Besides that, he said, the club hadn’t received any other threats during or after Pride Month. Minko told The Associated Press that a staff member also had to remove the rainbow flags from the bar’s entrance on July 4 because people on the street “were intentionally setting off firecrackers” at the front door. No injuries were reported in either incident. One has to wonder if there’s a kind of message they’re trying to send.”
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“One was at the beginning of Pride and one was right at the end. “I have to say that what I find odd was the timing of both events,” Minko said.
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Photos of the damaged flags have been shared on. According to PIX 11, rain extinguished the fire and no one was injured. The incident happened just a day before Pride Month celebrations were due to begin. New York City police were already investigating a possible anti-gay bias crime after rainbow flags at the Harlem bar’s entrance were torched just after midnight May 31, a day before the start of the city’s Pride Month celebrations. Just after midnight on Friday, pride flags outside Alibi Lounge, a gay bar in New York's Harlem neighborhood, were set on fire, NBC New York. NEW YORK (AP) - A rainbow flag was set on fire at the entrance to a New York City gay bar on Monday - the second such incident at the same club in just over a month.Īlibi Lounge owner Alexi Minko said staff members, alerted by someone on the street, found the flag had been set aflame between 12:20 a.m. A New York City police spokesman says the early Monday morning incident at Alibi Lounge is being investigated as a possible hate crime. The Alibi Lounge is Harlems first black and gay-owned business, but it could be facing closure due to financial troubles brought on by the COVID-19 pandemic. The owner of a New York City gay bar says a rainbow flag was set aflame at the club’s entrance for the second time in just over a month.
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A burned rainbow flag lays on the stoop of the Alibi Lounge, early Monday, July 8, 2019, in New York City, New York.