Bill White (neo-Nazi)
Encyclopedia
William Alexander "Bill" White (born May 29, 1977) is the leader of the internet-based American National Socialist Workers' Party, and former administrator of Overthrow.com, a now-defunct website dedicated to anti-communist thought, and far-right interpretations of anti-Zionist
and anti-capitalist
speech.
White came to public attention in 1996 in a front page article in The Washington Post after he posted allegations about the stepmother of a girl he said was being abused. In 1999 he expressed support for Eric Harris and Dylan Klebold
, killers of twelve students and a teacher in the Columbine High School massacre
, because according to White, they were being oppressed by the United States education system
. In 2005, The New York Times
quoted White as having "laughed" when United States district court
judge Joan Lefkow
's husband and mother were murdered because Lefkow had ruled against white supremacist Matthew Hale
in a trademark dispute. He told The Roanoke Times
that he looked forward to "further killings of Jews and their sympathizers." White is skeptical of the Holocaust
, saying "claims that ... the gas chambers were part of a 'Holocaust' of 'six million,' were invented almost entirely by the Soviet Union
, and were later adopted by the Jewish communities of the Western nations." The Anti-Defamation League
quotes White saying "there was no Holocaust" and describes what they call "White's Holocaust denial rhetoric".
In 2008, White was arrested for alleged threats to a federal juror. On December 18, 2009, White was found guilty on four counts, one of which was later dismissed by the judge. In 2010 the ACLU filed a brief asking the court to reverse White's convictions on those three charges. A federal district court overturned the convictions on First Amendment grounds and White was released in April 2011.
, Maryland
. According to an April 1999 interview with The Washington Times
, he began to drift toward anarchism
after reading The Communist Manifesto
at 13. He attended Walt Whitman High School
in Bethesda, Maryland
, where he founded the Utopian Anarchist Party (UAP) and published a magazine that focused on opposition to the education system, psychiatry, and law enforcement.
White graduated from Walt Whitman High School in June 1994. He became a psychology
major at the University of Maryland, College Park
where, in 1995, he started another political group called the Bill White Student Group, a continuation of the UAP. He founded Overthrow.com as the group's website where he published material from a wide range of political viewpoints, including communism
, anarchism, and fascism
. In 1995, White faced criminal charges of possessing deadly weapons, a knife and a club
, distributing obscene
material, and attempting to escape from police custody, arising out of the distribution of political leaflets. Montgomery County
declined to prosecute the case. In 1997, White served seven months in the Montgomery County Detention Center on weapons, assault and resisting arrest charges.
On February 14, 1996, White was featured in a front page story in The Washington Post after posting on Internet news groups the name and telephone number of a woman he believed was abusing
her daughter. The supposed victim had allegedly told a university counseling group that her parents would not allow her to use the telephone or see friends; someone from the group spread the story, and White posted it, asking readers to telephone the mother and "tell her you are disgusted and you demand that she stops." The Post reported that the mother and stepfather were near breaking point after receiving threatening telephone calls.
near Littleton
, Colorado
, killed twelve students and one teacher before committing suicide
. White's website claimed that "schools and juvenile psychiatric centers [that]...prescribe anti-depressants are evil and should be destroyed," and it gave a list of "Music to Shoot Your School Up By." The report continued that "[t]here are so many parallels between the Web site's message and the April 20 massacre in Columbine High School in Littleton, Colorado, that some police hate-crime experts say privately it is not inconceivable that the two teen-age gunmen in that case visited the site." FBI officials claimed there was no indication that the website had any connection to the shooting.
White told Reuters that "the reason [Columbine victims] got killed is that they are part of an authoritarian social movement and were seen by the killers as symbolic of that movement ... What the shooters were shooting at was not people but the movements they symbolized. It's a shame that authoritarian Christians, who are trying to dominate our society, don't have a clue how objectionable they are until people start shooting them." He said he would neither confirm nor deny that what he called a "Colorado cell" of his Utopian Anarchist Party had been in contact with the teenagers before the shooting.
White later clarified his position on Columbine in an interview with Jack Ross for Pravda Online:
to conservatism
.
From 1997 to 1998, White claimed involvement with the Maoist
Revolutionary Communist Party
's Refuse and Resist
, Coalition against Police Brutality, and the Trotskyist
International Socialist Organization
(ISO). White worked as a columnist for the Russian website Pravda Online, which took its name from the now-defunct newspaper
of the Soviet Communist Party. In 2000, White joined Ross Perot
's Reform Party
and the campaign to elect Pat Buchanan
, then running for President of the United States
on a Reform Party ticket. White later told American Free Press
that he resigned from the Buchanan campaign after a few months out of concern for what he called the campaign's "dishonest practices."
clone
called "ShopWhite" with the aim of capturing the White Power music and paraphernalia market, but the venture failed after security and administrative problems.
In late 2003, White moved to Roanoke, Virginia
, where he began trading as White Homes and Land LLC. According to The Roanoke Times
and the Southern Poverty Law Center
, White has owned nine single and multi-family properties in an impoverished black
neighborhood in South West Roanoke since April 2004.
White told the Roanoke Times that he is not a racist or Nazi, describing himself as a "libertarian socialist." He admitted to being an antisemite: "I wouldn't be out here buying and fixing up houses if I had some agenda against the black community...The Jews, I despise. They hate me. I hate them." He acknowledged calling some Roanoke residents "local nig-rats" and accused them of "conspiring to test me.".
organize a march and rally in Toledo, Ohio
. The march was canceled by police when the NSM and around 20 supporters were outnumbered by several hundred anti-racists and members of the largely African-American neighborhood in which the rally was to take place. White, the NSM's Dayton leader Mark Martin, and the rest of their supporters taunted the crowd with racial epithets. Some counter-protesters became violent and began rioting. More than 100 people were arrested.
In July 2006, White was removed from the NSM and formed the internet-based American National Socialist Workers' Party. On April 19, 2007, two of the ANSWP's fifteen members were arrested when they unveiled a swastika flag during a speech by President George W. Bush
in Tipp City, Ohio
. On May 23, 2007, White mailed letters and copies of National Socialist, the ANSWP magazine, to the residents of an apartment complex in Virginia Beach, Virginia
where tenants had complained about discriminatory behavior by their landlord.
and the Canadian Jewish Congress
asked the Canadian Radio-television and Telecommunications Commission, Canada's telecommunications regulator, to block access in Canada to White's websites. Warman claimed the websites contained material intended to incite violence against him that caused him to fear for his life.
and the telephone numbers of family members "in case anyone wants to deliver justice." According to an FBI spokeswoman, the website "essentially called for their lynching." Black activist Al Sharpton
claimed that some of the families have continuously received threatening and harassing phone calls.
by the FBI. The arrest stemmed from an alleged threat White made against a federal juror involved in the 2004 Matthew F. Hale
case and posting the juror's personal information online. White was held without bond. Other counts against White, filed December 11, 2008, included alleged threats he made against poor black tenants suing their landlords, and threats against others, including Warman, columnist Leonard Pitts
, former South Harrison Township, New Jersey
mayor Charles Tyson, and a university administrator from Delaware
.
In July 2009, one count of inciting violence was dismissed by the judge. The trial on the seven remaining charges began on December 9, 2009. On December 18, the jury found White guilty on four counts and not guilty on three counts.
On February 8, 2010, a Federal judge dismissed White's conviction of threatening Warman. On April 14, 2010 White was sentenced to 30 months imprisonment. Judge James Turk said he rarely sentences defendants on the high side of guidelines, but did so because of the fear White instilled in many of his victims.
The conviction was reversed as violating the First Amendment, and White was released in April, 2011.
Anti-Zionism
Anti-Zionism is opposition to Zionistic views or opposition to the state of Israel. The term is used to describe various religious, moral and political points of view in opposition to these, but their diversity of motivation and expression is sufficiently different that "anti-Zionism" cannot be...
and anti-capitalist
Anti-capitalism
Anti-capitalism describes a wide variety of movements, ideas, and attitudes which oppose capitalism. Anti-capitalists, in the strict sense of the word, are those who wish to completely replace capitalism with another system....
speech.
White came to public attention in 1996 in a front page article in The Washington Post after he posted allegations about the stepmother of a girl he said was being abused. In 1999 he expressed support for Eric Harris and Dylan Klebold
Eric Harris and Dylan Klebold
Eric David Harris and Dylan Bennet Klebold were American high school seniors who committed the Columbine High School massacre. They killed 13 people—including teacher Dave Sanders—and injured 24 others, three of whom were injured as they escaped the attack...
, killers of twelve students and a teacher in the Columbine High School massacre
Columbine High School massacre
The Columbine High School massacre occurred on Tuesday, April 20, 1999, at Columbine High School in Columbine, an unincorporated area of Jefferson County, Colorado, United States, near Denver and Littleton. Two senior students, Eric Harris and Dylan Klebold, embarked on a massacre, killing 12...
, because according to White, they were being oppressed by the United States education system
Education in the United States
Education in the United States is mainly provided by the public sector, with control and funding coming from three levels: federal, state, and local. Child education is compulsory.Public education is universally available...
. In 2005, The New York Times
The New York Times
The New York Times is an American daily newspaper founded and continuously published in New York City since 1851. The New York Times has won 106 Pulitzer Prizes, the most of any news organization...
quoted White as having "laughed" when United States district court
United States district court
The United States district courts are the general trial courts of the United States federal court system. Both civil and criminal cases are filed in the district court, which is a court of law, equity, and admiralty. There is a United States bankruptcy court associated with each United States...
judge Joan Lefkow
Joan Lefkow
Joan Humphrey Lefkow is a United States district court judge for the Northern District of Illinois. She was nominated by President Bill Clinton on May 11, 2000, to a seat vacated by Judge Ann Claire Williams, and confirmed by the United States Senate on June 30, 2000...
's husband and mother were murdered because Lefkow had ruled against white supremacist Matthew Hale
Matthew F. Hale
Matthew F. Hale , more commonly known as Matt Hale, was the third Pontifex Maximus of the white supremacist religion, Creativity, and the founder of the group formerly known as the World Church of the Creator and now known as The Creativity Movement. The organization's headquarters were based in...
in a trademark dispute. He told The Roanoke Times
The Roanoke Times
The Roanoke Times is the primary newspaper in Southwestern Virginia and is based in Roanoke, Virginia, United States. It is published by Landmark Media Enterprises...
that he looked forward to "further killings of Jews and their sympathizers." White is skeptical of the Holocaust
The Holocaust
The Holocaust , also known as the Shoah , was the genocide of approximately six million European Jews and millions of others during World War II, a programme of systematic state-sponsored murder by Nazi...
, saying "claims that ... the gas chambers were part of a 'Holocaust' of 'six million,' were invented almost entirely by the Soviet Union
Soviet Union
The Soviet Union , officially the Union of Soviet Socialist Republics , was a constitutionally socialist state that existed in Eurasia between 1922 and 1991....
, and were later adopted by the Jewish communities of the Western nations." The Anti-Defamation League
Anti-Defamation League
The Anti-Defamation League is an international non-governmental organization based in the United States. Describing itself as "the nation's premier civil rights/human relations agency", the ADL states that it "fights anti-Semitism and all forms of bigotry, defends democratic ideals and protects...
quotes White saying "there was no Holocaust" and describes what they call "White's Holocaust denial rhetoric".
In 2008, White was arrested for alleged threats to a federal juror. On December 18, 2009, White was found guilty on four counts, one of which was later dismissed by the judge. In 2010 the ACLU filed a brief asking the court to reverse White's convictions on those three charges. A federal district court overturned the convictions on First Amendment grounds and White was released in April 2011.
Background
White was raised in the Horizon Hill neighborhood of RockvilleRockville, Maryland
Rockville is the county seat of Montgomery County, Maryland, United States. It is a major incorporated city in the central part of Montgomery County and forms part of the Baltimore-Washington Metropolitan Area. The 2010 U.S...
, Maryland
Maryland
Maryland is a U.S. state located in the Mid Atlantic region of the United States, bordering Virginia, West Virginia, and the District of Columbia to its south and west; Pennsylvania to its north; and Delaware to its east...
. According to an April 1999 interview with The Washington Times
The Washington Times
The Washington Times is a daily broadsheet newspaper published in Washington, D.C., the capital of the United States. It was founded in 1982 by Unification Church founder Sun Myung Moon, and until 2010 was owned by News World Communications, an international media conglomerate associated with the...
, he began to drift toward anarchism
Anarchism
Anarchism is generally defined as the political philosophy which holds the state to be undesirable, unnecessary, and harmful, or alternatively as opposing authority in the conduct of human relations...
after reading The Communist Manifesto
The Communist Manifesto
The Communist Manifesto, originally titled Manifesto of the Communist Party is a short 1848 publication written by the German Marxist political theorists Karl Marx and Friedrich Engels. It has since been recognized as one of the world's most influential political manuscripts. Commissioned by the...
at 13. He attended Walt Whitman High School
Walt Whitman High School
Walt Whitman High School is a public secondary institution serving roughly the western part of Bethesda--an unincorporated suburban area of Washington, DC, in Montgomery County, Maryland. The school is named in honor of the American poet. It is fed into by Thomas W. Pyle Middle School.-History:The...
in Bethesda, Maryland
Bethesda, Maryland
Bethesda is a census designated place in southern Montgomery County, Maryland, United States, just northwest of Washington, D.C. It takes its name from a local church, the Bethesda Meeting House , which in turn took its name from Jerusalem's Pool of Bethesda...
, where he founded the Utopian Anarchist Party (UAP) and published a magazine that focused on opposition to the education system, psychiatry, and law enforcement.
White graduated from Walt Whitman High School in June 1994. He became a psychology
Psychology
Psychology is the study of the mind and behavior. Its immediate goal is to understand individuals and groups by both establishing general principles and researching specific cases. For many, the ultimate goal of psychology is to benefit society...
major at the University of Maryland, College Park
University of Maryland, College Park
The University of Maryland, College Park is a top-ranked public research university located in the city of College Park in Prince George's County, Maryland, just outside Washington, D.C...
where, in 1995, he started another political group called the Bill White Student Group, a continuation of the UAP. He founded Overthrow.com as the group's website where he published material from a wide range of political viewpoints, including communism
Communism
Communism is a social, political and economic ideology that aims at the establishment of a classless, moneyless, revolutionary and stateless socialist society structured upon common ownership of the means of production...
, anarchism, and fascism
Fascism
Fascism is a radical authoritarian nationalist political ideology. Fascists seek to rejuvenate their nation based on commitment to the national community as an organic entity, in which individuals are bound together in national identity by suprapersonal connections of ancestry, culture, and blood...
. In 1995, White faced criminal charges of possessing deadly weapons, a knife and a club
Club (weapon)
A club is among the simplest of all weapons. A club is essentially a short staff, or stick, usually made of wood, and wielded as a weapon since prehistoric times....
, distributing obscene
Obscenity
An obscenity is any statement or act which strongly offends the prevalent morality of the time, is a profanity, or is otherwise taboo, indecent, abhorrent, or disgusting, or is especially inauspicious...
material, and attempting to escape from police custody, arising out of the distribution of political leaflets. Montgomery County
Montgomery County, Maryland
Montgomery County is a county in the U.S. state of Maryland, situated just to the north of Washington, D.C., and southwest of the city of Baltimore. It is one of the most affluent counties in the United States, and has the highest percentage of residents over 25 years of age who hold post-graduate...
declined to prosecute the case. In 1997, White served seven months in the Montgomery County Detention Center on weapons, assault and resisting arrest charges.
On February 14, 1996, White was featured in a front page story in The Washington Post after posting on Internet news groups the name and telephone number of a woman he believed was abusing
Child abuse
Child abuse is the physical, sexual, emotional mistreatment, or neglect of a child. In the United States, the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention and the Department of Children And Families define child maltreatment as any act or series of acts of commission or omission by a parent or...
her daughter. The supposed victim had allegedly told a university counseling group that her parents would not allow her to use the telephone or see friends; someone from the group spread the story, and White posted it, asking readers to telephone the mother and "tell her you are disgusted and you demand that she stops." The Post reported that the mother and stepfather were near breaking point after receiving threatening telephone calls.
Columbine High School massacre
On April 20, 1999, Eric Harris and Dylan Klebold, seniors at Columbine High SchoolColumbine High School
Columbine High School or CHS is a high school in unincorporated Jefferson County, Colorado, United States.- History :Columbine High School opened in the fall of 1973. There was no senior class in its first year. The school's first graduating class was the class of 1975...
near Littleton
Littleton, Colorado
Littleton is a Home Rule Municipality contained in Arapahoe, Douglas, and Jefferson counties in the U.S. state of Colorado. Littleton is a suburb of the Denver-Aurora Metropolitan Statistical Area. Littleton is the county seat of Arapahoe County and the 20th most populous city in the state of...
, Colorado
Colorado
Colorado is a U.S. state that encompasses much of the Rocky Mountains as well as the northeastern portion of the Colorado Plateau and the western edge of the Great Plains...
, killed twelve students and one teacher before committing suicide
Columbine High School massacre
The Columbine High School massacre occurred on Tuesday, April 20, 1999, at Columbine High School in Columbine, an unincorporated area of Jefferson County, Colorado, United States, near Denver and Littleton. Two senior students, Eric Harris and Dylan Klebold, embarked on a massacre, killing 12...
. White's website claimed that "schools and juvenile psychiatric centers [that]...prescribe anti-depressants are evil and should be destroyed," and it gave a list of "Music to Shoot Your School Up By." The report continued that "[t]here are so many parallels between the Web site's message and the April 20 massacre in Columbine High School in Littleton, Colorado, that some police hate-crime experts say privately it is not inconceivable that the two teen-age gunmen in that case visited the site." FBI officials claimed there was no indication that the website had any connection to the shooting.
White told Reuters that "the reason [Columbine victims] got killed is that they are part of an authoritarian social movement and were seen by the killers as symbolic of that movement ... What the shooters were shooting at was not people but the movements they symbolized. It's a shame that authoritarian Christians, who are trying to dominate our society, don't have a clue how objectionable they are until people start shooting them." He said he would neither confirm nor deny that what he called a "Colorado cell" of his Utopian Anarchist Party had been in contact with the teenagers before the shooting.
White later clarified his position on Columbine in an interview with Jack Ross for Pravda Online:
Ideological shifts
Though most noted for his support of fascist movements, White has proclaimed multiple intense and conflicting political shifts across the political spectrum, ranging from communismCommunism
Communism is a social, political and economic ideology that aims at the establishment of a classless, moneyless, revolutionary and stateless socialist society structured upon common ownership of the means of production...
to conservatism
Conservatism
Conservatism is a political and social philosophy that promotes the maintenance of traditional institutions and supports, at the most, minimal and gradual change in society. Some conservatives seek to preserve things as they are, emphasizing stability and continuity, while others oppose modernism...
.
From 1997 to 1998, White claimed involvement with the Maoist
Maoism
Maoism, also known as the Mao Zedong Thought , is claimed by Maoists as an anti-Revisionist form of Marxist communist theory, derived from the teachings of the Chinese political leader Mao Zedong . Developed during the 1950s and 1960s, it was widely applied as the political and military guiding...
Revolutionary Communist Party
Revolutionary Communist Party, USA
The Revolutionary Communist Party, USA , known originally as the Revolutionary Union, is a Maoist Communist party formed in 1975 in the United States. The RCP states that U.S...
's Refuse and Resist
Refuse and Resist
Refuse & Resist! was a human rights activist group founded in New York City in 1987 by Emile de Antonio, Dore Ashton, Dennis Brutus, John Gerassi, Abbie Hoffman, William Kunstler, C. Clark Kissinger, Conrad Lynn, Sonia Sanchez, Rev. Fernando Santillana, and other activists who were concerned...
, Coalition against Police Brutality, and the Trotskyist
Trotskyism
Trotskyism is the theory of Marxism as advocated by Leon Trotsky. Trotsky considered himself an orthodox Marxist and Bolshevik-Leninist, arguing for the establishment of a vanguard party of the working-class...
International Socialist Organization
International Socialist Organization
The International Socialist Organization is a revolutionary socialist organization in the United States that identifies with the politics of International Socialism, a current of Trotskyism, and the Marxist political tradition that American socialist writer and activist Hal Draper called...
(ISO). White worked as a columnist for the Russian website Pravda Online, which took its name from the now-defunct newspaper
Pravda
Pravda was a leading newspaper of the Soviet Union and an official organ of the Central Committee of the Communist Party between 1912 and 1991....
of the Soviet Communist Party. In 2000, White joined Ross Perot
Ross Perot
Henry Ross Perot is a U.S. businessman best known for running for President of the United States in 1992 and 1996. Perot founded Electronic Data Systems in 1962, sold the company to General Motors in 1984, and founded Perot Systems in 1988...
's Reform Party
Reform Party of the United States of America
The Reform Party of the United States of America is a political party in the United States, founded in 1995 by Ross Perot...
and the campaign to elect Pat Buchanan
Pat Buchanan
Patrick Joseph "Pat" Buchanan is an American paleoconservative political commentator, author, syndicated columnist, politician and broadcaster. Buchanan was a senior adviser to American Presidents Richard Nixon, Gerald Ford, and Ronald Reagan, and was an original host on CNN's Crossfire. He sought...
, then running for President of the United States
President of the United States
The President of the United States of America is the head of state and head of government of the United States. The president leads the executive branch of the federal government and is the commander-in-chief of the United States Armed Forces....
on a Reform Party ticket. White later told American Free Press
American Free Press
The American Free Press is a weekly newspaper published in the United States.According to one former correspondent, the newspaper's direct ancestor was the publication The Spotlight, which ceased publication in 2001 when its parent company, Liberty Lobby, was forced into bankruptcy...
that he resigned from the Buchanan campaign after a few months out of concern for what he called the campaign's "dishonest practices."
Business interests
White incorporated his first company, White Web Publishing Inc., in 2002, which he sold in 2003. He set up an eBayEBay
eBay Inc. is an American internet consumer-to-consumer corporation that manages eBay.com, an online auction and shopping website in which people and businesses buy and sell a broad variety of goods and services worldwide...
clone
Clone (computer science)
In computing, a clone is a hardware or software system that is designed to mimic another system. Compatibility with the original system is usually the explicit purpose of cloning hardware or low-level software such as operating systems...
called "ShopWhite" with the aim of capturing the White Power music and paraphernalia market, but the venture failed after security and administrative problems.
In late 2003, White moved to Roanoke, Virginia
Roanoke, Virginia
Roanoke is an independent city in the Mid-Atlantic U.S. state of Virginia and is the tenth-largest city in the Commonwealth. It is located in the Roanoke Valley of the Roanoke Region of Virginia. The population within the city limits was 97,032 as of 2010...
, where he began trading as White Homes and Land LLC. According to The Roanoke Times
The Roanoke Times
The Roanoke Times is the primary newspaper in Southwestern Virginia and is based in Roanoke, Virginia, United States. It is published by Landmark Media Enterprises...
and the Southern Poverty Law Center
Southern Poverty Law Center
The Southern Poverty Law Center is an American nonprofit civil rights organization noted for its legal victories against white supremacist groups; legal representation for victims of hate groups; monitoring of alleged hate groups, militias and extremist organizations; and educational programs that...
, White has owned nine single and multi-family properties in an impoverished black
African American
African Americans are citizens or residents of the United States who have at least partial ancestry from any of the native populations of Sub-Saharan Africa and are the direct descendants of enslaved Africans within the boundaries of the present United States...
neighborhood in South West Roanoke since April 2004.
White told the Roanoke Times that he is not a racist or Nazi, describing himself as a "libertarian socialist." He admitted to being an antisemite: "I wouldn't be out here buying and fixing up houses if I had some agenda against the black community...The Jews, I despise. They hate me. I hate them." He acknowledged calling some Roanoke residents "local nig-rats" and accused them of "conspiring to test me.".
Intimidation and activism
On October 15, 2005, White helped the National Socialist MovementNational Socialist Movement (United States)
The National Socialist Movement is a neo-Nazi party operating in the United States. The group was founded in 1974 by Robert Brannen, former member of the American Nazi Party before its decline. The group claims to be the largest and most active neo-Nazi organization in the United States. Its...
organize a march and rally in Toledo, Ohio
Toledo, Ohio
Toledo is the fourth most populous city in the U.S. state of Ohio and is the county seat of Lucas County. Toledo is in northwest Ohio, on the western end of Lake Erie, and borders the State of Michigan...
. The march was canceled by police when the NSM and around 20 supporters were outnumbered by several hundred anti-racists and members of the largely African-American neighborhood in which the rally was to take place. White, the NSM's Dayton leader Mark Martin, and the rest of their supporters taunted the crowd with racial epithets. Some counter-protesters became violent and began rioting. More than 100 people were arrested.
In July 2006, White was removed from the NSM and formed the internet-based American National Socialist Workers' Party. On April 19, 2007, two of the ANSWP's fifteen members were arrested when they unveiled a swastika flag during a speech by President George W. Bush
George W. Bush
George Walker Bush is an American politician who served as the 43rd President of the United States, from 2001 to 2009. Before that, he was the 46th Governor of Texas, having served from 1995 to 2000....
in Tipp City, Ohio
Tipp City, Ohio
Tipp City is a city in Miami County, Ohio, United States. The population was 9,689 at the 2010 census. Formerly known as Tippecanoe, and then Tippecanoe City, this town was renamed to Tipp City in 1938 because another town in Ohio was likewise named Tippecanoe...
. On May 23, 2007, White mailed letters and copies of National Socialist, the ANSWP magazine, to the residents of an apartment complex in Virginia Beach, Virginia
Virginia Beach, Virginia
Virginia Beach is an independent city located in the Hampton Roads metropolitan area of Virginia, on the Atlantic Ocean at the mouth of the Chesapeake Bay...
where tenants had complained about discriminatory behavior by their landlord.
Access to White's websites in Canada
In 2006, Canadian human rights lawyer Richard WarmanRichard Warman
Richard Warman is an Ottawa-based lawyer who is active in human rights law. Warman worked for the Canadian Human Rights Commission from July 2002 until March 2004...
and the Canadian Jewish Congress
Canadian Jewish Congress
The Canadian Jewish Congress was one of the main lobby groups for the Jewish community in the country, although it often competed with the more conservative B'nai Brith Canada in that regard. At its dissolution, the president of the CJC was Mark Freiman. Its past co-presidents were Sylvain Abitbol...
asked the Canadian Radio-television and Telecommunications Commission, Canada's telecommunications regulator, to block access in Canada to White's websites. Warman claimed the websites contained material intended to incite violence against him that caused him to fear for his life.
Jena Six
On September 22, 2007, the FBI opened an investigation of Overthrow.com because it listed the addresses of five of the Jena SixJena Six
The Jena Six were six black teenagers convicted in the beating of Justin Barker, a white student at Jena High School in Jena, Louisiana, on December 4, 2006. Barker was injured in the assault by the members of the Jena Six, and received treatment for his injuries at an emergency room...
and the telephone numbers of family members "in case anyone wants to deliver justice." According to an FBI spokeswoman, the website "essentially called for their lynching." Black activist Al Sharpton
Al Sharpton
Alfred Charles "Al" Sharpton, Jr. is an American Baptist minister, civil rights activist, and television/radio talk show host. In 2004, he was a candidate for the Democratic nomination for the U.S. presidential election...
claimed that some of the families have continuously received threatening and harassing phone calls.
Roanoke, Virginia attack
In October 2007, White was attacked by Aries Brown and Lattoria Minnis, two African-Americans whose claims that White had assaulted them were dismissed by a judge. During the trial, White testified that he choked Brown unconscious during the incident. He later published an essay, "Transcendence and the Killing of the Wicked," describing the experience.Federal trial and conviction
On October 17, 2008, White was arrested in Roanoke, VirginiaRoanoke, Virginia
Roanoke is an independent city in the Mid-Atlantic U.S. state of Virginia and is the tenth-largest city in the Commonwealth. It is located in the Roanoke Valley of the Roanoke Region of Virginia. The population within the city limits was 97,032 as of 2010...
by the FBI. The arrest stemmed from an alleged threat White made against a federal juror involved in the 2004 Matthew F. Hale
Matthew F. Hale
Matthew F. Hale , more commonly known as Matt Hale, was the third Pontifex Maximus of the white supremacist religion, Creativity, and the founder of the group formerly known as the World Church of the Creator and now known as The Creativity Movement. The organization's headquarters were based in...
case and posting the juror's personal information online. White was held without bond. Other counts against White, filed December 11, 2008, included alleged threats he made against poor black tenants suing their landlords, and threats against others, including Warman, columnist Leonard Pitts
Leonard Pitts
Leonard Pitts Jr. is a politically progressive African American commentator, journalist and novelist. He is a nationally-syndicated columnist and winner of the 2004 Pulitzer Prize for Commentary...
, former South Harrison Township, New Jersey
South Harrison Township, New Jersey
South Harrison Township is a township in Gloucester County, New Jersey, United States. As of the United States 2000 Census, the township population was 2,417....
mayor Charles Tyson, and a university administrator from Delaware
Delaware
Delaware is a U.S. state located on the Atlantic Coast in the Mid-Atlantic region of the United States. It is bordered to the south and west by Maryland, and to the north by Pennsylvania...
.
In July 2009, one count of inciting violence was dismissed by the judge. The trial on the seven remaining charges began on December 9, 2009. On December 18, the jury found White guilty on four counts and not guilty on three counts.
On February 8, 2010, a Federal judge dismissed White's conviction of threatening Warman. On April 14, 2010 White was sentenced to 30 months imprisonment. Judge James Turk said he rarely sentences defendants on the high side of guidelines, but did so because of the fear White instilled in many of his victims.
The conviction was reversed as violating the First Amendment, and White was released in April, 2011.
External links
- "Shadowed by Threats, Judge Finds New Horror" by Jodi Wilgoren, David Bernstein, Gretchen Ruethling, Mindy Sink, and David Johnston, New York Times, March 2, 2005 (link is to the abstract only; full article must be purchased)
- "The Bottom of the Barrel" by Ryan O'Donnell, FrontPageMagazine.com, April 16, 2003
- "Jack Ross: Interview with Pravda.ru's Bill White" by Jack Ross, Pravda, January 10, 2002
- "Anarchist Web site salutes 2 killers", no byline, Washington Times, May 3, 1999
- "Web Site Asks Youths To Carry Weapons, Build Bombs" by Sarah Tippit, Reuters, May 3, 1999 - now a deadlink
- "Bigots in Business: Neo-Nazi landlord in black Virginia neighborhood", Southern Poverty Law Center, no byline, undated, retrieved June 9, 2005
- "Freedom Lover Takes Long Road to Truth", American Free Press, no byline, undated, retrieved June 8, 2005
- "Landlord denies allegations of sinister agenda" by Mike Hudson, Roanoke Times, July 9, 2004
- "School shooter liked to create macabre drawings and stories" by Amy Forliti, Associated Press, March 22, 2005
- "Weise's words, images keep Web buzzing" by David Hanners, Pioneer Press, undated
- Cramer, John and Jen McCaffery. "White Supremacist Comments on Case." Roanoke Times & World News, 3 March 2005.
- Ahearn, Lorraine. "Neo-Nazi Site Posts Addresses of Truth Panelists." Greensboro News & Record, 3 July 2005.
- "The 'N-Word,' and Other Readers' Letters," Philadelphia Daily News, 10 Aug. 2005.
- CNN article about Nazi event with Bill White quote
- Article on December Toledo nazi rally
- LSJ.com article on Lansing Neo Nazi rally
- 2008 Southern Poverty Law Center article on White
- How Two Canadians Helped Nab America's Top Neo-Nazi by Colin Freeze, the Globe and Mail, December 12, 2008.