Accused Kansas Shooter Could Face Death Penalty, Prosecutor Says
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Johnson County Police Dept(OVERLAND PARK, Kan.) — Frazier Glenn Miller, the man who allegedly went on a shooting rampage outside two Jewish community centers in Kansas, was charged Tuesday with one count of capital murder and a second count of premeditated first degree murder.
Prosecutors said the capital murder charge is for the deaths of William Lewis Corporon and his grandson, Reat Underwood, 14, who were gunned down outside the Jewish Community Center of Greater Kansas City, where parents and their children were gathering for a singing contest.
The premeditated first degree murder charge is for the shooting of Terri LaManno, 53, who was shot and killed minutes later outside the Village Shalom assisted living center where she was visiting her mother.
Under the charges, Miller could be eligible for the death penalty. He is expected to appear in court at 1:30 p.m. Tuesday.
The suspect is also known as Frazier Glenn Cross, according to police in Overland Park, and has long been on the radar of anti-hate groups, such as the Southern Poverty Law Center. At a news conference on Monday, police officially classified the massacre as a “hate crime.”
Miller, who was one of the country’s most prominent white supremacists in the 1980s according to two watchdog groups, was armed with at least one shotgun when he allegedly began shooting at people gathered in a parking lot.
Witnesses said the suspect, who is reported to be a former Grand Dragon of the Carolina Knights of the Ku Klux Klan yelled a Nazi salute after the shooting.
Miller served three years in federal prison on weapons and threatening communications charges, according to court records. As part of a plea bargain, Miller testified against other KKK members at a 1988 sedition trial.
After serving his time, Miller became an unwelcome figure in the white supremacist movement and was viewed as a traitor, Mark Pitcavage, director of investigative research at the Anti-Defamation League told ABC News.
“Ever since [he took a plea deal], most white supremacists don’t want anything to do with him,” Pitcavage said.
After laying low for a while, Pitcavage said Miller became active again in the past 15 years, taking his hate into the digital age.
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