The mug shot handed out by the FBI of the suspect Wade Michael Page after a press conference on the shooting at the Sikh Temple of Wisconsin where a gunman fired upon people at service August, 6, 2012 in Oak Creek, Wisconsin.
(Credit: CBS/FBI via Getty Images)
http://www.cbsnews.com/8301-201_162-57487668/sikh-temple-shooting-suspect-wade-michael-page-was-white-supremacist>
FULL REPORT
(CBS/AP) OAK CREEK, Wis. - Before he strode into a Sikh temple with a 9 mm handgun and multiple magazines of ammunition, Wade Michael Page played in white supremacist heavy metal bands with names such as Definite Hate and End Apathy.
The bald, heavily tattooed bassist was a 40-year-old Army veteran who trained in psychological warfare before he was demoted and discharged more than a decade ago.
When the shooting at the Sikh Temple of Wisconsin in suburban Milwaukee ended, six victims ranging in age from 39 to 84 years old lay dead. Three others were critically wounded, including Oak Creek Police Officer Lt. Brian Murphy.
Page was shot and killed by 32-year Oak Creek Police veteran Sam Lenda on scene.
Lt. Brian Murphy, one of the police officers who ran to the scene of the shooting of a Sikh temple in Wis., was critically injured.
(Credit: Milwaukee County Sheriff's Office) A day after the shooting, fragments of Page's life emerged in public records and interviews. But his motive was still largely a mystery. He left no hate-filled manifesto, no angry blog or ranting Facebook entries to explain the attack.
Page joined the Army in 1992 and was discharged in 1998. He was described Monday by the Southern Poverty Law Center as a "frustrated neo-Nazi" who had long been active in the obscure underworld of white supremacist music.
Mark Potok, a senior fellow at the nonprofit civil rights organization in Montgomery, Ala., said Page played in groups whose sometimes sinister-sounding names seemed to "reflect what he went out and actually did." The music often talked about genocide against Jews and other minorities.
In a 2010 interview, Page told a white supremacist website that he became active in white-power music in 2000, when he left his native Colorado and started the band End Apathy in 2005.
Bystanders stand outside the scene of a shooting inside The Sikh Temple in Oak Creek, Wis, Sunday, Aug. 5, 2012.
(Credit: JEFFREY PHELPS) He told the website his inspiration was "based on frustration that we have the potential to accomplish so much more as individuals and a society in whole," according to the law center. He did not mention violence.
End Apathy's MySpace page said the group was based in Nashville, N.C.
Joseph Rackley, who lives in Nashville, said Monday that Page lived with his son for about six months last year in a house on Rackley's property.
"I'm not a nosy kind of guy," Rackley said. "When he stayed with my son, I don't even know if Wade played music. But my son plays alternative music, and periodically, I'd have to call them because I could hear more than I wanted to hear."
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Wisconsin Sikh temple shooting
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Page joined the military in Milwaukee in 1992 and was a repairman for the Hawk missile system before switching jobs to become one of the Army's psychological operations specialists assigned to a battalion at Fort Bragg, N.C.
As a "psy-ops" specialist, Page would have trained to host public meetings between locals and American forces, use leaflet campaigns in a conflict zone or use loudspeakers to communicate with enemy soldiers.
He never deployed overseas while serving in that role, Pentagon spokesman George Wright said.
Page was demoted in June 1998 for getting drunk while on duty and going AWOL, two defense officials said, speaking on condition of anonymity because they were not authorized to release information about the gunman.
Page also received extra duty and was fined. The defense officials said they had no other details about the incident, such as how long Page was gone or whether he turned himself in.
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Suspect in Wis. shooting: "Frustrated neo-Nazi"
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Outside Fayetteville, N.C., a brick ranch house Page bought in 2007 with help from a Veterans Administration mortgage stood boarded up Monday with knee-high weeds in the yard. A notice taped to the front indicated the home was in foreclosure and had been sold to a bank in January.
Before buying the home, Page lived with Army soldier Darren Sherlock, his wife and young children in a doublewide trailer in a rural community near Fort Bragg, records show.
Sherlock, dressed in his military fatigues, declined to comment about Page or the shooting when approached Monday by The Associated Press.
Back in Wisconsin, Page responded to a recent online ad seeking a roommate in Cudahy, a small city outside Milwaukee.
Kurt Weins, who placed the ad, said Page moved in June 23 with only a television set, telling him he had recently broken up with his girlfriend and needed a place to stay.
"We talked, but it was really about nothing," Weins said. "He seemed pretty calm. He didn't seem like the type to raise his voice."
On July 15, Page moved to a duplex across the street. After the FBI searched that residence Sunday, Weins said he returned to the apartment and found only a computer desk, chair and an inflatable mattress.
Peter Hoyt, who lives about a block from Page's last apartment, said he spoke with Page about a dozen times. Hoyt remembered Page having a "9/11" tattoo on his arm but could not describe it.
"I never heard the guy ... say anything negative," Hoyt said. "When I found out it was him, I was awed. I can't believe it was him."
Online records show Page had a brief criminal history in other states, including pleading guilty to misdemeanor criminal mischief after a 1994 arrest in El Paso. He received six months' probation. Page also pleaded guilty to driving under the influence in Colorado in 1999 but never completed a sentence that included alcohol treatment, records show.
Suburban Milwaukee police had no contact with Page before Sunday, and his record gave no indication he was capable of such intense violence.
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© 2012 CBS Interactive Inc. All Rights Reserved. This material may not be published, broadcast, rewritten, or redistributed. The Associated Press contributed to this report.
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179 Comments +Add a Comment 1234... 8Next ».See all 179 Comments by norcalruss August 6, 2012 11:17 PM EDT The only thing good about this tragedy is that ther is one less Nazi scumbag running loose in society.Reply to this comment ...by rwsmith29456 August 6, 2012 11:10 PM EDT Yeah, Sikhs are a real threat to the white race.Reply to this comment ...by sandiegopete August 6, 2012 10:44 PM EDT Every comment I made today has been deleted. Guess I stepped on too many toes. Just posting this to see if it sticks. Pretty hard to go up against the powers that be.Reply to this comment ...by lucifersshadow August 6, 2012 10:37 PM EDT Michele Bachmann Thankful No Americans Died In Sikh Shooting.
http://www.theonion.com/articles/michele-bachmann-thankful-no-americans-died-in-sik,29071/Reply to this comment ..by norcalruss August 6, 2012 11:13 PM EDT For those of you who don't want to go to the above link, here is what that b i t c h Bachmann said, unbelievable!
WASHINGTON—In response to the shooting death of six Sikh worshippers at a temple in Oak Creek, WI yesterday, Rep. Michele Bachmann (R-MN) offered a public expression of her thankfulness that no Americans had been killed in the rampage. "It's a relief and a blessing that not a single American died in this event," Bachmann said of the incident that claimed the lives of six Americans who practice the Sikh faith. "All of us can be grateful for that. Had the gunman targeted a church or synagogue, this violent act could have been much, much worse. There's no telling how many Americans might have died." Bachmann concluded by calling on citizens nationwide to direct all their thoughts and prayers to the family of wounded police lieutenant Brian Murphy, who was shot multiple times while rushing to help victims....by FormerUSMCSergeant August 6, 2012 10:21 PM EDT Probably an avid FNC viewer.
Racists love their programming.Reply to this comment ..by erichsh August 6, 2012 10:38 PM EDT Why not be like ABC News and associate him with the Tea Party while you're at it....by mecanik-2009 August 6, 2012 11:10 PM EDT Maybe he's part of an alien invasion force. Might as well cover all the bases.....by lucifersshadow August 6, 2012 9:56 PM EDT Every time we have a shooting the media has to plaster the shooters photo all over the internet, and that is exactly what they want. You are feeding the shooters, just like the terrorists who make videos before the blow themselves up. Why doesn't the media take some responsibility and stop this practice? Making to much money doing it or what?Reply to this comment ...by sweetbobby August 6, 2012 9:30 PM EDT Does not take anybody different from you to kill you- These are good people CNN and other media are portraying- but if you learn of others that this one temple killer may have read of! To me Indira Ghandi, a sikh and then prime minister of India, said to me that sikhs have historically been involved in businesses and other occupations that involved violence. Indira said to me that she did not trust her sikh bodyguards- two of them killed her! Indira said to me that Mahatma Ghandi, a sikh, had thousands of sikhs killed in his rise to power and that he was killed by sikhs. The sikhs in the temple fled violence from other sikhs- not outsiders like this killer. I say this to show that maybe this killer considered these sikhs dangerous to others.Reply to this comment ...by chonder2 August 6, 2012 9:15 PM EDT Louweeville2
You started out badly when you tried that Dixiecrat/Democrat bait and switch.
Better luck next time with your selective history lesson.
Over and out.Reply to this comment ...by Resin-Smoker August 6, 2012 9:15 PM EDT I have to wonder is it any coincidence that its yet another white American male as the shooter? Maybe it has something to do with the perception of "persecution" of the white male by our politically correct society that leads them to attack others. This is often a common theme for most of these types of attacks and even more so now that the economy has been in decline for the last 5 years.Reply to this comment ..by 7_lucky-seven August 6, 2012 9:18 PM EDT A viable ponderance.
Also, since the majority is white, it seems statistically reasonable that it would be a white guy....by mecanik-2009 August 6, 2012 11:01 PM EDT Minorities are killing each other by the dozens in the inner cities and you think the whites have a problem. Get a grip and quit smoking the resin, it will clear your mind up.....by chonder2 August 6, 2012 9:02 PM EDT I'm suprised someone hasen't mentioned "welfare cadillacs".