Police investigating fliers linked to neo-Nazi group found in Bradenton neighborhood
Bradenton police are investigating after fliers weighed down with rocks and connected to a neo-Nazi group were thrown around the Village of the Arts last weekend.
Up and down the Village of the Arts south of downtown Bradenton, Ziploc bags appeared containing a flier filled with white supremacy rhetoric that began, “How dare anyone try to shame me for my white privilege?” The flier goes on to justify “white privilege” and to say others should earn their own privilege.
The racist rant ends with a web address, which does not exist but identifies a racist motorcycle club, Endangered Souls, or Crew 519.
Endangered Souls is labeled as a neo-Nazi hate group that is active statewide in Florida, according to the Southern Poverty Law Center.
Police were first called out to the Village at about 11:30 p.m. Friday, according to incident reports. Two more residents or business owners reported finding the same bags on their property.
Mark Burrows didn’t see the fliers until a customer walking up to his Art Junkies gallery stepped on it and told him. When he went out to take a look he found a second one near the path and then found three more on the other side of his property, which is on the northwest corner of 12th Street West and 12th Avenue West.
“We had them and then we looked down the road and they were up and down the street. They peppered this road,” Burrows said.
To him, it was the work of a hate group.
“There’s enough of them. It’s just gotten to a point of, who are you going to be afraid of and what’s the reasoning behind it,” Burrows said. “This just looked like another little small group wanting to get publicity.”
According to the Southern Poverty Law Center, Endangered Souls and eight other racist groups joined together in 2015 to form the coalition, United Aryan Front, or UAF.
Police spokesman Capt. Brian Thiers says they are taking the incident very seriously. The Ziploc bags have been processed for fingerprints but no additional details have been released about the investigation.
Dawn Collins also found one in her driveway at The Village Mystic, 1017 12th Ave. W.
“I don’t know what to think about it,” Collins said. “I think there are certain groups of people that always try to get reaction, one way or another.”
Many artists and business owners work and live in the Village of Arts, which continues to grow and flourish.
“When something like that happens, we do kind of get on guard,” Collins said. “We’d hate to think that it was anybody in our community being vindictive or maliciously doing something like this.”
Another local artist who works and lives in the Village, but asked not to be named, said it didn’t bother her. She said those responsible had freedom of speech, even if she didn’t agree with what they had to say.
“I choose to focus on positivity and love,” she said. “I don’t feel attacked.”
As for the copy of the flier she found, she choose to recycle it, using it as part of an art piece she is currently working on.
Burrows urged others not to be scared by the hateful tactics.
“Take the fear away and it takes their power away,” Burrow said.
To those responsible, Burrows had a message: “Not in my neighborhood. I don’t allow it. I don’t want it. Not here. This is way too diverse (a neighborhood) and we have such a great community that we don’t need it here.”
