The Imperial Wizard of the United Northern and Southern Knights of the Ku Klux Klan is guarded about discussing his organization’s membership.

But this much Cole Thornton openly shares: Florida cops belong to his Klan group because he said they like its rigid standards and its adherence to a strict moral code.

“They [police officers] like the fact that we support law enforcement,” said Thornton, who is based in the Gulf Coast community of Englewood. “These guys are out there putting their lives on the line, and we back them.”

He would not name those law-enforcement officers, but Thornton said he thinks that being a member of a “traditional Klan” group “makes them a better cop.”

Thornton’s comments come in the wake of the firing of an Alachua County corrections officer who acknowledged he was a member of Thornton’s Klan organization. Wayne Kerschner was fired Dec.29.

A year ago, the Fruitland Park Police Department investigated one of its officers who was linked to Klan groups. James Elkins denied he was associated with a Klan chapter and resigned.

Florida ranks third nationally, behind California and Texas, in the overall number of identified hate groups, according to the Southern Poverty Law Center, an Alabama-based group that provides tolerance-education programs, offers legal representation against white supremacists and tracks hate groups. The center defines a hate group as one that states other groups or people are somehow lesser or inferior.

Mark Potok, director of the center’s Intelligence Project, which investigates such groups, said membership in organizations such as Thornton’s have swelled in recent years.

However, Potok has found no evidence that Klan membership by police officers in Florida — or any other state — is on the uptick. He knew of one other case, in Nebraska, of an officer being removed because of his Klan affiliation.

“I doubt very much whether he [Thornton] has many police officers at all in his organization,” Potok said. “I’ve not seen anything to suggest any significant influx of law enforcement into the Klan. … There is an absolutely clear conflict between being a law-enforcement officer and a member of the Klan.”

Central Florida law-enforcement agencies would not speculate about their officers belonging to the KKK.

“I don’t have any knowledge one way or another,” Volusia County Sheriff’s Office spokesman Gary Davidson said. “Where there are two, there may be more, but I have no specific knowledge to confirm or refute what they’re saying.”

But Lt. Stephen Maynard of the Alachua Sheriff’s Office said: “I have no reason to doubt his [Thornton's] claims.”

Maynard said it’s likely other law enforcement-officers belong to secretive groups such as the Klan — as do people working for private businesses and perhaps even the media. The difference, he said, is that no organizations outside law enforcement endure the level of scrutiny and “self-policing” that can identify such group membership.

“While we’re certainly not proud that we had this individual working for us … we are glad this investigation did reveal this and we could remedy the problem by terminating him,” he said.

Thornton praised Kerschner this week and said he would support him if Kerschner challenged the firing.

“He’s one of the finest officers I have,” he said. “If he was violating what it takes to be a [law enforcement] officer, he would have violated what it takes to be a Klansman, and we would have booted him out. We have pretty high standards, as do they.”

Thornton insisted his Klan organization is not a hate or terrorist group, and he said it opposes violence by its members. “You’re not going to do this movement one bit of good sitting in a jail cell,” he said.

He said his group’s membership has grown because of issues such as the government’s handling of illegal immigration and school prayer and a desire to preserve “white heritage.”

The United Northern and Southern Knights of the Ku Klux Klan is listed as one of 56 Florida “hate groups” identified by the law center.

>> Source Article

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