Judge Sends Exactly the Right Message : Hate-mongering skinheads feel the full force of the law--and therefore justice

Two young skinheads who plotted to ignite a race war in Southern California will now spend years in federal prison.

Christopher David Fisher, 20, and Carl Daniel Boese, 17, pleaded guilty to conspiracy charges stemming from a federal investigation of their racist and violent activities. U.S. District Judge William Matthew Byrne Jr. refused to coddle them. He sentenced Fisher, a leader of the Fourth Reich Skinheads, to eight years and Boese to nearly five years.

Those appropriate sentences should put others who hate on notice: If they break the law, they will not get off lightly.

The youth of Fisher and Boese cannot excuse what they did with other members of their hate group. They used pipe bombs and Molotov cocktails against homes and synagogues; they plotted to attack the historic First African Methodist Episcopal Church, kill prominent African Americans, murder Jews, blow up Asians, harm Latinos. They served as lookouts for other criminals. They spewed hatred and, worse, they acted on their beliefs.

They were serious and they had the means--guns and explosives--to maim and murder.

Before anyone was killed--and that was their racist group’s avowed aim--a federal investigation into weapons trafficking by white supremacists stopped the plotting. Agents of the FBI, the federal Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco and Firearms and Los Angeles police made arrests in July before Fisher, Boese and others could put more of their murderous plans into action.

“They were sending absolutely the wrong message,” Judge Byrne said. “Hopefully, what occurs in this courtroom sends a different kind of message.”

The prosecutor, Assistant U.S. Atty. Marc R. Greenberg, is satisfied with the sentences. He can also take pride in the unusual counseling that he initiated last month for Fisher, Boese and others associated with the skinhead group. During three days of emotional sessions they met with Holocaust survivors, a black federal judge, Jewish and other minority students, rabbis and the black minister they had plotted to assassinate at First AME--the Rev. Cecil Murray, who put his beliefs into practice when he forgave them. They also toured the Simon Weisenthal Center’s Museum of Tolerance, watched the Holocaust movie “Schindler’s List” and visited the Men’s Central Jail, where inmates warned them to change.

Boese seemed less than guilt-ridden about the consequences of his hatred, but Fisher appeared contrite, tearfully voicing remorse at the sentencing. Regardless of the defendants’ demeanor, their tough sentences will warn others who share their awful beliefs.