Roanoke Times
Copyright (c) 1995, Landmark Communications, Inc.
DATE: WEDNESDAY, May 23, 1990 TAG: 9005230100
SECTION: VIRGINIA PAGE: B3 EDITION: METRO
SOURCE: DOUGLAS L. PARDUE STAFF WRITER
DATELINE: LENGTH: Medium
William Pierce, self-ordained minister of the Cosmotheist Community Church, a white separatist organization in Pocahontas County, W.Va., was arrested Monday evening at his 345-acre church compound on a mountain near the small town of Hillsboro, W.Va.
Pocahontas County Sheriff Jerry Dale said Pierce was arrested on the two misdemeanor charges shortly after Barbara Thomas, who had been working at Pierce's church, flagged down a deputy and said Pierce hit her and threatened her with a pistol.
Dale said the woman, a former schoolteacher who last lived in New Orleans, told a magistrate that she had started working for Pierce a few weeks earlier. According to police, she said she became disenchanted with his philosophy and that when she tried to leave Monday afternoon, Pierce grabbed her, hit her in the back and pointed a pistol at her.
Thomas told authorities she managed to get away from Pierce and was driven out of the compound by Pierce's ex-wife, Olga, who still lives there.
Dale said Pierce was arrested without incident and was released on $1,000 bond. A hearing was set for June 6.
In a telephone interview Tuesday, Pierce said the woman's story is false.
Pierce said he invited the woman to come to his church to work as a secretary in his distribution of books and other literature.
He said he and Thomas had corresponded for about four years and that she had repeatedly complained about being discriminated against because she was a white teacher working in predominantly black school districts.
"I sympathized with the woman," and offered to let her come to West Virginia to get away, Pierce said. He said he offered to pay her about $400 a month if she worked out as a secretary.
However, he said, Thomas began to demonstrate very strange phobias, such as claiming she was being deprived of oxygen.
She threw "a tantrum" one day because he hadn't left the back door of the church open so that she could get oxygen while she worked, Pierce said.
On Monday, he said, he decided he didn't want Thomas around anymore and asked his ex-wife to take her to the bus station so she could go home.
On the way to the bus station, he said, Thomas got out of the car and flagged down a deputy and filed her charges.
Pierce said he never tried to prevent Thomas from leaving and did not strike or threaten her in in any way.
Thomas said she didn't know until about a week after she arrived at his compound that he was the leading distributor of Nazi and hate literature in the nation. She said she did complain about lack of air in his so-called church, which she described as more of a warehouse with windows that don't open.
Now, she said, she is fearful for her safety and is being kept at a "safe house." Sheriff Dale confirmed he has temporarily placed Thomas in a safe house.
Pierce is a former associate of George Lincoln Rockwell, leader of the American Nazi Party. He produced much of the party's ideological publications. When the Arlington-based party collapsed after Rockwell's assassination in 1967, Pierce became director of the National Alliance, which produces right-wing, white-separatist literature.
Pierce is author of "The Turner Diaries," which outlines a futuristic takeover of the United States by white supremacists.
Earlier this year Pierce created a stir when his organization began distributing a catalog of white separatist publications to student dormitories at George Mason University. He said he was just trying to provide college students with a choice of literature from which to learn.
by CNB