazon warehouse in Connecticut in the wake of the discovery of another noose at the worksite.
A halt to work was ordered on May 26 after the eighth incident in the past month in which a noose was found on the Windsor worksite, triggering the second shutdown in as many weeks.
Amazon shut down the site to make way for the FBI, which is investigating the incidents, according to a statement by Kelly Nantel, an Amazon spokesperson, reported in various media outlets. The noose was found under electrical materials.
The latest incident came after the work was halted over the weekend and the worksite closed down in an effort to ramp up security.
It also comes on the heels of a decision by Amazon to hike the reward for information on the case up to $100,000.
Work on the 3.6 million-sq-ft warehouse project kicked off in 2020 and is expected to wrap up later his year.
In a statement the contractor, RC Andersen, said it is “rigorously investigating the recent incidents of racial prejudice that have plagued the Amazon project in Windsor.”
The contractor said it trains all workers on its projects in a “zero tolerance” policy in regards to racial and other forms of prejudice.
“RC Andersen believes that this deeply offensive conduct may also constitute crimes under federal and state statutes and, it is also … endeavoring to provide whatever assistance it may to the members of law enforcement investigating these incidents as crimes,” the company said in a statement.
The resumption of work comes as pressure builds to find the culprit or culprits behind the incidents, with everyone from Gov. Ned Lamont to the head of the Connecticut chapter of the NAACP weighing in.
“We have a serious problem in America, and it hasn’t gone away,” said Connecticut NAACP President Scot X. Esdaile on Wednesday, The Associated Press reported. “It’s deplorable. It’s sickening. It’s a sick mindset that Black people have to fight against.”
Complicating the investigation, all eight nooses found at the Amazon warehouse worksite in Connecticut were in areas without video surveillance.
The nooses placed at the Amazon warehouse project are the latest in a series of such incidents at construction sites across both the United States and Canada.
Racist graffiti was found last year in the office of a Black foreman in the Las Vegas Convention Center expansion project.
Hathaway Dinwiddie Construction Co., a California contractor, recently agreed to pay $725,000 to help settle a lawsuit by Black and Hispanic workers who were exposed to racist language and graffiti.
