UPDATE: 3:00
She was so frightened after reading his letter that she packed her things and fled. That was the tesitmony of Tiese Mitchell on the stand this afternoon.
Mitchell was one of several African-American tenants in a dispute with a white landlord and who were targeted by Bill White's relentless intimidation tactics.
The letter, after a rant about blacks on welfare, stated, “You may get one over on your landlord this time, and you may not. But know that the white community has noticed you, and we know that you are and will never be anything more than a dirty parasite – and that our patience with you and the government that coddles you runs thin.”
Mitchell said that the language and the tone of the letter, as well as the knowledged that White knew where she lived, caused her to leave her home with her two small children and run to a relative.
The letter was addresse to: “Whiny Section 8 Nigger.”
As we await new information from the trial, WSLS has put out this update:
Douglas Hantske, a member of the National Alliance, a neo-Nazi group unfriendly toward Bill White, took the stand for the prosecution this morning. Hantske testified that he had delivered racist fliers in the neighborhood of Leonard Pitts after seeing his address posted on White's website.
Bill White’s trial is underway- three days down and almost three weeks expected to go.
There are still some witnesses we could possibly hear from, including a University of Delaware professor who directed a training program for the school a couple years ago.
According to the indictment, White allegedly told the professor’s secretary he would hunt the professors down and that anyone who views racism the way she does should be shot.
White allegedly claimed the university forced students to think all white people are racist. Then he allegedly posted the professor’s home address online.
Also, there’s a collective group of people from Virginia Beach. About two years ago, they accused their landlord of discrimination and according to the indictment, White allegedly wrote letters back to them standing up for their landlord.
Another run-in with White involved a lawyer from outside the U.S. Three years ago, a Canadian lawyer shut down White’s Canadian-based web site. Since then, the indictment says White wrote an article on overthrow.com, allegedly writing to kill the man.
We’re not sure when we will hear from these possible witnesses over the week. But when everyone has finished testifying, the jury needs to decide if White is guilty of the crimes he’s charged with-not his views.
Apparently, the prosecution is attempting to establish that racists and white supremacists not only read Bill's website, but utilized information posted there, hence furthering the idea that the probability of violence or harm could befall White's victims.
Agent Church also relayed a conversation he had with White before bringing formal charges in which White had tried to convince him that what he wrote was meant to be political satire and nothing more. White claimed he didn't intend for anyone to get hurt and that he was "simply mocking" the people with whom he disagreed on matters of race.
More as the morning break ends.
