Aryan Circle

The Aryan Circle (AC) is a white prison gang spread throughout many U.S. correctional facilites.

Origins

The Aryan Circle was founded in Huntsville Penitentiary in Texas, 1985, by Mark Cooper Gaspard. The Aryan Circle was started as a protection group for white inmates who were the minority in the Texas Department of Criminal Justice (TDCJ). Unlike the more apolitical Aryan Brotherhood, the Aryan Circle adheres more strongly to white separatist ideologies.

Membership into the group usually requires an assault on an enemy of the organization, amongst other ways.

Aryan Circle members sport the common white supremacists/separatists tattoos such as swastikas, SS lightning bolts, and Celtic/Germanic symbols. The main "patch" of the AC is a diamond with a swastika with the letters AC in the center of a circle. Older gang members will have a small circle just below their left pectoral. However due to the group now being classified as a Security Threat Group (STG).

Unlike the Aryan Brotherhood, which was also originally started for the purpose of protecting white inmates in the California Department of Corrections from the more numerous black and Hispanic gangs, eventually giving up most of its white supermacist ideologies in order to turn a profit, the Aryan Circle carries its White ideologies more seriously.

The AC has also extended its reach beyond the walls of prison. The organization has stated that it is not a gang, but a white separatist group dedicated to the advancement of the white race, helping white men and women get on their feet, off drugs, and creating an educated family atmosphere. They also claim not to condone violence against other races to advance their cause.

Although the Aryan Circle used to act as traffickers of methamphetamine, as well as members using, they now maintain a drug-free policy. Some membership also has a high propensity for violence, and are willing to commit hate crimes in order to advance their cause.

On August 10, 2007 Aryan Circle member Dennis Leighton Clem killed two police officers in Louisiana in a shootout in which he was also killed. Clem and his girlfriend were on the run after Clem shot and killed a white adult, and two black teenagers who had opened fire on him in front of his house in Houston on July 14.

http://www.splcenter.org/intel/intelreport/article.jsp?pid=1500