FRC shooter: I targeted them because SPLC list said they were ‘anti-gay’

posted at 10:01 pm on April 24, 2013 by Mary Katharine Ham

Is a video of Floyd Lee Corkins admitting his exact motivations enough to connect the dots in this case?
Via the Washington Examiner:

Family Research Council (FRC) officials released video of federal investigators questioning convicted domestic terrorist Floyd Lee Corkins II, who explained that he attacked the group’s headquarters because the Southern Poverty Law Center (SPLC) identified them as a “hate group” due to their traditional marriage views.
“Southern Poverty Law lists anti-gay groups,” Corkins tells interrogators in the video, which FRC obtained from the FBI. “I found them online, did a little research, went to the website, stuff like that.”
The Washington Examiner’s Paul Bedard reported that Corkins, who pleaded guilty to terrorism charges, said in court that he hoped to “kill as many as possible and smear the Chick-Fil-A sandwiches in victims’ faces, and kill the guard.” As Bedard explained, “the shooting occurred after an executive with Chick-Fil-A announced his support for traditional marriage, angering same-sex marriage proponents.”

Southern Poverty Law Center still lists Family Research Council as a hate group. I’m against icing political speech by holding such a list responsible for the actions of crazy criminals. But then, I’m not one of those who was sure Sarah Palin’s crosshairs were responsible for the shooting of a Democratic Congresswoman and the deaths of six staff and constituents, despite copious evidence to the contrary— like, that the shooter had never seen the Palin map and was demonstrably not motivated by partisan politics. That crowd is awfully quiet about the influence SPLC’s dubious list might have on the future unbalanced. Curious, that.
Prosecutors want 45 years for Corkins, who wounded a security guard who got between him and his desire to kill as many people as possible and smear Chick-fil-a sandwiches in their faces as a political statement. Dots, connected, and yet this doesn’t make it into the narrative about the dangerous potential for incitement in political rhetoric and the notion our nation is teetering on the edge of total civil breakdown at the hands of irrational gun-toters. Curious, that.

Prosecutors say a Virginia man who planned a mass killing at the Washington headquarters of a conservative Christian lobbying group should spend 45 years in prison for his plot.
Prosecutors filed a court document Friday that recommends the 45-year sentence for Floyd Corkins II.
A security guard subdued Corkins in the lobby of the Family Research Council in August after he pointed a pistol at the man. Corkins fired three shots, and the guard was the only one wounded. Corkins, who was carrying nearly 100 rounds of ammunition and 15 Chick-fil-A sandwiches, later told authorities that he had planned to kill as many people as possible and then to smear the sandwiches on their faces as a political statement.

Tags: Chick-Fil-A, Family Research Council, shooting, Southern Poverty Law Center

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