NEW YORK — Law enforcement officials in the suburbs of New York City have announced the first arrest made under a newly implemented local law prohibiting the wearing of face masks in public.
Nassau County Police Department officers responded to a report of suspicious activity on Sunday evening near the border of Levittown and Hicksville, approximately 30 miles east of Manhattan.
Upon arrival, officers encountered Wesslin Omar Ramirez Castillo, who was dressed in black attire and wearing a black ski mask that covered his face, revealing only his eyes.
The police department stated that the 18-year-old resident exhibited further suspicious behavior, including attempting to conceal a prominent bulge in his waistband and refusing to comply with the officers’ instructions.
Officers determined that the bulge contained a 14-inch knife. Ramirez Castillo was subsequently apprehended without incident, according to police reports.
On Monday, Ramirez Castillo was arraigned in Westbury’s Family Court, facing misdemeanor charges of criminal possession of a weapon and obstructing governmental administration, as confirmed by the office of Nassau County District Attorney Anne Donnelly.
Lt. Scott Skrynecki, a spokesperson for the police department, indicated that Ramirez Castillo will also face a misdemeanor violation of the face mask law in the coming days.
Nassau County Executive Bruce Blakeman, a Republican who signed the mask ban into law earlier this month, declared that Sunday’s arrest exemplified the effectiveness of the new rule.
“Our police officers were able to utilize the mask ban legislation, along with other factors, to stop and question an individual who was carrying a weapon with the intent to commit robbery,” he stated in an emailed statement. “The enactment of this law provided law enforcement with an additional tool to thwart this dangerous criminal.”
Keith Ross, a criminal justice professor at the John Jay College of Criminal Justice in New York City, expressed that police officers did not necessarily require the new law to stop and question Ramirez Castillo, but it served to strengthen their justification for doing so.
“The law provides police officers, at the very least, reasonable suspicion to conduct a stop,” the retired New York City police officer explained by phone. “Under reasonable suspicion, police officers have the authority in New York state to forcibly stop an individual if they are suspected of committing a felony or a misdemeanor under the penal code, which is where this new law falls.”
However, Scott Banks, attorney-in-chief at the Legal Aid Society of Nassau County, which represents Ramirez Castillo, disputed this notion.
“There is no basis to believe that wearing a face mask was intended to conceal identity or criminal behavior, and if that was the basis of the stop, I believe there is a basis to conclude the stop was unlawful,” he wrote in an email.
Skrynecki declined to provide further comment, stating that police and county officials would address the incident at a press conference scheduled for Wednesday.
The New York Civil Liberties Union, a group that has voiced criticism of the new law, reiterated its warning that the mask ban is “vulnerable to selective enforcement by a police department that has a history of aggression and discrimination.”
Disability Rights of New York, an organization that advocates for individuals with disabilities, argued that the mask law is unconstitutional and discriminatory against people with disabilities.
A federal class action lawsuit has been filed seeking a temporary restraining order and preliminary injunction to immediately halt the enforcement of the ban.
The Mask Transparency Act was enacted in response to “antisemitic incidents, often perpetrated by individuals wearing masks” since the start of the Israel-Hamas war on October 7.
The law classifies it as a misdemeanor offense, punishable by up to a year in jail and a $1,000 fine, for anyone in Nassau County to wear a face covering to conceal their identity in public. It includes exemptions for individuals who wear masks “for health, safety, religious or cultural purposes, or for the peaceful celebration of a holiday or similar religious or cultural event for which masks or facial coverings are customarily worn.”