Three Stabbed at Ku Klux Klan Rally in Southern California
TEHRAN (Tasnim) – Five people were injured at a Ku Klux Klan rally in Southern California on Saturday when protesters attacked members of the white supremacist group, the police said, unleashing chaos on a popular park and leaving three people with stab wounds.
Clashes broke out as soon as members of the Klan arrived at Pearson Park in Anaheim, Calif., on Saturday, said Sgt. Daron Wyatt, a spokesman for the Anaheim Police Department. He said the group had planned to stage an anti-immigration rally with the theme “white lives matter.”
“Immediately as the K.K.K. guys got out of their vehicle they were attacked by the counter-protesters,” he said. “That soon developed into several different fights between the two groups that were spread along the length of a city block.”
A group of about 30 anti-Klan protesters spent part of the morning waiting at the park and were preparing to leave when six Klan supporters arrived, dressed in black and wearing Confederate battle flag patches sewn on their clothes, said Sergeant Wyatt.
Dr. Brian Levin, the director of the Center for the Study of Hate and Extremism at California State University, San Bernardino, said he attended the rally to conduct research. But when the Klansmen arrived shortly after noon, he said, “All hell broke loose.”
“There was a period of time that it was just a mob and these Klansmen and me on the block,” said Professor Levin, who tried to separate the two sides.
He said he saw a protester smash a window and the windshield out of the Klansmen’s S.U.V. while another stood nearby with a metal pipe.
“The crowd was jostling and yelling and cursing,” he said.
“A substantial minority of this crowd were out for blood.”
Sergeant Wyatt said Klansmen stabbed three protesters, including one who was stabbed with “the decorative end of a flagpole” and rushed to a nearby hospital in critical condition. The banner attached to the pole may have been a Confederate battle flag, he said, the New York Times reported.
A police officer found a knife-wielding member of the Klan standing over a bleeding protester who he claimed to have stabbed in self-defense, Sergeant Wyatt said.
Another stabbing victim was found in a car on the east side of the park.
Six people who attended the rally to support the Klan were arrested in connection with the stabbings, the police said. Seven people were arrested and accused of stomping on Klan members they had knocked to the ground, including three people who were detained as they attempted to flee from police officers.
