3 Florida prison guards linked to KKK are charged with plotting to kill inmate
Three current and former prison guards in Florida with ties to the Ku Klux Klan were charged with plotting to kill an African-American inmate.
The Orlando Sentinel reported Thursday that Thomas Jordan Driver, David Elliot Moran and Charles Thomas Newcomb have been arrested and charged with conspiracy to commit murder. Until yesterday, Driver and Moran had been working at the Department of Corrections Reception and Medical Center in rural north Florida. Newcomb had been fired in 2013.
According to the Sentinel, the three men are all members of the Traditionalist American Knights of the Ku Klux Klan. The Sentinel reported that the plot came about after Driver got into a fight with the inmate in question at a corrections facility in northern Florida. The inmate, who is HIV-positive and suffering from hepatitis, bit Driver during the altercation. The Sentinel reported that Driver, Moran and Newcomb decided to kill the inmate in retaliation and discussed their plans while attending Klan meetings. The Federal Bureau of Investigation learned of the plot through a confidential informant inside the group. According to the Sentinel, the three men hired the informant to carry out the murder once the inmate was released, and the informant staged the hit to make the three think it was successful.
“We are moving swiftly to terminate the employees arrested today and working closely with Office of the Attorney General to assist in their prosecution,” Department of Corrections Secretary Julie Jones said in a written statement. “Our department has zero tolerance for racism or prejudice of any kind. The actions of these individuals are unacceptable and do not, in any way, represent the thousands of good, hardworking honorable correctional officers employed at the Department of Corrections.”
According to the Sentinel, Thursday’s arrest is the latest in a line of troubling incidents inside the Florida state corrections system. Last year, the state fired 50 employees over allegations that they beat inmates. There were also two high-profile inmate deaths: One inmate was reported gassed while in confinement and the other died of wounds suffered while taking a shower in scalding hot water.
Meanwhile, the leader of the KKK group the three men are allegedly members of would not confirm or deny their membership. “We at the TAK do not in any way condone, tolerate, or support any type of illegal activity in our organization and because of this we would stand by any of our members pending a decision by a court of law, not a decision of the court of media or public opinion,” KKK imperial wizard Frank Ancona said in a statement.