The Criminals of Zuccotti Park

Meet Dave, one of those freedom fighters Barack Obama and Nancy Pelosi have thrown their support behind.

The criminals are crashing the party.

Lured by cheap drugs and free food, creepy thugs have infiltrated the crowd of protesters camped out in Zuccotti Park for Occupy Wall Street, The Post has learned.

“I got warrants. I’m running from the law,” boasted Dave, 24, a scrawny, unshaven miscreant in filthy clothes from Stamford, Conn. “I’m not even supposed to be here, but it’s as good a spot as any to hide.”

Wanted for burglary, the drug-addled fugitive said some of his hard-partying pals clued him in that the protest was a good place to be fed, get wasted and crash.

“I’ve been smoking and drinking in here for eight days now,” said Dave, booze on his breath and his eyes bloodshot as he lay sprawled on a tattered sheet of cardboard. “I need to get some methadone. Every day, I wake up, and I’m f--ked up.”

Drugs can be easy to score -- a Post reporter was offered pot for $15 and heroin for $10.

They’ve already fueled at least one violent incident, when a wasted nut job socked a medical volunteer in the face before others hauled the attacker away.

“We are trying to keep everything calm and work with the police, but there are some crazies in here,” said Paul, a security volunteer.

“The other day, there was a guy charging people $5 to use the McDonald’s bathroom. He was on LSD or high on something.”

But the creeps can’t give a bad name to the group’s overall anti-greed message, protesters said.

Maybe not, but we can.

If Dave admits to using too much salt then Bloomberg would probably have the park swept free.

The fearless Urban Infidel braved the fetid stench over the weekend and filed a report here.

While the media romanticizes these degenerates, the locals affected by this "occupation" are fed up.

Sanity also comes from readers. Sheri Rosen said she works downtown, at 111 Broadway, and is sick of the filth and mayhem.

“We work very hard every day for not that much money,” she writes. “We don’t camp out at a park and act like animals by urinating and stealing milk from the coffee vendors that are also trying to make a living.”

She blasted Council Speaker Christine Quinn and Comptroller John Liu for supporting the demonstrators, saying, “True New Yorkers who work hard for their money won’t forget this on Election Day.”

Reader Harold Theurer sees another angle. Noting the passing of Steve Jobs, he wonders how many protesters carrying Apple products understand how those gadgets came to exist.

“What started out as two men in a garage with ideas and passion would have been nothing more than two guys in a garage with ideas and passion had it not been for an IPO on Dec. 12, 1980, when Apple went public at $22 per share,” he writes.

“Big Bad Wall Street raised $101 million for Mr. Jobs to expand his ideas, create jobs and change the landscape of technology. The next time any of the Wall Street occupiers makes an iTune purchase, it can be traced back to some Big Bad Banker’s belief in Mr. Jobs and his company.”

Class dismissed.

At least they've found their leader.