White racist [Robert Gene Baker III] hunted after sniper attacks [in Maryland]

UK Independent ^ | 6 OCT. 2002 | Andrew Gumbel

[flamefront]

Police across three US states were searching yesterday for a 33-year-old whitesupremacist from North Carolina who they believe may be linked to the shocking series of random killings that have terrorised the Washington area over the past few days.

According to a bulletin from the North Carolina office of the Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco and Firearms, a man named Robert Gene Baker III was believed to be around the American capital armed with a handgun and a high-powered rifle, and should be considered extremely dangerous. The ATF said he was driving a white GMC truck with Maryland registration plates and heading south towards North Carolina.

That description dovetailed almost exactly with clues picked up by local police forces in Montgomery County, Maryland – where five of the seven shootings took place – and in the District of Columbia.

One of the very few eyewitnesses to emerge so far said he saw two men in a white truck speeding away from one of the crime scenes, and Charles Moose, the police chief in Montgomery County, has said he is working on the assumption that there is a driver as well as a marksman. Ballistics evidence, meanwhile, has shown that the perpetrators used high-intensity bullets of the sort used by hunters and soldiers – and which may be compatible with the weapon ascribed to Baker by the ATF.

Baker was described as a drug user affiliated with various militia and white supremacist groups. The agency said he was 5 ft 9in, had brown eyes and brown hair and sported tattoos on his back and both arms.

Police have mounted an intensive manhunt across the eastern seaboard but without much hard evidence to go on – even the white truck is not much of a clue, given that there are hundreds of thousands of them on American roads.

Six people have been killed and one other badly injured since Wednesday night, in what police officials have described as almost ghost-like sniper attacks.

The perpetrators appear to have chosen their targets without discrimination, picking on people as they went about their daily business. In each case, they fired from a discreet distance where they could not immediately be spotted, then vanished before anyone could pick up on their trail.

The latest attack, on Friday afternoon, took place outside a crafts store in Fredericksburg, Virginia, around 50 miles south of Washington – a location consistent with the ATF tip that Baker was heading south through Virginia to North Carolina. The victim of the Fredericksburg attack was loading her car with her purchases when she was shot in the back. Her condition was not immediately made known.

The investigation is in its very early stages and police have ruled nothing out. Baker has not been formally named as a suspect, and the authorities have no idea who the second man indicated by Chief Moose might be. Ballistics tests have linked only four of the seven shootings. The bullets from the Fredericksburg attack were still being analysed yesterday, while in the two other cases the ammunition had degraded too far to be identifiable.

Everyone is working on the assumption, however, that all seven attacks are the work of the same criminal or criminals. Chief Moose said it would be "very strange" if the unidentified bullets did not match. Speaking to reporters, he said the investigation was "one of the most complex cases I've been involved with".

"It could be military, it could be a hunter, it could be someone... who has an interest in weapons," he said, and appealed directly to the perpetrators: "Whoever is involved in this madness, rethink what you're doing. Turn yourself in. Surrender to law enforcement." Gunman kills Arab youth in France

Police in northern France were yesterday hunting a gunman who shot dead a 17-year-old of North African origin and wounded three others in two apparently racist attacks in Dunkirk.

The man, wearing sunglasses and a baseball cap, fired one rifle shot from behind the wheel of a Nissan 4x4 through a cafe window on Friday night. He then shot at customers who ran out in panic, police said yesterday. Two of the wounded were of North African origin.

An hour later, he fired at a group of teenagers at another cafe, killing Mohamed Maghara, a youth of Moroccan descent. Daniel Ferey, deputy prefect in Dunkirk, called the shootings "premeditated and racist". About 200 police were searching for the gunman, believed to be in his 40s.

"We have no clues about him and he was not identified," Mr Ferey said. "The licence plates were covered. He was wearing a hunting jacket or a military outfit."

About half the residents of Grande-Synthe, the Dunkirk suburb where the youth was killed, are of North African Arab origin. Yesterday 300 people marched through the area in protest at the attacks.

[IsItTimeYet]

Who, the media? They don't know a rifle from a shotgun.... Their feet haven't left pavement since youth camp. They have never been in the same room as a gun.

Yes, the media. That same entity with ready access to a vast store of information and a hundred-thousand rollodexes overflowing with experts on every subject and in any language.

Ignorance in the face of readily available knowledge is not ignorance at all, but negligance. and in their case, this willfull disregard for accuracy and their penchant for the dramatic lie furthers their ideology. Exposing them to the facts won't cause them to change the way they spin these stories. They aren't in front of the masses to spread truth, they are there to spread their favorite lies.

[IsItTimeYet]

I know it is frustrating, but it is always about winning votes. Either we do, or they do.

Who elected Peter Jennings and Dan Blather? It's not about votes when your dealing with entities that are not exposed to elections.

[Spirited]

"Are the FIB trying to bring back Project Megiddo?"

I don't know, but in view of the "one shot pp" someone ought to remind them that there is a person of whom they were apparently proud for doing the one-shot-take out.
Lon Horiuchi. I guess they should check to see where he is/has been. He may feel he is still under the same orders.

[HairOfTheDog]

Look, I am on your side.... I acknowledge that the media, and much of the public for that matter, don't know and don't care about the distinctions between an M-16 and a deer rifle. To them, they are essentially the same thing. Does that matter? If it does, what do we do? If it doesn't, why do we care?

Acknowledging the problem is halfway to solving it.... but only halfway. I suggest we start polishing our message and put it everyone who will listen... I am working on my coworkers at the moment... Two liberal gun control supporters are going shooting with me in a couple weeks. I bet they don't stay gun-control supporters, I bet I move them a little towards our side. That is what I meant by winning votes.

[IsItTimeYet]

I know, and as I said previously, your sentiment and your intentions are not at issue. I agree with your approach, it just doesn't work, at least not from my experiances.

I'm just flinching at the memories of my experiances wasting reasoned discourse on people who are incapable of anything other than an emotional response (i.e. liberals).

These folks are not responsive to common sense arguments. They have their hearts set on their delusions and they are not about to let their head get in the way and compromise things. Some of the liberals I've worked with in the past actually said they were "physically menaced" at the mere mention of an afternoon at the shooting range. Of course, I live in a very liberal city so my experiences may not be applicable to the libs you're courting, but across the board, these people don't think about issues like guns, they feel and they react to those feelings without thinking. That's the heart of the problem. Their feelings (mostly an irrational fear with a dash of pious contempt) are manufactured and cultivated by the kind of drivel I'm attacking on this thread.

I just want to be clear, I'm not attacking you or your ideas, I'm attempting to offer my experiances and observations as balance to your well intended, but ultimately fruitless approach. But maybe you are better able to "sell" the right point of view than I was. I am the eeeevvvvviiilll white male after all, so my opinions on guns and their benefits are typically greeted with suspicion, fear or a contemptous glare.

[IsItTimeYet]

maybe this guy IS Lon Hor! He developed a taste for shooting innocent women and children and now he's on the hunt for more!!!

I like it. I think they'll settle on this one as the most likely profile...(smirk)

[HairOfTheDog]

I live in Washington State, not five miles from arguably the most liberal college this side of Berkely.

I have had it work... so many times. I do this alot. Of course they flinch. And maybe it is my softer more emotional nature as a chick that makes it work. For one, I don't believe they are irrational or evil, so I don't have to hide my contempt for them when I talk, the way you do! *joke*

They are everyone I grew up with (this is a liberal town) if I held them in contempt I would be a lonely person indeed.

I haven't failed yet. They may not all rush out and buy guns after the experience, but they at least no longer fear me having mine, nor feel compelled to limit my right to continue. And that is what I am aiming for.

[HairOfTheDog]

Riddle me this, if you will.... If you don't think any of *them* are capable of being convinced we are right, then what is the point in being into politics? Who are we trying to convince that we are right? Ourselves? - Just a question.

[IsItTimeYet]

oh man! You mean I was supposed to HIDE the contempt?! (slapping self in forehead)

Maybe my approach could use a little revision :)

[HairOfTheDog]

Yeah... Best if you can act like you actually like them ;~D

[IsItTimeYet]

nah. I'm "into politics" to keep "them" at bay and to cull their insipid and corrosive idealism out of our once great institutions.

But I'm no spokesman for the "wrathful right", I'm just another Joe Schmo who doesn't like whats happened to this country. I pop onto forums like this to poll for good ideas and reasoned solutions like yours. Only, as I've stated before, I lack the charm to effectively employ your tactics.

[IsItTimeYet]

Yeah... Best if you can act like you actually like them

now THAT is a tall order.

So I guess that explains why I'm such a lonely, ornery cuss. ;)

[HairOfTheDog]

Maybe not! - You are being charming now! ;~D

I hope they figure out who this guy is soon... The guy that caused this discussion. Apparently random shootings is a bad deal all the way around. I can protect myself from people I know want to hurt me. I can't do a dang thing about this. Please pray someone talks. Someone knows, that I can be pretty sure of.

[IsItTimeYet]

charming? (blush)

Now just how am I supposed to pass myself off as an ornery cuss with you over there pointing out my soft under side ;)

as to this shooter, how much merit do you think there is in the "mid-eastern terrorist" notion?

I'm leaning towards Lon Horiuchi as the perp, myself. It's his M.O. all the way.

[HairOfTheDog]

I dunno... If it is a mid-east terrorist type then it is a lone guy on his own mission. I think it is some "kind" of guy on his own mission. Anything organized would be bigger, and in more places at the same time. It would not be that hard to organize something better than what has been done. [shudder]

The targets don't make sense for a MidEast motive.

I had to look up who Lon Horiuchi is... My memory for names is not that good! - LOL. Quite wicked!

[Prodigal Son]

Uh-oh, the press is invoking the middle name of the white perp. That's not a good omen- per my theory about white capital offenders and middle names.

[bluefish]

I don't know where you are getting the "Sourthern Mentality" thing with respect to LHO and the Kennedy assassination. When it is discussed, you hear the naive "lone gun" sheep accepting what the govt. tells them, or you here a multitude of conspiracy theories (many of which are more believable). The conspiracy theories include Castro, the Soviet Union, the Mob and a VP who wanted to deliver a war. The "Sourthern Mentality" thing you seem so sensitive to is virtually non-existent and plays very little with regards to the Kennedy assassination.

[TERMINATTOR]

1) There's plenty to dislike about our govt. (traditional/constitutional conservative)
2)There's nothing wrong with being white or any other color. (almost all conservatives).
3)The militia is everyone. (all US citizens and legal aliens).

The good people above resent being labled racist!

Section 311 of US Code Title 10, entitled, "Militia: composition and classes" in its entirety:

"(a) The militia of the United States consists of all able-bodied males at least 17 years of age and, except as provided in section 313 of title 32, under 45 years of age who are, or who have made a declaration of intention to become, citizens of the United States and of female citizens of the United States who are members of the National Guard.

(b) The classes of the militia are --

(1) the organized militia, which consists of the National Guard and the Naval Militia; and

(2) the unorganized militia, which consists of the members of the militia who are not members of the National Guard or the Naval Militia."

[Libertina]

Oh here we go- White. Rascist. Bad.