Photo by Craig

Police say a noose was found near the National Gallery of Art on Saturday—the latest of several such sightings in the D.C. region in recent weeks and the third reported incident on National Mall grounds.

The noose was found hanging from a lamppost near Third Street and Pennsylvania Avenue NW around 3 p.m., according to U.S. Park Police spokesperson Sergeant Anna Rose.

Three weeks earlier, on May 26, a noose was found hanging from a tree near the Hirshhorn Museum. And on May 31, visitors found a noose hanging in an exhibit on segregation inside of the Smithsonian’s National Museum of African American History and Culture.

“The noose has long represented a deplorable act of cowardice and depravity—a symbol of extreme violence for African Americans,” Lonnie Bunch, the museum’s founding director, said at the time, calling the incident “a painful reminder of the challenges that African Americans continue to face.” Smithsonian employees gathered outside of the museum in solidarity the following day.

All of these cases are still under investigation, Sergeant Rose said.

Multiple nooses have been spotted elsewhere in the region, including near a parking lot in a Montgomery County community on June 15. Two weeks earlier, residents in D.C.’s Hillcrest community found a noose hanging on the porch of a house that was under construction.

Nooses were also found on the campuses of the University of Maryland and American University in late April and early May.

Following the incident in Hillcrest, Mayor Bowser released a statement saying that D.C. is “an inclusive city, and we do not tolerate signs of hate, ignorance, and fear… we do not take these incidents lightly, and we will not accept that signs of hate are signs of our time.”

The mayor also said that she’s told the Office of Human Rights to activate the city’s hate crimes protocol and the Office of Religious Affairs to gather faith leaders as a resource for residents.