Information panels vandalized at World Trade Center site

NEW YORK -- Information panels along a viewing wall at the World Trade Center site, directly below a memorial list of victims' names, have been defaced with graffiti.

"After what happened here ... it's tacky and unpatriotic," said JoAnn Marquis, visiting the site with her husband from Salem, Mass.

The panels outline the twin towers' history, including their construction, the 1993 bombing and their ultimate destruction by terrorists on Sept. 11, 2001.

The diagrams and photos are now covered with writing, often scrawled in black marker.

Some of the messages are words of hope, remembrance or prayer: "God bless you. ... We will never forget."

Others are indecipherable or vaguely crude: "madison arrived here... Jaz -- A.K.A Big Butt..."

"I think it's terrible," said Jan Rodriguez of Boston. "I think it's somebody that just has no consideration for the people who lost their lives here."

Many visitors to the site said they considered even positive messages inappropriate.

"Graffiti is graffiti," said Rachael Jackson, from Las Vegas, Nev. "It angers me."

Steve Coleman, a spokesman for the Port Authority, which handles maintenance of the viewing wall, said agency officials are aware of the graffiti and appalled by it.

"We're very disturbed and disappointed that anyone would think of defacing anything at the World Trade Center site," Coleman said. The agency is in the process of having replacement panels made, he said.

He said the new information panels will be positioned higher on the viewing wall, to make it more difficult for people to deface them.

He said the replacements could be up by Labor Day.

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