Volksfront

:"This article is about an American political organization. Volksfront is also the German word for popular front (usually left-wing), or for the right-wing Afrikaner Volksfront in South Africa."

Volksfront is an American neo-Nazi organization.Matthew Thompson (August 31, 2004), [http://www.smh.com.au/articles/2004/08/30/1093852185161.html Neo-Nazi link to campus anti-foreigner campaign] "Sydney Morning Herald". Retrieved on 2007-09-26.] The Southern Poverty Law Center (SPLC) has added Volksfront to its list of hate groups.Heidi Beirich and Mark Potok (2007), [http://www.splcenter.org/intel/intelreport/article.jsp?aid=475 Two Faces of Volksfront] . Southern Poverty Law Center. Retrieved on 2007-09-26.] The Anti-Defamation League has called the group "one of the most active skinhead groups in the United States." [http://www.adl.org/PresRele/Extremism_72/5054_72.htm Violent neo-Nazi skinhead froup Volksfront growing in prominence on West Coast and internationally] . Anti-Defamation League press release. Retrieved on 2007-09-26.] The group was founded in 1994 in the Oregon State Penitentiary by Randall Krager. [Philip Dawdy (December 12, 2001), [http://www.wweek.com/story.php?story=2248 The flickering torch of racism] . "Willamette Week". Retrieved on 2007-09-26.]

Since its formation, the group has expanded to four continents and seven countries, with chapters in states such as Oregon, Massachusetts, Arizona, California, New York, Pennsylvania, North Carolina, South Carolina, Washington, Illinois, and Missouri. [ [http://web.archive.org/web/20060519062759/http://www.splcenter.org/intel/map/hate.jsp?T=29&m=4 Active U.S. Hate Groups in 2005] . Southern Poverty Law Center. Retrieved through web archive on 2007-09-26] As of 2007, they had approximately 100 members worldwide. In 2004, Stuart McBeth, an Australian neo-Nazi and then-president of the Patriotic Youth League, founded an Australian chapter of Volksfront, which is now defunct.

Violence by Volksfront members

Volksfront members have carried out racial and religiously motivated attacks.cite web|publisher=Anti-Defamation League|url=http://www.adl.org/learn/ext_us/volksfront/volksfront_report.pdf|title=Volksfront Report|year=2007]

In November, 2007, 22-year-old white supremacist Gabriel Laskey was sentenced to six months incarceration (with work release), six months home detention, and five years probation for an attack in which a group of men threw stones etched with swastikas through a Jewish synagogue's windows during religious services in Eugene, Oregon. [FBI - OREGON WHITE SUPREMACIST SENTENCED FOR ATTACK ON SYNAGOGUE; U.S. Department of Justice Press Release; November 14, 2007 [http://portland.fbi.gov/dojpressrel/2007/supremacistattack111407.htm] ] In April 2007, his brother Jacob Laskey, the ringleader of the group and self-avowed white supremacist admitted to intent to commit acts of violence and destruction against people of ethnic and racial groups and pleaded guilty to conspiracy to deprive people of civil rights, intentionally damaging religious property, solicitation to murder witnesses, soliciting a bomb threat against a federal courthouse, two counts of obstruction of justice, and being a felon in possession of a firearm and ammunition. He was sentenced to 11 years in prison. [FBI - WHITE SUPREMACIST SENTENCED TO 11 YEARS IN PRISON FOR ATTACK ON SYNAGOGUE IN OREGON; U.S. Department of Justice Press Release; April 3,2007 [http://portland.fbi.gov/dojpressrel/2007/synagogueattack040307.htm] ]

Gabriel and Jacob Laskey (formerly Volksfront’s Prisoner Affairs Coordinator in Eugene) had previously been charged with an attack on the Temple Beth Israel in Eugene, Oregon. On March 20th 1994, Chris Lord, a one-time affiliate of Volksfront and the neo-Nazi group American Front, fired 10 armor-piercing bullets into the Temple. He was convicted of first-degree intimidation, unlawful use of a weapon, first-degree criminal mischief and being a felon in possession of a firearm and was sentenced to four and a half years in prison. Lord’s accomplice, George Dennis Smith, was also convicted.

Kurtis Monschke, 20, a probationary unit leader for Volksfront, was sentenced to life in prison on June 4,2004, for his role in the March 23, 2003, murder of Randall Mark Townsend, 42, in Tacoma, Washington, in an attack that emulated a scene from the film American History X.

In April 1998, Brian Zauber, a former member of the Volksfront Arizona unit, was charged with leading a gang attack on three women who he thought were lesbians.

Footnotes

External links

* [http://www.volksfrontinternational.com/ Official Volksfront website]
* [http://www.adl.org/learn/ext_us/volksfront/default.asp?LEARN_Cat=Extremism&LEARN_SubCat=Extremism_in_America&xpicked=3&item=volksfront Volksfront - Extremism in America] , Anti-Defamation League
* [http://www.splcenter.org/intel/intelreport/article.jsp?aid=475&printable=1 SPLC article on Volksfront]
* [http://findarticles.com/p/articles/mi_qa3719/is_200607/ai_n16855770/pg_1 Overview of U.S. white supremacist groups] (See page 10.)