Anti-Klan rally gets fiery

As a car drove by the Florida Capitol playing "Dixie," a brief pause fell over a group of almost 100 activists rallying against recent Ku Klux Klan activity in North Florida.

They would resume their outcry, burning a Confederate flag on the concrete steps of the Old Capitol just moments later.

The rally came in response to leafleting of Leon and Jefferson county neighborhoods with Traditionalist American Knights of the Ku Klux Klan recruiting fliers last month and the arrest last week of two Department of Corrections employees and one former employee linked to the group in a plot to murder a black former inmate.

"This is a racist institution that we have to stand against. We have to fight it," said Nicky Nora, president of the Students for a Democratic Society, which led the march. "We have to tell the Klan that we want them out of our communities, out of our town, out of our public offices."

Brandishing signs reading "Amerikkka the ugly" and "You are not a patriot. You are a terrorist," the crowd drew attention to America's oldest hate group, their connection to some law enforcement agencies in Florida and their recent attempts to make deeper inroads in the Panhandle.

"People ask how can you connect the KKK to police?" said Florida State University student Regina Joseph. "And then you see what happened in the Department of Corrections"

DOC Secretary Julie Jones told a Senate committee this week she knows of no other KKK activity within the department, but sniffing out those who may be involved in extremist groups is hard because the agency is not allowed to ask job applicants about their political affiliations.

Last July, a deputy chief in the Fruitland Park Police Department, about 40 miles north of Orlando, resigned and an officer was fired when the FBI reported the two had KKK ties. Another officer resigned there in 2009 when photos of him surfaced in the KKK's trademark white robe and pointed hood.

Last month, four Fort Lauderdale police officers were fired after they produced a movie trailer called "The Hoods" which depicted hooded KKK members and scenes of racial violence. Also included in the department's internal investigation was a series of text messages between the fired officers filled with racial slurs, including some about their coworkers.

While national experts say the group has weakened from its once prominent stature of millions of members in the 1920s, local citizens were concerned to see recruiting efforts literally coming to their doorstep.

Those attempts are indicative of KKK supporters in the area, experts say, but are not likely linked to an active group in the Tallahassee area. Recruiting fliers can be printed from the group's website.

"A group and an ideology of white supremacy that we thought we had defeated in the 60s is back in the gates of the people," said SDS member Shivaani Ehsan. "They are back in our neighborhoods, and they are back to spread their hate."

Last year, the letters "KKK" were spray painted on three predominantly black churches in Wakulla County plunging the rural area into a discussion about racism in the Panhandle and unity among its citizens.

The TAKKK's national leader, Imperial Wizard Frank Ancona told the Tallahassee Democrat the fliers were a targeted recruitment effort across the Panhandle, but the group is not focused on the hate that once marked the group's history.

Tallahassee Police and the Leon County Sheriff's Office did not investigate the distribution of the fliers in March because the KKK had not violated any laws, despite their upsetting nature.

Some are not as lenient with the message they send.

"I know some people say the KKK has whatever free speech rights. (Expletive) that," said SDS leader Zachary Schultz. "They should not be allowed to spread their hate and racist propaganda in our communities, in our cities, and we will stop them."