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Updated: November 7, 2005
Former Klansman Sentenced to 14 Years in Chattanooga
On November 4, 2005, a former member of the North Georgia Knights of the Ku Klux Klan, was sentenced in Chattanooga to 14 years in prison for making pipe bombs and selling them to an undercover informant.
Daniel Schertz, 27, admitted to selling five pipe bombs to an undercover federal agent and a confidential informant for $750 in April, according to the plea agreement. According to court records, the informant had explained to Schertz that the bombs would be used to kill Mexican workers on a bus in Florida and attack Haitians.
During a hearing in U.S. District Court on August 4, Schertz pleaded guilty to six charges, including teaching and demonstrating how to make a weapon of mass destruction, interstate transport of explosive material with intent to kill or injure and possessing a pistol with armor-piercing bullets.
Schertz, who was arrested in South Carolina in May, was expelled from the White Knights in Tennessee that same month for unrelated reasons, according to the group's Imperial Wizard Billy Jeffery. "We kicked him out for breaking his oath that he swore before God," Jeffery said.
Klansman Arrested on Pipe Bomb Charges
Posted: June 27, 2005
Federal agents in South Carolina arrested a member of the Ku Klux Klan, accusing him of building seven pipe bombs to be used against Haitians and Hispanics.
Daniel Schertz, 27, was arrested May 19 in Greenville, South Carolina, after a seven-month investigation; the six-count indictment against him was unsealed in June. Schertz is charged with teaching and demonstrating how to make and use a bomb to further a violent crime, making bombs and possessing a weapon with armor-piercing bullets.
According to the Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco, Firearms and Explosives, an ATF confidential informant encountered Schertz at an October 2004 rally in Dunlap, Tennessee, sponsored by the North Georgia Knights of the Ku Klux Klan. Schertz subsequently met with the informant numerous times to build pipe bombs and discuss their use—meetings that were videotaped by federal agents. Schertz also allegedly offered to participate in bombings that the informant said would take place, including attacks on Haitians and Hispanic workers.
The trial is currently scheduled for July 25, but an expected superceding indictment could delay it.
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