| Hateland -
Articles |
08/03/02
- Former leader of Ku Klux Klan jailed for racial harassment
By Kim Sengupta
A former leader of the Ku Klux Klan in Britain was jailed
for three months yesterday for the racist harassment of
an Asian shopkeeper. Allan Beshella, a convicted paedophile
who styled himself the "Grand Dragon", was placed
under a two-year restraining order banning him from the
shop in Maesteg, south Wales.
But the victim, Mohammed Nawaz, 37, and anti-racist campaigners
criticised the sentence – passed by Judge Christopher
Llewellyn-Jones QC, at Cardiff Crown Court – as too
lenient. Mr Nawaz said: "I am very disappointed and
will definitely be moving out of the area ... It really
worries me."
Beshella, 52, of Tonna Road, Maesteg, south Wales, had
entered Caerau Discount Store on 14 September last year
to threaten Mr Nawaz, who lived there with his wife, his
three children and his 75-year-old mother.
Ieuan Bennett, prosecuting, said Beshella had asked Mr
Nawaz what his views were on the 11 September attacks
in America. He had then said "I am the Klan man"
and "kill the Jews". He had called at the shop
again on 28 September with a friend and made further threats.
The friend, who has also been charged, allegedly refused
to pay for two beers and said to the assistant: "You've
got a pretty face. I'm going to mess it up." Beshella,
who has lived in America, claims to have been the driving
force behind establishing the British branch of the KKK.
The Bridgend Coalition Against Racism said: "People
were expecting a much longer sentence. This is a man who
has terrorised an area for a long period of time."
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