A Blow Against Bigotry

When a federal court judge last Friday sentenced a Westminster man to 37 months in federal prison for burning a cross on the lawn of a black family in his neighborhood, the sentence was intended as more than punishment.

The court, in specifying the longest prison term possible, also was serving notice that it would not tolerate what the judge described as a blatant and heinous example of racial bigotry.

The U.S. attorney’s office also was intent on using the case as an example to others. The prosecutor in the trial sought the maximum sentence possible because he believed that a tough sentence would send a message to anyone following the “repugnant ideas of white supremacy.”

The jury that convicted Gary Skillman of conspiracy, using a fire for purposes of intimidation and violating the civil rights of others, took only 15 minutes to come in with its guilty verdicts.

If the 24-year-old Skillman, who once remarked that he wanted to get blacks out of his neighborhood, thought the cross-burning would help ignite similar feelings, he and others so disposed should have learned a lot about the community’s distaste for prejudice and bigotry.

The community, instead of standing by in silent agreement when the cross was burned, reacted quickly and boldly, denouncing the racism that the flames represented. A community festival organized by the County Human Relations Commission was attended by more than 2,000 people of diverse ethnic origins who turned out to show that they were united against such a display of bigotry.

And the commission also decided to organize a residents’ support group to respond to incidents of racial or religious violence. The initial group would be formed in Westminster where other black, Asian and Latino residents report they have received threatening phone calls and have been taunted by groups of “skinheads.” The neighbor

hood networks also could be formed in other communi- ties in response to any incident of racial or religious violence. Neighborhoods should react to such violence to show a united front against racial and religious intolerance whenever and wherever it appears.

The sentencing in the cross-burning case was the second time in the last several months that a judge has handed down the maximum punishment possible in a crime in which people resorted to violence as a means of expressing prejudice.

Last January a Superior Court judge in Santa Ana sentenced three neo-Nazi skinheads to terms ranging from 4 to 7 years. He accused them of having a “wolf-pack” mentality in their “gay-bashing” assault of a man walking in a Laguna Beach park. The victim, who was beaten with a lead pipe and knocked unconscious and who required 70 stitches to close the wounds to his head and body, was, as the judge noted, “middle-aged, unarmed, alone, unsuspecting . . . and doing nothing more than simply minding his own business.”

The community was repulsed by both cowardly and reprehensible acts. That reaction, like the stern prison sentences, send word that racism, prejudice, terrorism and violence will not be tolerated in Orange County. It is a message that must be sent whenever such ugly acts are committed.

Residents are not black neighbors. Or Latino neighbors. Or Asian neighbors. Or gay neighbors. They are just neighbors. Everyone has the legal right to live wherever he or she chooses. But that right means nothing if it exists only as words and ideals in the Constitution. It must live in the neighborhoods of Westminster, Santa Ana, Irvine, Newport Beach and every community in the land.

The courts punished individual criminal acts. And in doing so, they upheld the right to live where you please, and properly served notice that anyone trampling on that right faces the full force of the law.