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- An Amazon site in Connecticut has been shut down for the second time after an eighth noose was found there.
- The red noose was wrapped around electrical cords, the police department said.
- Local NAACP officials and town leaders described the incident as "deplorable" and "sickening."
- See more stories on Insider's business page.
A construction worker found a red noose at an Amazon site in Windsor, Connecticut, on Wednesday, forcing the company to shut the building site for the second time over safety concerns.
Eight nooses have been found at the site within the past month.
The eighth noose was found "mixed in with and entangled with electrical cords," a police department press release said on Wednesday, per CNN. The cords had "not been used for more than two weeks and were being stored on a pallet amongst other electrical equipment on the floor," it said.
Amazon and the site developer are offering $100,000 for information on how the nooses got there.
The site was first closed down on May 20 after the seventh noose was spotted, so that cameras and other security measures could be put in place.
Local officials from the National Association for the Advancement of Colored People (NAACP) and town leaders denounced the incidents as hate crimes against Black people.
"We have a serious problem in America and it hasn't gone away," Scot X. Esdaile, president of the Connecticut NAACP, said Wednesday in a press briefing outside the warehouse site, per the Associated Press. "It's deplorable. It's sickening. It's a sick mindset that Black people have to fight against."
-Shosh Bedrosian (@ShoshBedrosian) May 26, 2021
Nuchette Black-Burke, a Windsor town council member, said in the briefing that many staff at the Amazon site were scared to go into work.
"Many people don't understand our history," she said. "A noose? People's heads were put in those and hung from trees, hung from different places. So while people may think that someone's doing this just for giggles and ha-has, no, it's real history that impacts."
Black-Burke said she's putting pressure on Amazon to put an end to the problem.
The first noose was reported on April 27 "hanging from a steel beam on the second floor of the building," a supervisor for the construction firm working on the Amazon facility said.
Insider contacted the Windsor police department for comment, but did not immediately receive a response. Chief Donald Melanson said Amazon would reopen the site on Thursday, per CNN.
Amazon didn't immediately respond to Insider's request for comment.
The company told CNN in a statement: "Hate, racism or discrimination have no place in our society and are certainly not tolerated in any Amazon workplace - whether it be under construction like this one, or fully operational.
"We will continue to work with all levels of law enforcement as well as our development partners, to hold the perpetrators accountable and ensure that all members of our community feel valued, respected and safe."