The victim of last month's hate crime in Eagle Heights believed he was being retaliated against for taking early leave of a barbecue attended by white supremacists from across the state, a UW-Madison police detective said Monday.
According to the criminal complaint, on the morning of Oct. 19, three men clad in jackets adorned with swastikas and \white power"" patches kicked and pounded on the doors in the 100 units of Eagle Heights and threatened to kill the residents.
All three were arrested and charged with disorderly conduct hate crimes.
Carol Ann Glassmaker, the case detective for UW-Madison police, said the victim attended the earlier downtown meet-up for Wisconsin white supremacists.
Matthew Dobrasz, 26, a defendant and a white supremacist leader in Madison, hosted the party, according to the complaint. The other defendants, Carl Pielmeier, 21, and Thomas Vanzandt, 21, a white supremacist leader in northern Wisconsin, also attended.
The victim left the party without telling anyone because he did not get along with Vanzandt, who ordered people around, the complaint stated. This was a violation of the white supremacist code of conduct, and the victim expected punishment.
""Every group has their own social order,"" Glassmaker said. ""Obviously, in any meeting, including a Boy Scout meeting, they have codes of conduct, and I think they just felt it was very rude that he left without saying anything.""
According to the complaint, the defendants drove to the victim's apartment and began pounding on his doors and windows around 12:40 a.m. The victim thought the windows would break and feared for his safety, so he called 911.
Other residents of Eagle Heights, which houses a number of minority families, also called the police. One resident heard the harassers yell, ""We are going to get these people, we are going to kill them,"" according to the complaint.
Neighbors said the victim kept to himself and they were unaware of his connections to hate groups, Glassmaker said.
Rajesh Uthamenthil, an Eagle Heights resident and a UW-Madison graduate student, said he was surprised that someone with extremely hateful views would live in the neighborhood.
""I've been here for two-and-a-half years ... and everybody's been friendly. It's really shocking in that sense,"" Uthamenthil said.
Glassmaker said hate crimes are rare in Madison, but white supremacists have a history of criminal activity.
