The Palm Beach Post from West Palm Beach, Florida • Page 187

2B THE PALM BEACH POST FRIDAY, MAY 17, 1996 sl Neo-Nazis use pagers to boost hate hot line mm By DALE FUCHS Palm Beach Post Staff Writer To the dismay of hundreds of unwitting callers, you can now dial Hate. And counter-Hate. A local neo-Nazi group has taken advantage of the modern era in communications, when messages from loved ones and strangers alike are reduced to a pager beep. The Lake Worth-based group, known as Children of the Reich, has been randomly paging Palm Beach County residents for at least a year with a local number. When the page is returned, the unsuspecting caller is greeted with a recorded message that begins by attacking Jews, blacks and other minorities and ends with a plug for the $2 "neo-Nazi merchandise" catalog.

"You have made contact with Children of the Reich neo-Nazi racist hot line," a cheerful recorded voice begins. In response, a militant Jewish group, the New York -based Jewish Defense Organization, has set up a counter-Hate line. When dialed, a recorded voice urges callers to bombard BellSouth with complaints about the neo-Nazi hot line in hopes that public pressure will force the company to disconnect it. Hate hot lines, though offensive, are usually considered protected speech, according to Klan Watch's associate legal director, Brian Levin. But the uncommon way this local hot line is reached by returning a page may offer a legal opportunity to shut the line down, Levin said.

BellSouth Regional Manager Sid Poe said the matter is "under review." "Even though the message may be personally offensive, under (state law), it must be profane, obscene or personally abusive for the line to be disconnected," Poe said. But that doesn't satisfy Mordechai Levy, a leader of the self-proclaimed "militant" Jewish Defense Organization who says his group's mission is "to defend Jews by any means necessary." The Children of the Reich, Michael Wino-grad, associate director of the Anti-Defamation League's regional office in Miami, said, is "miniscule" and, so far, has not posed a direct threat to residents. The Anti-Defamation League, which advocates education to combat hate, has received complaints about the pages from residents of all races and creeds, Winograd said. Levy's answer is to launch "Operation Nazi Kicker" in Palm Beach County. In New York, an "Operation Klan Kicker" involved so many rallies and protests that at least two alleged Ku Klux Klan members were fired from jobs and evicted from their homes, according to news reports.

St. Lucie County sheriff's detectives arrested three Fort Pierce men, one of them an assistant manager of a Vero Beach drugstore, charging them with trafficking in prescription drugs. Tom Roe, 26, of 2300 Seventh Ave. was arrested Monday behind the Walgreens at 1700 U.S. 1, Vero Beach, after dejauties say he sold them hydrocodone, a painkiller similaito codeine.

Police said Roe was supplying the drug, which is marketed as LorcetPlus, to Keith Benson, 22, of 5502 Killarney and Vance Zelasky, 26, of 5503 Shannon Drive. They were both arrested last week. FORT PIERCE A Fort Pierce man was arrested Thursday on charges he stabbed a Homestead man to death. Tony Bernard Knight, 35, of 711 Avenue Apt. 3, stabbed Michael L.

Thompson, 23, after the two argued over money, according to police reports. A prostitute was with them at the time, police said. Thompson's brother, Clarence, called police from a pay phone at 615 North U.S. 1 early Thursday to report that his brother needed medical help. Police found Thompson dead in the passenger seat of his brother's car.

He had been stabbed in the chest. Police say Clarence Thompson, also of Homestead, drove from Knight's home, where i the stabbing took place, to U.S. 1 to find a phone because he didn't know where a hospital was. The Florida Highway Patrol is investigating who shot at a Uodge Neon on Interstate 95 Wednesday night that was being driven by Maria Rodriguez, 20, of Boynton Beach. Rodriguez, who is pregnant, crashed at 11 p.m.

on 1-95 near Lantana Road after four shots were fired at her car by two Hispanic men in a green Chevrolet Nova, FHP trooper said. 1 ler car was disabled in the outside lane when it was hit from behind by an Oldsmobile driven by Joseph Rice, 49, of Liverpool, Ohio, troopers said. The Oldsmobile was then hit by a Ford driven by Joyce Shockley, 47, of Boynton Beach. No one was hit by the gunfire or seriously injured in the accident, the FHP said. LAKE WORTH Albert "Cuba" Martinez was arres- tedon a charge of attempted murder Thursday in the shooting Tuesday of Ofelio Martinez Jr.

Martinez, 17, voluntarily went to the Lake Worth Police Department for questioning at 2 p.m. Thursday, police said. Chavez, who remains in critical condition at Delray Community Hospital, was shot four times in a drive-by shooting and has been unable to move his legs since. He turns 15 years old today. 1 TOOTS --FMM1U.

mw 1 3 I 111 1 jKItI BROWARD COUNTY p' PEMBROKE RD. i 11 iimiriiiimir nm.i ninn 1 1 wwiwMWirMimiiiiiiniiinii 1 1 t- iihi linn, mnini ini.in ,11,111 i II mil. fPS fW visi izdJ SJJ SJJ vJwL -FMfflM OEflMVIffW lmmfmzmtT wttj urn ml hi in 'wmmmtmmmmmimmmmmmmmmmtmmmmmmmmmmmmmmtmmmmmmm lilli.l ill I mil i mum -w FORT PIERCE Five St. Lucie County High School students have been named winners of the Outstanding Youth Volunteers Award by the St. Lucie County Children's Services Council.

They will be honored at a reception at 4 p.m. Friday at Lawnwood Pavilion Conference Center, 1860 N. Lawnwood Circle, Fort Pierce. Winners are Darryl Ama-dio, Port St. Lucie High School; Emily Garment, Lincoln Park Academy; April Rowe, Fort Pierce Central High School; Tameka Sims, Fort Pierce Westwood High School and Katie Van Vorst, John Carroll High School.

PORT ST. LUCIE Officials at Port St. Lucie High School filed a criminal complaint Thursday against a contractor they say took $900 and didn't deliver the steel that was to be used to renovate the press box at the school's stadium. Officials told deputies the contractor, whose name was not released, had also refused to return the money although they had contacted him with a certified letter and spoken to his wife several times about the money. The case has been referred to the Sheriff Office economic crimes unit.

TJnfi 1 II 1 I' III. HIM FORT PIERCE Port St. Lucie City Council member Paula Lewis filed papers Thursday to run for the St. Lucie County Commission seat now held by Denny Green, a Republican. Lewis, a Democrat, is completing her first two-year term on the city council.

She is Green's only announced opponent. PORT ST. LUCIE Comments regarding fair housing will be accepted at a Port St. Lucie Community Services and Redevelopment Commission meeting at 6 p.m. May 30 in city council chambers.

These comments will be included in the report required by the U.S. Department of Housing and Urban Development for all areas that receive Community Development Block Grants. Representatives of the St. Lucie County Lending Consortium, the Board of Realtors and a fair housing consultant will discuss fair housing issues in Port St. Lucie.

Anyone interested in speaking or providing written comments should call 871-5220. A sign-up sheet will be available at the meeting. Palm Beach County can keep $170,000 from auctioning exotic birds in 1994, an appeals panel has ruled. The county had seized the 347 birds from a Loxahatchee ranch in 1994 after the disappearance of the ranch owner, Bhagwan "Moses" Lall and his aunt, Lilawattie "Lila" Buerattan. Mahadai Lall, Moses Lall's mother, challenged a 1995 county court decision awarding the auction money to the county, but a panel of three circuit judges upheld the lower court ruling this month.

JUPITER t- Twenty-two police officers and civilians were honored at the annual police awards ceremony Wednesday night at town hall. Awards went to: Detectives Dominick Barbancra and Scott Pascarella and officers Pamela Winegard and Bruce St. Laurent, chiefs letters of commendation; David Rawls, Jeffrey Rich, Larry Newcomb, Matthew I lumphrey, William Turner, David Baker, citizen meritorious citations; Sgt. Gerald Stickl and communications officer Lynn Gordey, meritorious citation; Barbanera, Sgt. Samuel Miller, officers Peter Conyette, Clyde Fisher, Brian Chabot, John MacVeigh, Peter Conyette, Clifford Curtis and citizens Susan Fisher and Lya O'Brien, lifesaving awards; and John Urban, citizen letter of appreciation.

A portrait was also unveiled in honor of Maj. Edward K. Humphrey, who died in the line of duty in September 1995. tdL 'a I 1 1 ii" 1. 1 1 fir 1 WEST PALM BEACH Santos McGill, 13, convicted last month as an adult for armed robbery, was sentenced Thursday as a juvenile to serve at a state-run detention center.

Prosecutors urged Palm Beach County Circuit Judge Mary Lupo to send the boy to prison for 6V2 years. Instead, Lupo ordered him into the custody of the Department of Juvenile Justice program that is scheduled to take about a year, followed by a year of after-care supervision and community control until he is 19. McGill was the youngest of three youths who held up a man in Lake Park in 1994. WEST PALM BEACH The 4th District Court of Appeal on Wednesday overturned a jury's award to a nudism activist who said officials violated her constitutional right to expression when they charged her with disorderly "conduct in 1990. A Palm Beach County Circuit Court jury in May 1994 gave T.A.

Wyner $4,000 from three officials at John D. MacArthur Beach State Park. Wyner was wearing a revealing outfit of placards representing the Bill of Rights during a demonstration at the park, which nudists frequented. The charge was later dismissed. The appeals court said the officials should have been shielded by immunity.

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