Racist Flyers Found in Westlake High School Lockers

Thousand Oaks school officials on Friday found racist flyers stuffed into lockers at Westlake High School, less than a month after the same literature was distributed to hundreds of lockers at Simi Valley High School.

Similar flyers have been found hidden in products at stores from Thousand Oaks to southern Los Angeles, officials say. While the materials appear to be protected by the First Amendment, police are investigating whether they can be connected to a growing number of hate crimes in Southern California, officials say.

In Simi Valley, police are pursuing misdemeanor assault charges against Allan E. Carlson, 30, of Glendale, who is suspected of putting the flyers into lockers at the high school the evening of Dec. 16. Carlson allegedly punched a custodian who told him to leave campus, police said.

However, police have said they could not prosecute him for distributing the flyers because they are protected by the Constitution’s guarantee of free speech.

Carlson also is awaiting trial in Los Angeles County on misdemeanor vandalism charges for allegedly stamping a racist message into blank notebook tablets at a store in Covina last August, police said.

Westlake High School administrators reported Friday’s incident to police after students brought the materials to them, said Fred Van Leuven, director of secondary education for the Conejo Valley Unified School District.

“We notified all other schools in the district to be on the lookout for the same type of activity,” Van Leuven said.

The flyers advocate driving minorities from the United States, saying they are breeding so fast they threaten to overrun the white race.

The flyers conclude with a phone number in the 818 area code to call for more information. The phone number leads to a recording that claims affiliation to the White Aryan Resistance, or WAR, a white separatist group.

Van Leuven said he did not know when or how many of the flyers were left in lockers at the school. The materials could have been distributed the night before, he said.

“Obviously, it’s offensive,” Van Leuven said. “From our standpoint, it’s unacceptable and we take it very seriously.”

Ventura County sheriff’s detectives who investigated the Westlake High School incident said it wasn’t clear whether the person who distributed the flyers had an otherwise legitimate reason to be on campus, said Sgt. Bruce Watlington.

“We don’t know if it’s a student with a right to be there, or someone who just walked onto school grounds, or an employee, or who it was,” Watlington said.