On Monday, August 17, Glenn Miller will finally go to trial for murder.
Miller joined the white supremacist movement in 1973. He led a Carolina Klan group and then the White Patriot Party in North Carolina in the 1980s. He was accused, but never charged, of receiving hundreds of thousands of dollars from a large band of Aryan bank car robbers, declaring war against the so-called Zionist Occupied Government and then, after capture, testifying against his Aryan brethren in 1988. (See timeline). After failing to find much of an organized following in Southwest Missouri, he drove to the Kansas City area on April 13, 2014, and opened fire at two different Jewish institutions in Kansas, killing three non-Jews.
The victims, William Corporon, 69, Terri LaManno, 53, and Reat Underwood, 14, should live on in our blessed remembrance.
While stymied in jail, Miller confessed to the intrepid Kansas City Star reporter Judy Thomas. He has since pleaded guilty to the charges, and now claims he wants to act as his own attorney. At the trial this week we should expect little new information about the criminal charges. It is literally open and shut. We should expect, however, multiple attempts by Miller to use the court proceedings to launch verbal invective at Jews, individually and collectively. The prosecution and the judge should use the regular legal procedures to cut Miller short. The week may end with Miller in chains outside the courtroom, while his appointed legal team finishes up the case.
The lone legal question will be: will the jury sentence the clearly unremorseful Miller to death. And if he is sentenced to death, will the aging Miller live long enough to face his own execution.
Most Kansas City area residents are tired of Glenn Miller and his anti-Semitism, racism, and bigoted violence. They will soon be rid of him for good. Unfortunately, the problems of anti-Semitism, racism, and anti-gay violence that accompany the white nationalist movement will not be gone. Neither will its violence, as the multiple murders in the Charleston, South Carolina show. Neither will racist movements such as the Tea Party disappear overnight. As a result, our collective resolve to face these multiple evils should not be lessened.
