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U.S. NEWSThursday 23 July 2015
Black state official ‘overwhelmed’ by viral photo response
SEANNA ADCOX In this July 18, 2015 photo provided by Rob Godfrey, police of- one week after the Con- ly posted it to Twitter, where
Associated Press ficer Leroy Smith, left, helps a man wearing National Socialist federate flag was removed it has received hundreds of
COLUMBIA, S.C. (AP) — Movement attire up the stairs during a rally in Columbia, S.C. from Statehouse grounds. thousands of views. It’s also
Amid angry demonstra- Smith, the director of South Carolina’s public safety agency, The Legislature voted to re- been picked up by news
tions over the Confederate said Monday, July 20, 2015, he hopes the photo that shows him move it following the mas- media around the world.
flag last weekend, a quiet helping the white man wearing a racist T-shirt will be a catalyst sacre of nine parishioners “What Leroy Smith did to-
gesture of human kind- for people to work toward overcoming hate and violence. at a historic black church tally overshadowed what
ness unfolded on the steps in Charleston, including went on at the Statehouse
to South Carolina’s State- (Rob Godfrey via AP) the pastor, Sen. Clementa when those from outside
house: A white man over- Pinckney. The white man South Carolina tried to dis-
come by the sweltering counter-protesters behind White Knights of the KKK charged with killing them rupt a time of healing and
heat and wearing a Nazi police barricades mount- overlapped an earlier rally had posed with a Confed- unity in our state,” he said
swastika on his T-shirt was ed. on the opposite side of the erate battle flag in online Wednesday.
escorted to rest and shelter “You could feel the tension Statehouse organized by photos. Through a spokeswoman,
by a black man wearing an in the air as the crowd start- a Florida-based group af- About 50 people rallied Smith initially fended off re-
officer’s uniform. ed to swell,” Smith said. filiated with the New Black with the KKK, including quests for an interview. But
That man in the uniform The rally organized by the Panther Party. members of the Detroit- as dozens of news organi-
was Leroy Smith, who runs North Carolina-based Loyal The dueling rallies came based National Socialist zations flooded his office
the state Department of Movement, a neo-Nazi with requests, he relented.
Public Safety, and a photo group. Even so, he sought to cred-
of his Saturday encounter They gave no speeches, it others who work for his
with the man wearing the but shouted “white power” agency. At least one officer
swastika has gone viral on and racial insults as they was pushed to the ground
the Internet. walked back and forth be- during the Saturday dem-
Smith said Wednesday that hind the barricade waving onstrations. Fights broke
he didn’t think twice about Confederate flags. Shout- out as officers escorted
assisting the ailing man. ing and obscenities esca- the protesters from behind
“I saw a man who needed lated between them and
some help, and I was go- the crowd, and officers the barricades to a nearby
ing to help him,” Smith told broke up some fights. Smith
The Associated Press in a monitored the scene as he parking garage.
phone interview. paced back and forth on
Smith said the man in the the Statehouse steps. “I can’t overstate how
photo was actually the Smith said that’s when a
second demonstrator he protester approached, proud I am of law enforce-
helped up the Statehouse saying someone needed
steps in the 100-degree medical help. Smith and ment officers who put their
heat, as tensions between Columbia Fire Chief Aubrey
white supremacists and Jenkins, who also is black, lives in peril to maintain or-
responded to a demonstra-
tor overcome by the heat. der,” Smith said.
The first white demonstra-
tor they helped climb the The Associated Press has
steps and enter the air-
conditioned Statehouse been unable to find and
could walk on his own. The
second clearly could not, interview the man wearing
Smith said.
“He was struggling, fa- the swastika T-shirt.
tigued, appeared to be
lethargic. I knew there was A spokesman for the Na-
no way he could make it up
the steps on his own,” Smith tional Socialist Movement
said. So Smith coached
him up the steps, putting said the man in the photo,
his right hand on his arm
and his left arm around his as well as a woman walking
body.
Smith didn’t get the man’s up the steps behind him,
name, and they had no ex-
tended conversation. are members of that orga-
“He told me he wasn’t from
around here. I told him it nization but he declined to
gets hot in South Carolina,”
Smith recalled. provide their names.
Both demonstrators they
escorted were treated in- Instead, he reacted angrily,
side by local emergency
workers. made offensive comments
Gov. Nikki Haley’s spokes-
man, Rob Godfrey, was on to a reporter and hung
the Statehouse portico ob-
serving when he snapped up when asked questions
a cellphone photo of Smith
helping the man. He quick- about the viral photo. He
said he did not want report-
ers to contact the man or
woman.
The group is the largest and
most prominent neo-Nazi
group in the United States,
said Mark Potok, an ex-
pert on extremism with the
Southern Poverty Law Cen-
ter.
Smith said, “I’ve just been
overwhelmed” by the re-
sponse to the photo.
At the time, he said, he
didn’t think about it. He was
just doing his job. But he
realizes why the photo at-
tracted so much attention:
“There was a KKK rally and
a public servant law en-
forcement officer showed
love and compassion in the
heat of that.”q
