Police ID suspect behind antisemitic flyers in Squirrel Hill
An Ohio man who police said last month drove more than two hours to throw antisemitic flyers out of a golden Dodge SUV in the Pittsburgh neighborhood most densely packed with Jews could face nearly $50,000 in fines — for littering.
Police in Pittsburgh issued more than 160 traffic citations against Jeremy Brokaw, 45, of Zanesville, Ohio.
Authorities mailed Brokaw the summonses, each with one charge of “depositing waste on a highway” that corresponded to the individual flyers police recovered May 18 in Pittsburgh and Peters Township, said Shawn Brokos, the Jewish Federation of Greater Pittsburgh’s director of community security and a retired FBI veteran.
Each violation carries a $300 fine — which would total $48,000 if Brokaw is found or pleads guilty to all the citations, according to Brokos.
“The more significant part of the story is the message that if you come in and threaten and intimidate anyone in the Jewish community, anyone in any minority community … you will be caught,” Brokos said. “If you come in with ill intent, you will be caught.”
Authorities Monday said Brokaw was one of three or four people in the SUV who threw leaflets in the city’s Squirrel Hill neighborhood, which is home to at least a dozen synagogues and three Jewish day schools.
Brokos declined to name streets the SUV traveled or the number of homes where flyers were thrown, citing the ongoing investigation.
The Jewish federation said the flyers, which officials called “antisemitic and racist,” came from the white supremacist group Goyim Defense League.
That organization is “a small network of virulently antisemitic provocateurs” formed in 2022, according to the Anti-Defamation League.
“Goyim” is a Yiddish and Hebrew slur for non-Jews.
An ADL official Monday said it remains unclear how — or if — Brokaw is involved or associated with the group.
“We are just really glad there’s a suspect,” Kelly Fishman, an Anti-Defamation League regional director, told TribLive.
Fishman monitors antisemitic incidents in Western Pennsylvania, Ohio, West Virginia and Kentucky.
“We do not know whether he’s a member” of the Goyim Defense League, Brokos told TribLive. “What we do know is they drove over two hours to strategically target Squirrel Hill.”
Officials said flyers were found in plastic bags weighted down with corn kernels. People inside the SUV also shouted slurs at Jewish residents, according to authorities.
The distribution of flyers, the latest in a string of more than 100 antisemitic incidents reported in Pittsburgh so far this year, came days after a gunman shouting “Free, free Palestine” shot and killed two staffers from the Israeli Embassy in Washington, D.C., after they left a Jewish event.
On Sunday, a man armed with incendiary devices attacked demonstrators in Colorado who were calling for the release of Israeli hostages in Gaza.
Twelve people were injured in the Boulder incident; the FBI has described the violence as a “targeted terror attack.”
It remained unclear Monday if the FBI characterized the distribution of flyers in Pittsburgh as a hate crime or expression of protected speech. The people in the car did not direct slurs or antisemitic language at any specific person, authorities said.
The FBI defines a federal hate crime “as a criminal offense against a person or property motivated in whole or in part by an offender’s bias” against someone based on their race, religion or other factors, the agency said on its website.
“Hate itself is not a crime — and the FBI is mindful of protecting freedom of speech and other civil liberties,” the agency said online.
The FBI is involved in the investigation into the flyers — but not leading the effort, said Bradford Arick, an agency spokesperson in Pittsburgh.
“We take these kinds of things seriously and we run down every tip that’s given to us,” Arick said. “We really try to leave no stone unturned.”
Emily Bourne, a Pittsburgh Public Safety spokesperson, said Peters Township issued the same type of citations for alleged violations there. Police and district court officials in Peters did not return calls Monday seeking comment.
Brokaw has no record of arrests in Pennsylvania, online court records show.
In Muskingum County, Ohio, where Brokaw owns a single-family home and multiple acres of land, his court record contains three traffic violations — none since 2008, online records show.
Brokaw and a woman listed as a co-owner of the Zanesville home did not respond to multiple calls seeking comment.
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