Shofar archives:
Dallas Morning News
July 27, 1989 (A24)
6 skinheads will plead guilty to rights charges
Action result of U.S. probe of racial violence
By Lee Hancock
Staff Writer of the Dallas Morning News
Six North Texas members of the white supremacist Confederate
Hammerskins have agreed to plead guilty to civil rights
charges and other federal violations, the U.S. Justice
Department said Wednesday.
A seventh skinhead, Daniel Alvis Wood, was indicted Wednesday
on a charge of fleeing the state in May to avoid federal
prosecution and a federal grand jury subpoena.
Mr. Wood, 20, was sentenced in January to 10 years in state
prison for vandalizing a Dallas synagogue last October. He was
free on bond pending appeal when he failed to answer a
subpoena to appear before a federal grand jury on May 25.
The indictment and plea agreements represent the first formal
charges brought in a Justice Department investigation of
racially inspired violence and vandalism by the Confederate
Hammerskins, federal officials said.
The Dallas-based skinhead group’s members wear close-cropped
hair and steel-toed boots and espouse anti-Semitic, racist
beliefs.
One of the six, Waco resident Andrew Francis Flowers, 19,
appeared Wednesday before U.S. District Judge Barefoot
Sanders. Mr. Flowers pleaded guilty to a single misdemeanor
civil rights charge in connection with two rampages by
skinheads in Robert E. Lee Park last July and August.
An arraignment for a second man, Michael Edward Cannon of Fort
Worth, was postponed at his attorney’s request. Mr. Cannon was
named with Mr. Flowers in a criminal information detailing the
Lee Park incidents.
The information, filed Monday, is an outline of charges filed
in lieu of an indictment because the defendents agreed to
plead guilty.
Mr. Flowers declined to comment.
A document outlining the charge said he and “numerous other
Confederate Hammerskins” went to Lee Park twice last summer to
intimidate blacks. They chased two from the park and assaulted
at least one, the document said.
“Mr. Flowers understood the purpose of patrolling the park on
this night was to chase blacks from a park which his group
considered to be a symbol of the Confederacy, and thus white
supremacy,” the document said.
Mr. Flowers and Mr. Cannon each face a maximum of one year in
prison and a $5,000 fine. Mr. Wood faces a maximum of five
years imprisonment and a $250,000 fine.
Mr. Flowers will be granted immunity from further federal and
state prosecution in exchange for cooperation with the federal
investigation, according to his plea agreement.
Federal officials also announced the filing of an information
naming four juvenile skinheads in a two-count delinquency
charge. The information was ordered sealed because the four
are minors.
A statement released by the Justice Department said the four
were charged in Lee Park incidents against blacks and
“vandalism of Jewish properties.”
The Justice Department investigation was prompted by concerns
raised by the Anti-Defamation League of B’nai B’rith and
others that the skinhead movement, although small, was
spreading anti-Semitic violence nationwide.
The Confederate Hammerskins is one of the better-known
skinhead groups in the nation. One founder is serving an
18-month sentence for attempted murder in Milwaukee. Another
member, Shawn Michael Day, 28, was sentenced last month to 30
years in state prison for attacking an off-duty Plano police
officer.
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