Records show feds used
ultra-right radio host for
years

Sunday, November 29, 2009
Last updated: Thursday December 24, 2009, 2:21 PM

BY MIKE KELLY AND PETER J. SAMPSON
The Record
STAFF WRITERS

They called him "Valhalla."

But it was more than a nickname.

For more than five years, Hal Turner of North
Bergen lived a double life.

The public knew him as an ultra-right-wing
radio talk show host and Internet blogger
with an audience of neo-Nazis and white
supremacists attracted to his scorched-earth
racism and bare-knuckles bashing of public
figures. But to the FBI, and its expanding
domestic counter-terror intelligence
operations in the wake of the Sept. 11
attacks, Turner was "Valhalla" „ his code
name as an informant who spied on his own
controversial followers.

Turner's clandestine past was confirmed this
past summer when he was jailed on charges
that he made threats on his blog against

three federal judges in Chicago. In court after
his arrest, federal prosecutors acknowledged
Turner's FBI ties but downplayed his
importance and even described him as
"unproductive."

But an investigation by The Record „ based
on government documents, e-mails, court
records and almost 20 hours of jailhouse
interviews with Turner „ shows that federal
authorities made frequent use of Turner in
its battle against domestic terrorism.

As Turner took to his radio show and blog to
say that those who opposed his extremist
views deserve to die, he received thousands
of dollars from the FBI to report on such
groups as the Aryan Nations and the white
supremacist National Alliance, and even a
member of the Blue Eyed Devils skinhead
punk band. Later, he was sent undercover to
Brazil where he reported a plot to send non-
military supplies to anti-American Iraqi
resistance fighters. Sometimes he signed
"Valhalla" on his FBI payment receipts instead
of his own name.

His dual life of shock jock and informant
offers a window into the murky realm of
domestic intelligence in the years after the
Sept. 11 terror attacks „ in particular, the
difficult choices for the FBI in penetrating
controversial fringe groups with equally
controversial informants.

In interviews, conducted before Turner was
released on bail, he said the FBI coached him
to make racist, anti-Semitic and other
threatening statements and now he feels
double-crossed by the bureau after his
arrest. The documents reviewed by The
Record, however, show repeated instances of
federal agents admonishing Turner for his
extremism.

Federal prosecutors in Newark and Chicago
declined to respond to Turner's claims, as
did FBI officials. "We do not comment on
matters before the courts and will not
address Mr. Turner's allegations in the
press," said the FBI's Weysan Dun, who runs
the bureau's Newark field office.

Turner's "Valhalla" life will likely be on
display this week when he is scheduled to go
on trial for his alleged blog threats against
three federal appeals court judges in Chicago
who upheld a law banning handguns. The
trial, originally set for Chicago, was switched
to Brooklyn, with a judge flying in from

Louisiana.

The trial may have its share of political
intrigue. Turner's defense attorney, Michael
Orozco, said he plans to subpoena
Governor-elect Chris Christie to testify about
whether he advised the FBI about Turner
while Christie was U.S. attorney in Newark.
On Friday, Orozco filed a motion to dismiss
the case, accusing the government of
"outrageous conduct."

But the center of the court battle will likely be
the story of Hal Turner and his FBI
connections, which began in 2003 with the
Newark-based Joint Terrorism Task Force,
and continued on and off until this year.

Rumors of Turner's FBI work surfaced two
years ago after unknown Internet hackers
electronically broke into his Web site and
found e-mails between Turner and an FBI
agent. Turner never acknowledged his FBI
role until after his arrest in June „ and then
with a mix of anger and chagrin.

"Imagine my surprise," he wrote in one of
several letters from jail to The Record, "when
agents from the very FBI that trained and
paid me came to my house to arrest me."

In a memo only two years earlier, the FBI said
Turner "has proven highly reliable and is in a
unique position to provide vital information
on multiple subversive domestic
organizations." The memo went on to say
that Turner's "statistical accomplishments
include over 100 subjects identified, over 10
acts of violence prevented and multiple
subjects arrested."

"I was not some street snitch," Turner said in
one of several lengthy interviews at the
Hudson County Jail, where he was kept until
the terms of his bail were worked out in
October „ terms that prevented him from
talking to reporters after his release. "I was a
deep undercover intelligence operative."

Misgivings on both sides

Whatever his role, one thing is clear: The
relationship between Turner and the FBI
often was rocky, with both sides cutting ties
several times.

In March 2005, Turner abruptly quit. In a
letter to his FBI handlers, he cited a
"complete failure" by the agency "to achieve
the goals for which I began the relationship,"

the "dismal lack of arrests," the failure to
track down a "threat to kill me and my family"
and "exploitation" by the FBI "to interfere with
content of my Internet Web site."

By June, however, Turner was again on the
FBI payroll. The FBI, meanwhile, harbored its
own doubts about Turner.

Five days after Turner's March 2005 letter, an
internal FBI memo summarized rising
concerns that his rhetoric was too
controversial and possibly dangerous.

"Is he a big mouth? Yes," the memo said.
"Does he say really deplorable things? Yes. Is
he a physical threat to anyone? I don't think
so."

Records show the FBI continued this kind of
questioning throughout its connection to
Turner „ valuing his ties to right-wing hate
groups, but also worrying that his audience
might follow up on his violence rhetoric.

In a July 2007 memo, Turner's primary FBI
handler, Special Agent Stephen Haug, wrote
that Turner "will continue to be admonished
in the strongest possible terms and on a
periodic basis about his rhetoric and the
potential of it inciting acts of violence."

Haug went on to say that Turner would be
"instructed to utilize his celebrity status to
insure he continues to remind those who
follow his rhetoric that such rhetoric is not
intended to incite violence."

"In balance," Haug wrote, "this source's value
outweighs the discomfort associated with
source's rhetoric. Source's unique access
provides important intelligence which, if lost,
would be irreplaceable."

Turner, meanwhile, often tried to assure the
FBI that his shock jock rhetoric was not
serious. "The audience loves the rip-roaring
radio psycho," he wrote in one e-mail to the
FBI. "They literally throw money at it. Just be
confident that the personality you hear (or
hear about) on radio is not real life. I have
zero intention of doing anything stupid."

Nonetheless, Turner's statements were
closely watched.

In February 2008, in the midst of the
presidential primary season, Turner attracted
the attention of federal officials when he
turned against then-Democratic candidate

Barack Obama.

"I'm starting to come to the realization that it
may be up to a sole person, acting alone, to
make certain this guy is never allowed to
hold the most powerful office in the world,"
Turner wrote on his Web site. He later
removed the statement.

But later that year, court records show that
he contacted federal authorities to say that
he had heard of a possible assassination plot
by white supremacists against the president-
elect.

"I didn't like Barack Obama," Turner
explained in an interview. "But he won the
election."

Seven months after the possible threat to
Obama, Turner was in FBI handcuffs „ for
allegedly threatening the Chicago judges.

"Let me be the first to say this plainly: These
judges deserve to be killed," Turner wrote on
his blog on June 2. "Their blood will replenish
the tree of liberty."

Turner also posted photos of the judges,
their work phone numbers and office
addresses as well as a map of the courthouse
that pointed out "anti-truck bomb barriers."

"The word 'deserve' is just an opinion,"
Turner later told The Record. As for posting
the photos of the judges, he added: "I can't
tell you to this day how sorry I am."

Even if he wins his federal case, Turner's
legal problems will not be over. In June,
Connecticut authorities charged Turner with
inciting violence against state officials who
supported a proposed state law to give
Roman Catholic parishioners greater control
over church finances.

In each case, Turner contends his words are
protected as free speech under the First
Amendment. Turner's attorney, Orozco,
adds that other federal prosecutors routinely
ignored his outlandish statements. "He has
made other controversial remarks about
judges, none of which have ever been
prosecuted," wrote Orozco in a legal brief.

"I never intended for anybody to feel
threatened," Turner said.

Longing to be heard


Whatever his intentions, it remains unclear
who the real Hal Turner is.

A fraud? A serious threat to homeland
security? A white supremacist? A loyal citizen
trying to help the FBI? A radio showman
trying to build an audience „ and income „
with shocking statements?

After he was arrested by FBI agents in June,
Turner was sent on a journey that took him
to jails in Newark, Oklahoma and Chicago „
often in solitary confinement. By late
September, he was transferred back to New
Jersey and sent to the Hudson County Jail in
Kearny. In all, he spent 119 days behind
bars.

In the interviews at the Hudson County Jail,
Turner offered many glimpses of his
personality and motivation.

"My country needed me," he said when asked
why he accepted the FBI's offer in June 2003
to become an informant. "I'm a loyal, patriotic
decent American citizen."

But why did he say „ or hint „ that some
judges and other officials should be killed?
Turner blames the FBI, saying that while
agents never said he could threaten judges,
they coached him on the limits of what he
could say. As a result, Turner said he felt he
had wide latitude.

"I was given specific instructions," he said.
"Here, I am in prison, betrayed."

In one of his more controversial statements,
Turner gloated over the murder of the
husband and mother of a federal judge in
Chicago in 2005. But Turner described his
rhetoric as fake, arguing he hoped it "would
solidify my anti-government credentials"
among ultra-right-wing groups he was
spying on.

As for hanging out with neo-Nazis and
skinheads, Turner said, "That's not me. It
never has been."

Raised in Ridgefield Park, the 47-year-old
Turner labored more than a decade in a
variety of positions with several moving-van
companies. In 1988, while working for a
moving company in Atlanta, Turner was
arrested on a drug possession charge. In
interviews, he said he had a cocaine
addiction at the time and checked into a
rehab program.


By the early 1990s, Turner moved to North
Bergen and worked as a real estate agent.
Within a few years, however, he began to
dabble in politics, trying to beef up the
Republican Party in overwhelmingly
Democratic Hudson County. He also was a
campaign manager in New Jersey for
Republican presidential candidate Pat
Buchanan.

Politics seemed to offer Turner something he
never realized he had „ a voice and a need
to speak out on hot topics. Now, however,
several close associates question whether
that voice is authentic or just the work of
someone looking for the limelight.

In 1997, when Ramapo College Finance
Professor Murray Sabrin ran for governor on
a libertarian platform, he hired Turner to
manage his campaign. Turner was a frequent
caller on WABC's popular talk radio shows
with Bob Grant and Sean Hannity „ "Hal from
North Bergen," as he came to be known.

Turner surely had a conservative flair,
especially on such issues as abortion and
immigration. But Sabrin noticed a complete
shift after Turner started his own talk radio
show. In particular, Sabrin, who is Jewish,
found some of Turner's remarks to be anti-
Semitic.

"People have a public face and a private face,"
said Sabrin. "Everything that he is doing now
is a complete 180-degree shift. It's totally
opposite from what I knew. I don't know
where this is coming from. I certainly
wouldn't have tolerated it."

For several years, the Southern Poverty Law
Center, an Alabama-based civil rights group,
has regularly monitored Turner's radio
broadcasts and blog. Indeed, the center was
one of the first organizations to raise
questions that Turner might be an FBI
informant.

Hearing now that Turner admits to being an
informant, the center's director of research,
Heidi Beirich, was especially critical of the
FBI. "We've never seen anything like this with
informants. It's essentially idiotic on the part
of the FBI. Anybody who spent two seconds
looking at Hal Turner's Web site would know
he is a wild hare," she said.

Indeed, Turner's own recounting of his life
with the FBI does not always mirror what

records show he did.

Turner, for example, says the FBI asked him
to participate in a mission to plug leaks of
information inside the Department of Justice
to a variety of groups including the Southern
Poverty Law Center and the Anti Defamation
League. Turner also says the FBI asked him
to specifically criticize such African-
American leaders as Jesse Jackson and Al
Sharpton.

"I was supposed to be a counterbalance to
Sharpton," Turner said.

Officially, the FBI declined comment on those
unproven stories by Turner. The documents
bear no trace of those operations.

Expedition to Brazil

Unofficially, FBI and other federal officials
expressed a mix of dismay and outright anger
when told of Turner's claims of being
coached to make provocative statements.

"Absurd," said one. Another added: "And pigs
will fly beginning with the next full moon. It
never happened."

During interviews with The Record, Turner
was at times unclear on some details. FBI
records indicate, for example, that he did not
become an informant until June 2003; Turner
originally said he was recruited by federal
agents in 2002, but later said he was
mistaken.

Along with Haug of the FBI, his other regular
contact was Leonard Nerbetski, a New Jersey
State Police detective assigned to the FBI's
Joint Terrorism Task Force.

Requests to interview Haug and Nerbetski
were turned town by the FBI and by the state
police.

In an early communication, Turner reported
to the FBI about a meeting in Elmwood Park
by the National Alliance. A few months after
that, FBI records show that Turner was
reaching out to several national leaders of
the alliance.

FBI memos indicate that the bureau had
appropriated as much as $100,000 for
Turner's work as an informant.

"It was good money," said Turner, who would
not say how much he was ultimately paid by

the FBI.

Turner said he was earning about $15,000 a
month from his suddenly popular radio show
and blog.

As 2004 wore on, Turner found himself
reporting to the FBI about a possible theft of
evidence in a Bergen County drug case and
about an attempt to set up a chapter of the
Aryan Nations in northern New Jersey.

A year later, with the FBI paying for his visa
and passport renewal, Turner embarked on
his most ambitious mission „ to confer with
a wealthy white supremacist in Brazil who
was considering making a $1 million
donation to his American counterparts.

While in Brazil, Turner also reported meeting
a World War II German Luftwaffe flying ace
and linking up with a representative of the
Brazilian Arab Society, who discussed a plan
to ship $10 million in consumer goods to
anti-American Iraqi resistance fighters.

After Turner returned to New Jersey, the
records show that the FBI investigated the
Arab Society representative and even
reached out to U.S. officials in Brazil for help
in monitoring his activities. But it's not clear
if the $10 million shipment was attempted.

The $1 million donation also never
materialized, records show. The Brazilian
benefactor backed out of the deal when an
American white supremacist did not
accompany Turner on the trip.

Records indicate the FBI wanted Turner to
return to Brazil to spy on white-supremacist
training there. But Turner never went. While
in Brazil, Turner said, he carried a gun for
protection, which was not authorized by the
FBI.

Only a few weeks after returning to the
United States from Brazil, Turner again found
controversy. In a radio broadcast, he
targeted African-Americans.

"A full day of violence against blacks would
be a really nice thing," he said.

Turner went on to call for "lynchings, church
burnings, drive-by shootings and bombings
to put these subhuman animals back in their
place," according to a report complied by the
Anti-Defamation League.


The episode illustrates the complicated
relationship between the FBI and Turner.
Despite Turner's racist radio rhetoric, the FBI
also valued his undercover work „ and was
apparently willing to take a risk with him
again „ and pay him, too.

For example, a July 2005 memo by the FBI
said Turner had been paid $10,365 in the
previous fiscal year and that he "provided
information which continues to be highly
accurate and sensitive."

Turner continued to reach out intermittently
to the FBI „ with tips including a possible
KKK murder plot „ until June 2, 2009, the
day he posted the alleged threats on his blog
about the Chicago judges.

In an e-mail that day to the FBI, Turner says
he has heard reports that agents had
interviewed skinheads and others about him.

"Am I unapproachable?" Turner asked in the
e-mail. "Geez, I'd think by now I would have
proved myself. It's not like I'm gonna go
postal or anything."

Three weeks later, Turner was arrested.

Four months after that, Turner, unshaven
and wearing frayed green prison garb and
fumbling with a loose tooth, sat in an
interview room at the Hudson County Jail
and pondered his journey „ from shock
jock to FBI informant to inmate charged with
a serious federal crime.

"I can't believe this is happening to me," he
said.

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The Great Purge was a series of campaigns of political repression and
persecution in the Soviet Union orchestrated by Joseph Stalin in 1936–
1938. It involved a large-scale purge of the Communist Party and
Government officials, repression of peasants, Red Army leadership, and
the persecution of unaffiliated persons, characterized by widespread
police surveillance, widespread suspicion of "saboteurs",
imprisonment, and executions.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Great_Purge

An estimated 4 million people were purged between the 1920s and 1950s,
most of them in 1937 and 1938, when 1.3 million were arrested and more
than half of them executed, under the ill-famed Article 58 of the
Penal Code just about anyone could easily fall under:

“We got a painful, catastrophic inheritance from the political purges
ordered by Vladimir Lenin and Josef Stalin, when thousands of people
were killed only because the authorities thought they posed a threat
to their rule, says Alexander Brod, the director of the Moscow human
rights bureau. People were sentenced on trumped-up charges and based
on confessions made under torture."

http://english.ruvr.ru/2009/08/13/274767.html
http://www.globalmuseumoncommunism.org

"Once people figure it out, they're going to do what people everywhere
do, they're going to start protesting and they're going to start
revolting. And when that happens that's when the powers that be feel
threatened and they use the power that they have." - Jim Simpson

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