5 Linked to Klan, Nazis Found Liable in Death : Jury Also Holds 2 North Carolina Police Officers Responsible in Suit Over 1970 Killing of Leftist

A federal jury Friday found two Ku Klux Klansmen, three Nazis, two Greensboro police officers and a police informant liable in the wrongful death of one of five leftist demonstrators who were killed at a 1979 anti-Klan rally.

But the jury, deciding a $48-million suit, found that the klansmen, Nazis, Greensboro police and federal agents did not engage in a conspiracy against Dr. Michael Nathan or the four other Communist Workers Party members shot to death at the “Death to the Klan” rally.

The six-member jury also found four klan-Nazi defendants liable in the assault and battery of Nathan and two other demonstrators.

101 Witnesses Testify

The verdict came after 4 1/2 hours of deliberations Thursday and seven hours Friday. The jury heard 101 witnesses testify in the 13-week trial, the third stemming from the Communist Workers Party rally on Nov. 3, 1979, in Greensboro.

U.S. District Judge Robert Merhige told the jury to begin deliberating on damage awards in the wrongful death and assault counts.

Earlier Friday, the jury told Merhige it could reach a decision on only one count, but he told them to keep trying.

In the two previous trials stemming from the rally, six klansmen and Nazis were found innocent of state murder charges in 1980, and nine were acquitted of federal civil rights conspiracy charges last year.

Defense attorneys in all three trials said the klansmen and Nazis fired in self-defense.

The 16 plaintiffs in this suit-- relatives of the victims and survivors--claim the defendants conspired to deprive them of their civil rights by disrupting the rally or failing to prevent the confrontation, then covering up their involvement.

The defendants included 20 klansmen and Nazis, four federal agents, 20 Greensboro police officers and other officials and the city of Greensboro.

Defense lawyers said the demonstrators lured klansmen and Nazis to the rally for a fight that they thought would build the Communist Workers Party and are lying in the lawsuit now to gain $48 million.

Those found liable in Nathan’s death were Eddie Dawson, a Greensboro police informant who posed as a klan member; klansman David Wayne Matthews, klansman Jerry Paul Smith, Nazi Roland Wayne Wood, former Nazi Jack Fowler, Nazi Mark Scherer, Greensboro police Lt. P.W. Spoon and Greensboro police Detective J.H. (Rooster) Cooper.

Matthews, Smith, Wood and Fowler were also found liable in an assault on Nathan and demonstrators Paul Bermanzohn and Tom Clark.

The jury cleared all 45 defendants accused of engaging in a conspiracy to violate the plaintiffs’ civil rights. Dawson and other defendants were cleared of failing to prevent a racially motivated conspiracy to deprive the plaintiffs of their civil rights.

Seventeen city and police defendants were cleared of a charge that they failed to provide adequate protection for the demonstrators.

Seven city and police defendants and the city of Greensboro were cleared of a charge that they failed to provide adequate training and supervision of police and police informants.

Finally, the jury cleared three police officers of charges that they falsely arrested two demonstrators.