The mayor of a New Jersey town said two Orthodox Jewish men are pressing charges after they claim they were intentionally hit with snow and ice from a passing road plow.
The two men in Lakewood claim the driver of the snow plow did it on purpose, and Lakewood Mayor Raymond Coles said that investigators are now considering whether the incident should looked into as a hate crime.
Coles confirmed to NBC New York that the incident, which was captured on video from a cellphone inside the truck, occurred during Saturday's snowstorm along County Line Road, near the border with Jackson Township. The video appears to show a truck driver purposely dropping his plow to spray snow and ice onto the Jewish men, as they were walking to or from religious services. The video then ends with a callous laugh.
While police and prosecutors consider whether hate crime charges are called for, they have not yet said whether the person who initially posted the video online was the man behind the wheel of the plow. The video made the rounds on social media, leaving those in town disgusted.
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"I think it's very disgusting ... besides the fact that they're targeting Jews, it could've actually hurt somebody very badly and God forbid, killed them," said neighbor Harvey Rosenthal.
No one answered the door at the home of the person who posted the video.
Waste Management, which provides private trash and plow services, issued a statement Monday saying that they are "aware of an incident that was posted by an off-duty Waste Management employee to his personal social media account. The hateful conduct depicted in this video is unacceptable," and went on to that the employee has been suspended amid the investigation.
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Lakewood Police and county prosecutors have not confirmed to NBC New York whether they have identified the driver, if charges are imminent, or if they have made any conclusions about possible hate crime charges.
