FBI Probes White Supremacists' Threats Against Black Columnist

[DeSwiss]

FBI probes white supremacists' threats against black columnist

USAToday
Posted by Mike Carney
03:52 PM/ET, June 20, 2007

Leonard Pitts of The Miami Herald has been receiving threats since a white-supremacist group published his contact information on its website in response to a column that criticized allegations that the media "refuse to report black on white crime while pulling out all the stops when crime is white on black," according to Editor & Publisher.

The group listed Pitts' home address, phone number and date of birth. Pitts is one of the USA's most prominent black journalists. "His wife gets very upset when you call," the website says after naming the acclaimed columnist's wife. Editor & Publisher says Dave Wilson, a managing editor at the Herald, sent the group an e-mail requesting that they remove Pitts' personal information from their website.

In response, the person identified as the site's owner wrote: "We have no intention of removing Mr Pitts' personal information. Frankly, if some loony took the info and killed him, I wouldn't shed a tear. That also goes for your whole news room." The website republished both e-mails, along with a parenthetical comment from the publisher: "Note that I have not encouraged anyone to harass Mr Pitts. Just to contact him and share their thoughts and feelings."

The website includes contact information for the Editor & Publisher reporter, as well as the personal information for a manager at the Knoxville News-Sentinel, which has been covering the incident Pitts mentioned in his controversial column about what happens "when white people put on the victim hat." In a forum associated with the publisher of the website, which we have decided not to identify in this posting, someone suggested they publish the Herald editor's personal information "so that we may explain to him the first amendment." You can read the entire column by Pitts in the http://www.freep.com/apps/pbcs.dll/article?AID=/20070605/OPINION03/706050339/1068/OPINION">Detroit Free Press, a fellow Gannett paper.

http://blogs.usatoday.com/ondeadline/2007/06/report_black_co.html

[w13rd0]

1. The website in question...

...is called Overthrow.com or somesuch, and is run by a "man" named Bill White, who has a colorful and ever-changing history of being two bolts short of a complete case of nuts.

[DeSwiss]

2. Well, with a name like "Overthrow"

...one would hope that the FBI was already watching this guy even before this incident. One would hope....

[jcrew2001]

3. i think you need to look at prison statistics

to determine whether black on white crime is really under-reported. For This particular case the murderers have been caught and are in jail now.

There really is not purpose for further media coverage unless the goal is to incite race riots or genocide.