If there are any human rights defenders in a position to help protest Butler,
Bertolloni, Story, please get through somehow to somebody. Recently our community
started a chapter of Anti-Racist Action here in Moscow, ID, the phone number
(208) 882-9755 and email <[EMAIL PROTECTED]> both are shared with local
environmental groups. The Southern Poverty Law Center now knows what's going on
with these two fanatics added to Butler's establishment and locals are gearing up
to face this onslaught of racism in our backyard. The biggest problem here is
that local authorities have gone out of their way to make sure Butler's rights
aren't trampled on. An even bigger problem is Bob Barr in congress, and KKK man
Duke vying for Livingston's seat. I'll look for other local Task Force email
addresses in the area this week if anyone is interested. thanks/donna
Sunday, December 20, 1998
Lewiston Morning Tribune
White supremacy has new financing source; Sandpoint
men are the bucks behind recent mailing of racist,
anti-Semitic posters
ASSOCIATED PRESS
SANDPOINT -- Two former California businessmen are pouring cash into the
relatively low-budget white supremacist movement, allowing it to
reach out to thousands of households in northern Idaho.
Human-rights activists are alarmed at the infusion of money into the movement and
say they are scrambling to fight back.
Vincent Bertollini and Carl Story of Sandpoint, who grew wealthy in California's
computer industry, financed the mailing of racist and
anti-Semitic posters and videos to some 3,000 homes in September. Bertollini and
Story have adamantly refused interviews.
"Our message speaks for itself," Bertollini wrote in an e-mail response to an
interview request. "We do not grant interviews."
Their message is a vitriolic stew of quasi-biblical prose that attacks Jews and
contends that, "Jesus said they were murderers and liars from the
beginning."
According to the poster sent by the pair, nonwhites are the product of sexual
relations between Eve and Satan, which begat Cain, "a hybrid,
mongrel, bastard and soul-less child."
Calling themselves The 11th Hour Remnant Messenger, the two men paid to create
and mail the 6-foot-long, glossy-paper poster with colorful
artwork that purports to show "The Adamic Race Pure Blood Seedline."
It is the quality of the posters, as much as the message, that has raised alarm
from human rights groups. The posters cost a reported $9.45 each to
print and mail.
"The difference is they've got money," said Bill Wassmuth, director of the
Northwest Coalition Against Malicious Harassment. "That enables
them to extend their message on a broader range."
Northern Idaho has long been home to white supremacist groups, including the
Aryan Nations of Hayden. The region was also home to Randy
Weaver, and the Militia of Montana is based just a few miles away in Noxon, Mont.
The Southern Poverty Law Center of Montgomery, Ala., which monitors hate groups
across the country, was caught by surprise by the
mailings, said researcher Mark Potok. They had never heard of the two men.
"The problem of the white supremacist movement for decades has been financing,"
Potok said. It took Oklahoma City bomber Timothy McVeigh
half a year to raise the $10,000 to buy the materials for that bomb.
The emergence of Bertollini and Story, and their money, is "terribly important,"
Potok said.
Despite refusing to speak to the press, the two men have hardly kept a low
profile in this lakeside tourist town of 5,200 people.
They occupy large homes in posh neighborhoods, and are known for leaving $100
tips to waitresses. Bertollini recently served a 10-day jail
sentence for drunken driving.
Bertollini has performed at least one wedding in Bonner County as a lay minister
for the Remnant Messenger, public records show.
Bertollini also was a surprise visitor at a recent human rights rally in
Sandpoint, which was called to discuss the mailings. He was the only
person in the crowd wearing a suit and tie, several people noted.
"Is there anything in our literature that says anything about hate?" Bertollini
told the crowd, according to The Spokesman-Review newspaper of
Spokane. "No. It just says we white people are different."
"Our intent is to bring truth to a world that believes a lie. It's a burden, a
burden on my heart, and it's Carl Story's burden, too," said Bertollini,
who arrived with Aryan Nations founder Richard Butler.
Bertollini told the newspaper that the Remnant Messenger had spent $1.5 million
in the past eight years on Christian Identity causes.
Christian Identity is a white supremacist religion that holds that white people
are the true Israelites, descendants of Abel. Christian Identity
adherents believe nonwhites and Jews are inferior to whites.
The Remnant Messenger also paid for the recent production and mailing of a video
to Sandpoint homes showing Butler explaining his views.
Butler called Bertollini and Story "Christian gentlemen" he has known for several
years.
"I think they're doing good," Butler said.
The Aryan Nations handed out copies of the poster during their parade last summer
through downtown Coeur d'Alene. Thousands of copies
were also mailed to people on the Aryan Nations' mailing list.
Bertollini, 59, and Story, 65, have lived quietly in the Sandpoint area for
several years.
"I don't know why they're starting to become more vocal," said Gretchen
Albrecht-Hellar, leader of the Bonner County Human Rights Task
Force.
The task force, which charges just $1 for lifetime dues, cannot compete with the
men's money, she said.
The Rev. Paul Graves, a Sandpoint city councilman, is organizing a January
protest by area ministers.
"They're a flat-out distortion of scriptural record," Graves said of the two men.
"They totally distort Christianity."
The city council has also condemned the mailings, he said.
Story and Bertollini have been friends for 30 years, and formed The 11th Hour
Remnant Messenger in 1990 when they still lived in the San
Francisco Bay Area, The Spokesman-Review reported.
During their business careers, the two men used their engineering and marketing
skills to build two computer chip companies into
multimillion-dollar concerns, the newspaper said.
Story and a business partner were convicted in 1979 of shipping $299,970 worth of
computer chip-handling equipment to the Soviet Union.
Authorities believe the gear was used to develop Soviet missile-guidance systems
during the Cold War.
In a plea bargain, Story avoided federal prison but paid a $25,000 fine and was
placed on three years' probation, court records show.
The pair left California in 1995 and decided to move to northern Idaho after
spending six months touring the United States, the newspaper said.
Albrecht-Hellar worries that the concentration of white supremacists is serving
as a magnet for others of like minds.
Bertollini told the newspaper that nonwhites "have a special place on this
planet." But "they don't have to deal with the law and redemption and
the power of Jesus Christ."
"We don't hate them. God, we're blessed that they're here. They don't have to
deal with what we have to deal with. They don't have the
responsibility that we have."
White people, he said, "are caretakers of the world."
"Don't you see that? Isn't that simple? Isn't it obvious?" he told the newspaper.
Bertollini said there's more to come.
"I'm on a mission from God, and it will not end until my last breath is gone."
