Local News

Everett City Council candidate speaks out after racist effigy targets her campaign

Guerline Alcy says someone left a burned and mutilated "replica of a skull" beneath one of her campaign signs.

Guerline Alcy speaks during an Everett City Council meeting held at Everett High School in 2022. Josh Reynolds for The Boston Globe, File

By Abby Patkin

August 9, 2023

2 minutes to read

Everett police are investigating after a Black city council candidate reported that someone left a racist effigy beneath one of her campaign signs.

In a Facebook post last month, Guerline Alcy said she learned on July 14 that a “disturbing object” had been placed under one of her campaign signs on Broadway.

Upon further inspection, she said, the object appeared to be “a replica of a skull with black burnt head, with the mouth and nose cut out and stuff[ed] with an object and disturbing graffiti all over the face.”

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The owner of a nearby 7-Eleven provided her with a picture and video of the incident, she said, sharing a clip on Facebook. The video shows two people walking down the street, one of them holding something on a stick. As they pass by Alcy’s campaign sign, they plant the stick in a chain-link fence below the sign.

“It looks premeditated,” Alcy said in a filmed interview with GBH, which first reported on the incident. “It looks like the person took their time, you know, to burn the head of the object, cut the mouth out, cut the nose — as if that’s what they want to do to me, and burn me, to shut me down.”

She added: “They are trying to scare me or to intimidate me. I’m not easily intimidated, so I’m not really sure why I’m the one that’s picked to be bullied.”

Alcy said in her Facebook post that she reported the incident to Everett police and provided documentation.

Everett Police Chief Steven Mazzie confirmed in an email that the department has been in contact with Alcy, adding, “we have an open and active investigation on the incident.”

Mayor Carlo DeMaria’s office did not return a request for comment.

Alcy is among 13 candidates vying for one of five at-large seats on the city council this fall. She’s previously been in the news after speaking out against racism in Everett.

“I was told that I have a big mouth,” Alcy told GBH. “I am going to continue to have a big mouth until they realize that they need to do work. They need to do work; they need to stand up for the community.”