Member of White Supremacist Group Admits Role in Hate Crime Assault
| U.S. Attorney’s Office April 02, 2013 |
TRENTON, NJ—A Mercer County, New Jersey man today admitted his role in the New Year’s Eve 2011 hate crime assault of two Middle Eastern men in Sayreville, New Jersey, U.S. Attorney Paul J. Fishman announced.
Michal Gunar, 28, of East Windsor, New Jersey, a purported member of the white supremacist group known as the “Aryan Terror Brigade,” pleaded guilty before U.S. District Judge Joel A. Pisano in Trenton federal court to an indictment charging him with conspiracy to commit a hate crime assault, as well as the actual commission of a hate crime assault, in violation of the Matthew Shepard and James Byrd, Jr., Hate Crimes Prevention Act.
According to documents filed in this case and statements made in court:
Gunar admitted attended a New Year’s Eve “meet and greet” white supremacist event at a residence in East Brunswick, New Jersey, on December 31, 2011. That night, Gunar, Christopher Ising, and Kyle Powell drove to an apartment complex in Sayreville, New Jersey, with the express purpose of assaulting random, non-Caucasian individuals. Gunar brandished a knife and attacked two Middle Eastern men while shouting anti-Arab slurs. He admitted today that he assaulted at least one man by pulling the individual out of a parked car and punching the man about the face and head, causing physical injury.
Ising, 31, of Waretown, New Jersey, a purported member of a white supremacist group known as the “Atlantic City Skins,” previously entered a guilty plea on both counts of the same Indictment before Judge Pisano on February 13, 2013. Powell, 24, of Wildwood, New Jersey, and a member of the Aryan Terror Brigade, entered a guilty plea on January 23, 2013, before Judge Pisano to an information charging him with conspiracy to commit a hate crime assault.
The hate crimes to which Gunar pleaded guilty are punishable by a maximum of potential penalty of 10 years in prison on the assault count and by a maximum of five years in prison on the conspiracy count. Both counts are also punishable by a $250,000 fine.
U.S. Attorney Fishman credited special agents of the FBI, under the direction of Acting Special Agent in Charge David Velazquez; special agents of the U.S. Secret Service, under the direction of Special Agent in Charge James Mottola, as well as detectives from the New Jersey State Attorney General’s Office, under the direction of Attorney General Jeffrey S. Chiesa, with the investigation that lead to today’s guilty plea.
The government is represented by Assistant U.S. Attorneys Dennis C. Carletta of the U.S. Attorney’s Office National Security Unit in Newark and Trial Attorney Fara Gold of the criminal section of the Civil Rights Division of the Department of Justice in Washington, D.C.