[Vision2020] Officials Counter Racist Acts

[Tom Hansen]

Courtesy of today's (August 22, 2009) Spokesman Review.

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Officials counter racist acts
Flare-ups galvanize area leaders, who promise resistance

Criminal citations and civil lawsuits are options. But a recent rise in
racist activity is best handled by a unified community dedicated to
rejecting discrimination and hate, leaders from across the Inland
Northwest said Friday.

“We have been vested with the authority and the power to take action, and
I assure you I will use that power and authority to take a stronger stance
of boldness,” Spokane police Chief Anne Kirkpatrick said. “People who are
hateful are bold. But stand by to stand by, because we are more bold than
they are.”

City leaders and law enforcement from around the region joined members of
the Kootenai County Task Force on Human Relations to respond to racist
fliers that have been appearing in residential yards since April.

A man with extensive ties to hate groups, Paul R. Mullet, moved to Athol
from Ohio about five months ago and has promised to resurrect the Aryan
Nations. The group moved its headquarters from Hayden Lake after the death
of its founder, Richard Butler, in 2004.

Mullet and Kevin McGurre, who’s listed in police documents as a Manhattan,
Mont., resident, were ticketed for littering and Todd Weston, of Athol,
for aiding a misdemeanor Aug. 8 after neighbors in Coeur d’Alene
complained about the fliers to police.

“We will not be known as places that allow hatred to dwell,” Spokane Mayor
Mary Verner said.

Racist incidents crop up
The Kootenai County task force is credited with dismantling Butler’s
Hayden Lake compound with a civil lawsuit that bankrupted the Aryan
Nations in 2000. The land is now a peace park.

But racist activity has persisted quietly in the region. In 2007, a man
claiming Aryan Nations ties interrupted a talk by task force founders Tony
Stewart and Norm Gissel at the Human Rights Institute. Three others stood
outside the building handing out pro-Aryan literature. That summer, two
men reportedly screamed racial slurs and neo-Nazi mantras at Hayden Lake,
and Silverwood Theme Park near Athol ordered a group of men with swastika
tattoos to cover the markings or leave. The men left.

In April, Coeur d’Alene residents awoke to fliers advertising the Aryan
Nations in their yards. Residents in Spirit Lake have gotten them, too.
Earlier this month, Coeur d’Alene police ticketed Mullet, McGurre and
Weston after a neighbor said they’d thrown the fliers to children playing
in a yard. Less than two weeks later, Spokane Valley yards were littered
with the fliers, police said.

‘Speaking out’
At Friday’s press conference, Spokane Valley Mayor Richard Munson
encouraged citizens to reject Mullet and his “type of vitriolic nonsense.”

Officials from Rathdrum, Spokane Valley, Dalton Gardens, Post Falls, Coeur
d’Alene, Liberty Lake, Spokane, Sandpoint and the Coeur d’Alene Tribe
attended the press conference, which was held off Interstate 90 near the
state line.

“We believe that where there’s hate speech, good speech is essential and
it wins out in the end,” said Stewart, task force secretary. “
 I
think it comforts the people in the neighborhoods. They know we are
speaking out.”

Two assaults have been reported in Spokane and Coeur d’Alene in the past
month that police think may have been racially motivated, but detectives
say they have no reason to suspect members of the Aryan Nations. Idaho’s
hate crime law makes it a felony to “intimidate or harass another person
because of that person’s race, color, religion, ancestry or national
origin.”

Washington’s malicious harassment law can be used to prosecute racial
intimidation.

Mullet said in a prepared statement his organization will not violate the
law.

“For far to long ALL other groups have been able to spread there messages
unchallenged and nay encouraged to have free speech but one group the
WHITE RACE!” the statement reads. “The media blitz this morning is nothing
more than them stirring up a population of people to do nothing more than
attack us for having the willingness to speak truth, granted to us under
the constitution of the United States!”

Mullet has promised to fight the littering citation filed this month.

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Tony Stewart, of the Kootenai County Task Force on Human Relations, speaks
Friday at a press conference attended by police and human rights
activists. “We believe that where there’s hate speech, good speech is
essential and it wins out in the end,” he said.

http://tinyurl.com/n4awq

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More on Paul R. Mullet, Minnesota leader of the Aryan Nations can be found
at:

http://www.rickross.com/reference/hate_groups/hategroups326.html

Seeya at Farmers' Market, Moscow.

Tom Hansen
Moscow, Idaho

"The Pessimist complains about the wind, the Optimist expects it to change
and the Realist adjusts his sails."

- Unknown