“I’m trying to give human voice to people that most of society sees as monsters,” said Julie Platner, a 28-year-old photojournalist and video journalist in Brooklyn.

“I’m interested in truth at the end of the day.”

This is a sound credo for anyone who sets out to document what is usually dismissed as the lunatic fringe. In the case of Jeff Hall, who led a Southern California chapter of the neo-Nazi National Socialist Movement, the truth was complex and the circumstances unexpectedly tragic — “really shocking,” to use Ms. Platner’s words.

Mr. Hall, 32, was shot and killed at his home in Riverside, Calif., on May 1. The police have charged his 10-year-old son with the killing. In “Neo-Nazi Father Is Killed; Son, 10, Steeped in Beliefs, Is Accused,” Jesse McKinley describes the National Socialist Movement, Mr. Hall’s role in it and his surprising death.

Besides being a rising figure in the National Socialist Movement, Mr. Hall had also been Ms. Platner’s principal contact with the group, which she has chronicled for more than a year. “He was the one who was most open to me coming,” she said in a telephone interview on Tuesday. He was helpful in making introductions and would vouch for Ms. Platner when others objected to her presence. “We talked a lot,” she said. Of Mr. Hall and his wife, Krista, she said, “I do believe in most ways they were good parents, despite the indoctrination of their children.”

Ms. Platner was raised in Los Angeles. She graduated from Northeastern University and studied at the International Center of Photography. She worked in film production, including “Flight of the Conchords” on HBO. As a freelance photographer, she covered the earthquake in Haiti for The Wall Street Journal.

While covering the 2008 presidential campaign, Ms. Platner found herself growing interested in the large number of disaffected white people whom she encountered. “I think that since Obama was elected president, it’s a little more acceptable to be outwardly racist,” she said. “To explore that, I felt compelled to explore the extreme version of the story in a human way. I was interested in who they were and what they did. I think that they are pushed to the edge; almost like a white gang type of thing. They build a community. A lot of them are marginalized by society. Many are working-class people who have been hurt by the economic downturn.”

It took about six months, Ms. Platner said, to persuade anyone in the neo-Nazi movement to let her photograph the group. About 10 months into her self-assigned project, she interested The New York Times in the topic, having already developed numerous contacts with the National Socialist Movement.

When she left Mr. Hall’s home on April 30, Ms. Platner still had questions to ask him about his life and his family. Now, there will be no chance of an answer.