PORTSMOUTH – Vandals spray painted “Burn In Hell” and “Racist Scum Die” in bright red letters on the home of a woman who spoke out against Portsmouth High School’s plan to switch its graduation gowns.

The suspect or suspects also egged the Aldrich Road home of Beth Ricci sometime late Wednesday night or early Thursday morning.

Police Sgt. Chris Kiberd said Ricci reported the crime to police Thursday morning and a “patrol officer took an initial report” on the vandalism.

Police do not yet have any suspects, but are also working with Portsmouth High School’s resource officer to try to determine who vandalized Ricci’s home, which sits on a quiet residential neighborhood off Islington Street.

“I think it’s terrible that it happened to anyone in our community,” Kiberd said Thursday morning.

Neither Portsmouth High School Principal Mary Lyons nor Superintendent Steve Zadravec responded to multiple phone and email requests for comments on the vandalism Thursday.

Ricci could not be reached for comment.

Ricci covered the spray painting so her neighbors couldn’t see it, but there were still eggs on her front porch Thursday morning.

Mayor Jack Blalock deplored the vandalism when he heard the news Thursday.

“Any form of vandalism directed at anybody for any reason is irresponsible and inappropriate at the very least,” Blalock said.

“It bothers me that people would reach to that level,” Blalock added.

Kiberd said it doesn’t appear the vandalism rises to the level of hate speech, because “it’s not against a particular group.”

“It doesn’t look like it’s a hate crime but it’s still under investigation,” Kiberd said.

At this point the crime would be considered criminal mischief, he said.

Ricci “just came home and discovered the spray painting,” Kiberd said.

He pointed to a letter to the editor Ricci wrote opposing the switch of more than 60 years of tradition where boys would wear maroon gowns and girls wear white on graduation, and also a Portsmouth Herald story she was quoted in.

“Because of that we’re not so sure if it would be a student or it would be someone” from outside the community, he said.

Ricci, who graduated from Portsmouth High School in 1979, said the change of gowns “just breaks my heart to see tradition thrown away.”

She said Monday she believes the change was made because of a transgender student in the graduating class who had a problem with the practice of wearing different colored gowns.

She believes school administrators are needlessly changing a tradition that’s been in place at least 63 years.

“My dad graduated in ‘53 and we have a picture on the wall of the guys in maroon and the girls in white,” she said.

Ricci in a letter to the editor said that “many seniors are very upset with this change.”

“I am assembling a group of concerned parents and students to appear before the School Board on May 24 to address this issue,” she said. “I am not an angry person, but rather a saddened one. I can’t believe this insanity had permeated my beloved city.”

Assistant Mayor Jim Splaine, who disagreed with Ricci’s stand on changing the gowns, called the vandalism “a hate crime by any definition that I know of.”

“Human beings don’t do that to other human beings,” Splaine said.

He also stressed that “Portsmouth doesn’t have room for that kind of activity.”

“I think it was a good decision by the school department,” Splaine said. “But anybody who has a different point of view on that or any other issue should be welcomed and encouraged to voice that opinion. That’s what makes Portsmouth great.”

He worried that the incident likely scared Ricci.

“Those people who did that should feel ashamed,” Splaine said. “And if identified should be shamed.”