Film Spurs Review of Metzger’s Probation : Television: Nazi program produced by the Fallbrook racist may have violated the terms of his release from jail.

Authorities in San Diego County are trying to determine whether white supremacist Tom Metzger violated the terms of a court-ordered probation after the airing of an anti-Semitic documentary on a local public access cable channel.

Culled from the archives of Nazi propaganda films, the documentary aired shortly after midnight last Saturday on Cox Cable San Diego, which serves about 324,000 subscribers in the county.

A spokeswoman for the cable service said that John Metzger, the son of Tom Metzger, and co-founder of the so-called skinhead movement, brought the tape to the company only recently for airing on Channel 24, which is reserved for public-access programming.

Cox official Sandy Murphy said Thursday that she was uncertain whether the elder Metzger was involved in producing or directing the program, which equates Jews to rats and talks of a worldwide Jewish conspiracy that “must be resisted.”

But Metzger, 54, acknowledged Thursday that he produced the program, which has as its centerpiece a Nazi propaganda film titled “The Eternal Jew.” He said he continues to produce such programs for public-access channels on about 60 cable systems in 40 cities.

In response to authorities’ reviewing the program to determine whether he had violated probation, Metzger said, “That’s really a laugh. If they want to put me back in jail for 40 days, let ‘em do it. That’s all I’ve got left on the (six-month) sentence anyway.

“Geez . . . I mean, that’s really stretching it. But, if it’s just a matter of two, three weeks, hey--I’m not afraid of jail. I did 46 days in the Los Angeles County Jail. Wow. . . . That would really be something if they nailed me on that.

“That would be a nationwide story: ‘Producer thrown in jail for putting on World War II propaganda film.’ That particular film is shown to college students all over the world. It’s not something Tom Metzger put together in his basement.”

Metzger laughed and said, “Well, I did produce it. I just didn’t make it. (Nazi propagandist) Josef Goebbels made it, and he’s unavailable for comment. I doubt you’d be able to find him.”

San Diego County officials said Thursday that any involvement by the elder Metzger may have violated the terms of a court-ordered probation that followed his conviction on a hate crime in 1991 in Los Angeles County Superior Court.

Arlene Smith, a spokeswoman for the San Diego County Probation Department, said officials were investigating the matter to determine if Metzger had violated probation. Jose Garcia, the probation officer assigned to Metzger, declined comment.

Smith said the case had been referred to probation officers in Los Angeles County, which maintains jurisdiction despite the fact that Metzger, a TV repairman and former grand dragon of the California Ku Klux Klan, still resides in Fallbrook.

Smith said the Los Angeles County Probation Department will make the decision about any violation, or any other matter involving Metzger.

Metzger and two co-defendants were sentenced to six months in jail last December for their role in a 1983 cross-burning in a racially mixed neighborhood in the San Fernando Valley. Metzger also was ordered to perform 200 hours of community service near his Fallbrook home.

The judge fined him $200 and ruled that the community service be confined to organizations that work with minorities or in a hospital. It was Metzger’s first criminal conviction and the first time he had been incarcerated, despite a career of racist activity.

Metzger, who, at the time, vowed that “nothing was going to change,” was recently granted an early release by Los Angeles Superior Court Judge J. D. Smith because his wife, who later died, had lung cancer. Metzger and the two co-defendants were given three years’ probation.

But, in granting his release in February, Smith ordered Metzger to curtail his racist activities and reprimanded him for comments made in a jailhouse interview that the judge perceived as a threat against him.

“The hunter better run,” Metzger said, “because the bear is very dangerous.”

Although it was Metzger’s first criminal conviction, he and his son, John, were held liable in a civil suit in 1990 for the beating death of an Ethiopian immigrant killed by skinheads in Oregon. Metzger was forced to sell his Fallbrook home to help pay the $12.5-million judgment.

Morris Casuto, San Diego director of the Anti-Defamation League, said Thursday that he had received numerous calls about the half-hour broadcast, which he said was a German-produced documentary first aired in the 1930s in Europe and commissioned by Adolf Hitler’s Third Reich.

Calling it “disturbing and disgusting,” Casuto said the grainy, black-and-white documentary, with a voice-over narration, is meant “to dehumanize the Jewish person, to present the Jew as an enemy of civilization, as grasping and disloyal. It is classic anti-Semitism.”

Casuto said he supports the First Amendment freedoms of anyone wishing to air such a program--which Cox Cable accepts and televises free of charge--but that the broadcast in question should have been rejected because of poor technical quality.

In January of last year, Torrance Community Television in Torrance declined to broadcast one of Metzger’s documentaries, citing a “hissing” sound that in its view made the program technically unacceptable.

In late 1990, Southwestern Cable, which serves areas north of Interstate 8, stopped airing the “Race and Reason” series, citing Metzger’s conviction in the Oregon civil suit. Southwestern officials could not be reached for comment Thursday.

Metzger said “Race and Reason” will soon resume on Southwestern, “because, legally, they can’t stop it, although they sure have tried.” He said the program, which features about 150 documentaries, is seen on most of the cable systems in Southern California.

Casuto said that, although a condition “of Metzger’s being released was that he can’t be involved in the racist movement any more, he’s still the same old racist he’s always been. In terms of his activities, he hasn’t changed a bit. He hasn’t changed his political views, he hasn’t changed his style. He continues to be an entrepreneur of bigotry.”

“It’s curious that as a society we view nudity as far more dangerous than bigotry,” Casuto said. But he said it’s almost impossible, because of the law, to stop cable companies from airing Metzger’s programs.

“We’ve decided there’s no sense in fighting something that in our view is unwinnable.”

Murphy, the Cox Cable executive, said she did not know how long “Race and Reason” had aired on San Diego’s primary cable service or whether Metzger’s legal difficulties had interrupted it.

“I also don’t know when it will air again,” she said.

Murphy said laws governing the content of public-access programming are set by the communities in which they air--in Cox’s case, by the San Diego City Council and the San Diego County Board of Supervisors.

“Anybody in our community has the right to use it,” Murphy said. “Anyone. And the only restriction is whether or not it is illegal. In other words, if it’s obscene programming or intended to defraud the viewer. We do have some restrictions about (technical) quality.”

Murphy said African-American groups had sought to have “Race and Reason” barred from airing on cable outlets in Kansas City, Mo., but that a suit by the American Civil Liberties Union had guaranteed the airing of Metzger’s program on an uninterrupted basis.

“It doesn’t really matter how we as a corporation feel about it,” Murphy said. “In order to continue doing business in San Diego County, we have to abide by certain regulations, and among those is the mandate to provide public-access programming--even if it offends people.”

Murphy said Cox Cable had reviewed “The Eternal Jew” and decided it satisfied all existing qualifications for public-access programming. She said Metzger’s son, John, had provided the tape “but as to the exact day, I’m not really sure.”

Tom Metzger said Thursday that, even if he’s jailed again, he won’t be deterred in fighting the causes of the White Aryan Resistance, or WAR, movement founded by him and propagated by his son.

“I feel like a military man,” he said. “I’m going into war--I’m in a war--and, while I’ll lose some of the skirmishes, I’ll win most of the battles, and ultimately, you can bet I’ll win the war.

“That tape they’re talking about (The Eternal Jew) can be taken two ways. If you’re on the side that says all Germans are rats, well, it’s got something for you. Or, if you’re on the other side, you can see that what it really is, is a statement full of nothing but truth.”