News
Greensboro police: No files destroyed in Klan-Nazi shootings
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Published: May 13, 2008
GREENSBORO
An internal investigation has shown that no evidence related to the 1979 Klan-Nazi shootings has been destroyed, Greensboro police said Monday.
In 2001 or 2002, five to 10 boxes of newspaper clippings from the time of the shooting were discarded by the department. Greensboro Police Chief Tim Bellamy said the disposal was not a violation of department policy or record-retention laws, the
News & Record of Greensboro reported Monday night.
The investigation was done by the Greensboro Police Department's Professional Standards Division.
Two of the three local ministers who raised the issue in February were not convinced of the findings. The Revs. Cardes Brown, Gregory Headen and Nelson Johnson said they were provided information that approximately 50 boxes of files related to the shootings were thrown away in 2004 or 2005 after the records were requested by the Greensboro Truth and Reconciliation Commission.
"Our police department needs some investigation from outside," Headen said.
On Nov. 3, 1979, five people were killed and 10 were wounded in a shootout during a confrontation between Klansman and Nazis and anti-Klan marchers.
Greensboro police launched their investigation in February after the three pastors told the media that files relating to the shootings were thrown away at the direction of Lt. Craig McMinn.
Thirteen current and former employees were interviewed for the investigation, Bellamy said. One person, whom Bellamy declined to identify, provided a box said to have been among the discarded boxes. It contained newspaper clippings related to the shootings and subversive groups, Bellamy said.
The chief said other employees were able to verify that the boxes contained newspaper clippings, where the clippings were located in the office and how they were stored.
"There were no memos. No investigative reports," Bellamy said.
The investigation found no wrongdoing on the part of the department or McMinn.
Although police files relating to the shootings could have been legally destroyed in 1999, the department has them stored in a secured location, Bellamy said.
The city continues to maintain 49 volumes of those records, all of which were provided to the Truth and Reconciliation Commission, Bellamy said.
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N.C. Politics
Federal Politics
The Downtown Summer Music Series will begin on Thursday. Ed Bumgardner talks to some of the organizers of the Downtown Jazz lineup, in which a form of music known as "smooth jazz" will play a more prominent role this year.
Thursday's relish stories will appear in the Entertainment section.
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