FULLERTON : Distributors of Hate Literature Sought

Police are searching for members of one or more white-supremacist groups who they believe are responsible for distributing racist hate literature in two Fullerton neighborhoods, officials said Tuesday.

The literature--which residents said included a white supremacist newspaper and flyers smearing blacks and Jews--was left at the doorsteps and in the mailboxes of several homeowners in the 600 block of West Southgate Avenue and at three businesses in the 100 block of West Orangethorpe Avenue before dawn Jan. 20, Fullerton Police Sgt. Joe Klein said.

Police have no witnesses or suspects, but investigators are trying to track the source of the literature through four post office boxes printed on the flyers, Klein said. Two of the addresses, one for an organization calling itself White Aryan Resistance and another for the so-called Aryan Women’s League, are in San Francisco.

The flyer for the Aryan Women’s League also lists a San Francisco phone number. Calls are answered by a tape machine that includes a 2 1/2-minute hate message against minorities and the federal government.

The leaflets also included literature from a group calling itself the Aryan White Separatists, which lists a post office box in Brea, and for Western Hammer Skinheads, which has an address in Claremont. At least one of the flyers attacked the Jan. 15 holiday honoring the birthday of Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr., who was depicted with a target on his forehead.

The distribution of the literature appeared to be the work of neo-Nazi skinheads, Klein said, noting that swastikas were painted on several street and stop signs in the area. If caught, the distributors of the leaflets could be charged with civil rights violations, Klein said.

Klein and residents of West Southgate Avenue said that the block on which the literature was distributed is in an integrated neighborhood and that no particular family was targeted. One 10-year resident who asked not to be named said it appeared that the block was randomly chosen in a recruitment drive.

“They probably wanted us to join them,” the homeowner said, adding that it was the first time since he’s lived on the block that racist literature was distributed.

“I was kind of shocked,” said another resident who also asked to remain anonymous. “This is the first time something like that has gone around in this neighborhood. I was kind of upset.”

Elizabeth Gail, regional director of the Orange County office of the Anti-Defamation League of B’nai B’rith, said the leaflets are the first in recent memory in Fullerton and that the ADL will continue to monitor white supremacist activities there.