Local News
Terrorists
Christmas Choir
The number of hate groups and patriot
groups, which do not all share the same
beliefs and conduct, has been growing
across the country since President Barack
Obama was elected in 2008, according to an
annual report by the Southern Poverty Law
Center in Montgomery, Ala., which tracks
extremists.
SPLC’s 2010 compilation of active hate
groups found 1,002 nationwide. Of those,
15 were located in Oregon and 13 each in
Washington, Idaho and Montana, the SPLC
said. The group counted 888 hate groups in
2007,
before
Obama’s elec-
tion.
Obama is also
seen as someone
who would cur-
tail individual
rights such as
gun ownership, said Rich King, a professor
at Washington State University in Pullman
who studies hate groups and teaches a class
on white power movements,
Meanwhile, the financial woes sparked by
Wall Street have fed anti-Semitic senti-
ments, King said.
It has been a busy year for extremists in
the Northwest.
In the most violent incident, a young cou-
ple was arrested and charged in connection
with a murder spree that claimed four lives
in three Western states.
David “Joey” Pedersen, 31, and his girl-
friend, Holly Grigsby, 24, were arrested in
California in October. They have expressed
white supremacist beliefs.
They are charged in Washington with
aggravated first-degree murder, accused of
killing Pedersen’s father and his wife in
Everett sometime around Sept.
26. They are also suspected of killing 19-
year-old Cody Myers in Oregon and
Reginald Alan Clark, 53, in Eureka, Calif.
They shot Myers because his name sound-
ed Jewish, even though he was a Christian,
according to court documents. Clark was
black.
Grigsby and Pedersen were arrested out-
side
Yuba
City, Calif.,
when a police
officer spot-
ted them in
Myers’ car.
Grigsby
told officers
“the couple was on their way to Sacramento
to ‘kill more Jews,’” court documents said.
In another high-profile incident, a man
planted a pipe bomb along the planned route
of the Martin Luther King Jr. Day parade in
Spokane. The shrapnel-packed bomb was
found and disabled before it could explode,
but the FBI said it had the potential to kill or
injure many of the 2,000 marchers, who
included children.
White supremacist Kevin Harpham, 37,
was arrested in March and has pleaded
guilty to attempted use of a weapon of mass
destruction, and the hate crime of placing
the bomb in an effort to target minorities.
He faces 27 to 32 years in prison when he is
They are part of a trend that
has seen extremist activity on
the rise nationally
PHOTO BY SUSAN FRIED
continued from page 1
The Mount Zion Choir sings at the Third Annual Christmas Day of Caring at
Mount Zion Baptist Church on Saturday Dec. 17. lines for the holiday event,
co-sponsored by C.A.M.P and Mount Zion, surged out the door and down
the street.
sentenced by a federal judge on Dec. 20.
Another violent incident occurred June 12
outside of Missoula, Mont., when former
militia leader David Burgert opened fire on
two Missoula County sheriff’s deputies on a
remote logging road in the Lolo National
Forest.
Burgert disappeared into the forest after
the gunbattle, in which no one was injured.
He has yet to be found, despite an extensive
manhunt.
Burgert is a longtime patriot activist who
spent eight years in prison on weapons
charges and authorities charged him at the
time with trying to spark a revolution. He
was released in 2010.
Justice Department’s findings.
“There are certain things a lot of us have
known for years, especially minorities,”
said Nicholas Polimenakos, who added he
has been a concerned citizen of Seattle since
1983. He and another sign holder also iden-
tified themselves as members of the Occupy
Seattle movement.
The ACLU of Washington called the
Justice Department report a good start.
“Now the long-term effort to bring about
the needed change in systems, culture, train-
ing and leadership begins,” said Kathleen
Taylor, ACLU of Washington executive
director, in a written statement.
Other incidents captured on surveillance
or police-cruiser video include officers
using an anti-Mexican epithet and stomping
on a prone Latino man who was
mistakenly thought to be a rob-
bery suspect; an officer kicking
a non-resisting black youth in a
convenience store; and officers
tackling and kicking a black
man who showed up in a police
evidence room to pick up
belongings after he was mistak-
enly released from jail.
The report also found:
- The trend of escalation toward force is
most pronounced in encounters with per-
sons with mental illnesses or those under
the influence of alcohol or drugs.
- When officers use batons, 57 percent of
the time it is either unnecessary or exces-
sive.
- About 61 percent of the cases of exces-
sive force involved more than one officer
confronting a single person.
- In 2010, 20 officers were responsible for
18 percent of all use-of-force incidents.
- The police department has no effective
supervisory techniques to better analyze
why these officers use force more than other
officers, whether their uses of force are nec-
essary, or whether any of these officers
would benefit from additional use of force
training.
- The public developed its belief that the
department engages in discriminatory poli-
cy through their own negative experiences,
well-publicized videos of force being used
against people of color, incidents of overt
discrimination, and concerns that the pat-
tern of excessive force disproportionately
affects minorities.
“The solution to the problems identified
within the Seattle Police Department will
require strong and consistent leadership
ago. First, the number-crunchers got all of
last year’s state test scores in reading and
math. Then they compared the scores
against information provided by students
each year about the languages they speak at
home.
The results, although preliminary, were
eye-opening: Only 36 percent of black stu-
dents who speak English at home passed
their grade’s math test, while 47 percent of
Somali-speaking students passed. Other
black ethnic groups did even better,
although still lower than the district average
of 70 percent.
In reading, 56 percent of black students
who speak English passed, while 67 percent
of Somali-speaking students passed. Again,
other black ethnic groups did better, though
still lower than the district average of 78
percent.
Teoh noted the numbers are based on self-
reported home-language information and
exclude English Language Learners, which
is an optional program for students who
score poorly on an English proficiency test.
He also said that because the English-
speaking category includes students of
many black ethnic groups, it’s impossible to
compare specific ethnic groups.
Those details seemed less relevant to par-
ents at the meeting at Rainier Beach.
``It’s very alarming that students that were
born right here are at the bottom of the bar-
rel,’’ said Vallerie Fisher, whose daughter is
a senior at Rainier Beach. ``How is that pos-
sible?’’
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Police
continued from page 1
findings of the Justice Department report.
“I want to make this clear,” Diaz said dur-
ing an interview with The Seattle Times.
“The department is not broken.”
Seattle Mayor Mike McGinn said the
police department has already started mak-
ing reforms in response to the issues raised
in the report. The public is concerned about
use of force and possible bias in the police
force, McGinn acknowledged, adding that
the police chief and his officers take those
concerns very seriously.
“We will be looking closely
at
the
specifics
the
Department of Justice has
raised and how we can have
the best possible police
force,” he said
The
American
Civil
Liberties
Union
of
Washington and 34 other
community groups called for the inquiry
after a Seattle officer shot and killed the
woodcarver, John T. Williams, in 2010.
Video from Officer Ian Birk’s patrol car
showed Williams crossing the street holding
a piece of wood and a small knife, and Birk
exiting the vehicle to pursue him. Off cam-
era, Birk quickly shouted three times for
Williams to drop the knife, then fired five
shots. The knife was found folded at the
scene, but Birk later maintained Williams
had threatened him.
Birk resigned from the force but was not
charged. A review board found the shooting
unjustified.
A man holding a “Justice for John T.
Williams” sign at Friday’s news conference
said he was mildly encouraged by the
The public developed its belief that
the department engages in
discriminatory policy through their own
negative experiences
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Students
continued from page 1
about the presentation. ``I was shocked, and
we’re not getting a sense of urgency from
the district. We need a timeline. Not anoth-
er committee. We need to know what
they’re doing and when.’’
District officials said they need to study
the new data further before speculating
about the reasons for it or making policy
changes in response.
Mark Teoh, the district’s data manager,
said he has wanted to break down student-
achievement data this way for years.
His team started the project two months
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December 21/ December28, 2011 The Seattle Skanner Page 3