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Of those interviewed, 34 agreed that Hale-Cusanelli had “extremist or radical views regarding the Jewish people, minorities and women”. A fellow entrepreneur said he discusses his aversion to Jews every day. A supervisor told investigators she had to reprimand him for sporting a “Hitler” mustache (images which prosecutors were taken from Hale-Cusanelli’s phone).
“A master of the navy said the defendant constantly spoke of the Jewish people and remembered the defendant saying ‘Hitler should have finished the job’,” according to the summary of the prosecutors’ report.
The recently released interview results are the latest evidence that the January 6 insurgency, when a crowd of thousands of Donald Trump supporters stormed the Capitol to disrupt the certification of the 2020 election results, included a contingent of white supremacists – in addition to an extremist militia. and paramilitary groups who used crowd cover to break through the Capitol.
Hale-Cusanelli’s case gained attention because of his role in the Army Reserves and active employment in a military installation. The new evidence highlights a challenge that policymakers have begun to face on Capitol Hill and through military leaders: how to combat extremist ideologies among the military. Many former soldiers and police were among the rioters.
Prosecutors disclosed the results of the NCIS investigation in part to refute a letter of support from one of Hale-Cusanelli’s supervisors to NWS Earle, Sgt. John Getz, submitted by defense attorneys to support Hale-Cusanelli’s bail. In a two-page letter, Getz told the court he was “appalled at how [Hale-Cusanelli] was slandered in the press as a “white supremacist”. “
“I never knew him like that. I know our colleagues would agree, “wrote Getz, adding:” I have never seen Mr. Hale treat any of his African American colleagues differently than anyone else, and I have heard no jokes or unpleasant language. come out of his mouth. . “
But prosecutors say Getz’s letter contradicts his own statements to NCIS investigators about Hale-Cusanelli’s conduct. Getz told NCIS that Hale-Cusanelli “would make racial jokes and not be silent about it.” He said he knew Hale-Cusanelli was a Nazi sympathizer and Holocaust denier, but that “nothing in Hale-Cusanelli’s statements seemed dangerous.”
Getz also recalled that Hale-Cusanelli “would walk up to new people and ask, ‘You’re not Jewish, are you? “”
“He described Hale-Cussnelli’s behavior as ‘joking but not’,” according to the summary of the report.
Due to the contradictions – and the fact that the letter of support was neither dated nor signed – NCIS investigators visited Getz on March 9, prosecutors revealed. In an interview, he admitted to writing the letter and that it contradicted his statements to NCIS in January.
“Sergeant Getz said he did not feel obligated to include his observations about the defendant’s conduct, as reported to NCIS, in his letter to the court,” prosecutors said. “Sergeant Getz explained that he wanted to ‘speak positively’ about the defendant for the bail hearing, and because he was not personally offended by the defendant’s conduct.
Hale-Cusanelli’s lawyer Jonathan Zucker, arguing for his bail earlier this month, said Hale-Cusanelli was not charged with committing violence on January 6, has joined no anti-government group and is accused of little more than going into the building and verbally harassing a Capitol policeman who used pepper spray on the crowd.
Zucker argued that the Hale-Cusaneli government’s characterization of a white supremacist and Nazi sympathizer was incorrect.
“In fact, during an interview with Mr. Hale-Cusanelli by FBI agents, he denied this by stating that” he is not a Nazi … “and” he is not a white nationalist or a white supremacist, “” Zucker said, citing the summary of Hale-Cusanelli’s interview with the FBI in February. “There is no evidence that Mr. Hale-Cusanelli is a member of any white supremacist organization.
He also called Hale-Cusanelli’s YouTube channel “controversial,” but mostly about local New Jersey politics. And he said the government’s discovery of Hitler’s “Mein Kampf” and “The Turner Diaries” at Hale-Cusanelli “did not mention that there were hundreds of other books in Mr. Hale’s collection. -Cusanelli. “
Prosecutors refuted the claims, revealing that Hale-Cusanelli’s phone was filled with anti-Semitic and racist content. And they argue that his views were the driving force behind a “fantasy of participating in another civil war.” His resignation from the military and his exclusion from work at NWS Earle because of his alleged actions would give him more time to pursue those goals if he was released pending trial, prosecutors said.
“If nothing else,” wrote Assistant U.S. Attorney James Nelson, “the events of January 6, 2021 have revealed the size and determination of right-wing fringe groups in the United States, as well as their willingness to stand up to them. themselves and others in danger. their political ideology.
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