Neo-Nazi Father Allegedly Killed by Own 10-Year-Old Son
Jeff Hall bragged about teaching his son how to shoot.
May 11, 2011 -- Jeff Hall, the head of the Southern California chapter of the National Socialist Movement, the largest neo-Nazi group that remains in this country, was an outspoken supporter of a White society.
Two Sundays ago, he was allegedly silenced by his own son.
Authorities believe, his son, just 10 years old, stood at the bottom of the living room stairs and shot his father as he lay on the couch.
Hall often armed himself with guns and night-vision goggles to patrol the Mexican border, and even bragged about how he was teaching his son to shoot.
"Whites have rights too. Whites have a voice too," was one of his trademark messages during protests. "And we want our voices to be heard."
Jesse McKinley, San Francisco bureau chief for The New York Times, had been documenting Hall's activism for months and said the 10-year-old boy showed no outward anger and appeared to love his father. The boy's name is being withheld because he is a minor.
On the day before his death, McKinley reported, Hall held a white supremacist meeting at his house. The boy and his four younger sisters were right in the middle of it. During the meeting the boy showed McKinley a new, prized possession, a yellow belt with a special symbol.
"The insignia on the belt is actually something that's well-known amongst groups that follow hate groups," said McKinley. "It's known as a death head. It's a symbol that was drawn from ... the Nazi SS and it essentially symbolizes kind of loyalty to a white supremacist movement. In this case it was, of course, emblazoned on a children's belt, which is a little bit surreal."
Mark Potok, director of the Intelligence Project at Southern Poverty Law Center, says that across the white supremacist movement there are "an awful lot of dysfunctional families."
"These ideas, the rage that is expressed by the parents in a family like this toward people who are not even personally known to the children is difficult to process for the kids," said Potok. "I think it's very clear that the young children in this family were being taught not only the belief systems ... but in fact about weaponry as well. And I think that that happens with some frequency in this world."
Hall's followers would rally and often rumble, fighting with those who opposed their views. During his most recent protest two months ago he told a reporter, "I identify with my culture, I'm proud to be white. You know, you see T-shirts, 'brown pride, Hispanic pride, black pride,' but if you see a white man wearing a white pride T-shirt then it's offensive."
Hall was part of a larger group, the National Socialist Movement, which has hundreds of members across 32 states. Some have produced memorial videos for Hall.
Hall predicted to McKinley his activism would lead to his death. He had a surveillance camera installed to look out for strangers or outsiders who might go after him. In the end, police believe his 10-year-old boy would prove his father wrong.
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