Denver, July 6, 2005 – The Mountain States Regional Office of the Anti-Defamation League (ADL) expressed serious concern upon learning of vandalism in the Jewish portion of the Evergreen Cemetery in Colorado Springs over the weekend of July 1-4.

ADL Regional Director Bruce H. DeBoskey issued the following statement:

We are greatly dismayed to learn that vandals targeted Jewish gravesites at the Evergreen Cemetery in Colorado Springs.  Thirty-eight headstones were toppled or otherwise damaged throughout the Jewish section of the cemetery, which is separately fenced, while only two memorials were attacked in the larger, non-Jewish sections.

This kind of anti-Semitic vandalism is shocking in a Colorado community, and we call upon the Colorado Springs authorities to redouble their efforts to find the perpetrators and bring them to justice.  We also urge the good citizens of Colorado Springs to speak out and to declare that such hate-filled actions are unacceptable, and that Colorado Springs is No Place for Hate.

The Anti-Defamation League, founded in 1913, is the world's leading organization fighting anti-Semitism through programs and services that counteract hatred, prejudice and bigotry.