A service of Salisbury University and University of Maryland Eastern Shore
Play Live Radio
Next Up:
0:00
0:00
0:00 0:00
Available On Air Stations

Charlottesville Shooter is Member of KKK, Will Not Fight Extradition

ACLU

TOWSON, Md. (AP) - A man who police say fired a handgun during a white nationalist rally in Charlottesville, Virginia, is a KKK member who's been charged but not convicted of violent crimes in the past.

Richard Wilson Preston Jr. on Monday said he wouldn't fight extradition from his home city of Baltimore to Charlottesville. He faces a count of discharging a firearm within 1,000 feet of a school during the Aug. 12 rally.

The ACLU released a video of a man firing a gun toward protesters before Preston was arrested Saturday. No one was hit.

A 2013 article and video from the News Journal in Wilmington, Delaware, shows Preston in Ku Klux Klan garb calling for the impeachment of then President Barack Obama.

His criminal history in Maryland includes several assault charges that did not lead to convictions.

Don Rush is the News Director at Delmarva Public Media. An award-winning journalist, Don reports major local issues of the day, from sea level rise, to urban development, to the changing demographics of Delmarva.