Man Who Took Part in Cross-Burning Episode Put on 5 Years Probation

A former Ku Klux Klan member who had admitted his role in a 1983 cross burning near racially mixed Lake View Terrace has been sentenced to five years probation, court officials said Monday.

Winston Burbage pleaded no contest May 20 to felony conspiracy to violate the Los Angeles Fire Code and related misdemeanor charges. He was sentenced Friday in Los Angeles Superior Court.

Burbage had been scheduled to be sentenced Monday, but the date was moved up without notice.

He is under subpoena as a witness in the trial of white supremacist Tom Metzger and three co-defendants on charges stemming from the same incident.

Deputy Dist. Atty. Dale A. Davidson declined to comment on the sentencing and said it was not certain if Burbage would be called to testify.

Prosecutors contend that Burbage and the four remaining defendants burned three 15-foot crosses in Kagel Canyon the evening of Dec. 3, 1983, to intimidate blacks living nearby and to incite violence.

As evidence, prosecutors noted in opening statements last week that the defendants were armed with billy clubs, bulletproof vests and riot helmets.

The gathering was broken up by police.

Metzger, head of the White Aryan Resistance and a former KKK grand dragon, claims that the cross burning was an exercise of his right to free speech and not a hate crime.

He and co-defendants Brad Kelly, Erich Schmidt and Stanley Witek contend that they broke no laws because the cross burning was a private ceremony that took place on private property leased for that purpose.

They are charged with felony conspiracy to violate the fire code and misdemeanor counts of unlawful burning and unlawful assembly.

Each faces up to 3 1/2 years in prison if convicted.

The case has taken more than seven years to come to trial because the charges were dismissed by one court, then reinstated by another.

Originally, 15 men were arrested, but cross-burning charges against most of them were dropped after they were convicted of more serious crimes, including murder, as part of a nationwide wave of white racist violence.

In testimony last week, free-lance journalist Peter Lake, who said he had infiltrated Metzger’s group, showed jurors a videotape that he made of the burning.

The tape showed a group of hooded men erecting the crosses and setting them ablaze.