FAKE NEWS: Huffington Post “Journalist” Accuses Wrong Man Of Burning Black Man Alive In Tennessee

UPDATE: Mark Pitcavage and Christopher Mathias have deleted several of their tweets. The Huff Post and ADL articles have also been changed, but not before we archived it.

Editor’s Note: These are the “experts” who the federal government has been relying on for “intelligence” about hate and extremism … people who can’t even do a Google image search or make a simple phone call to do the most basic fact checking.

I was scanning through my Twitter feed when I saw this:

Our experts uncovered that a white man accused of burning a black man alive in Tennessee in March was a known white supremacist who subscribed to a racist & anti-Semitic ideology known as Christian Identity. Full statement: https://t.co/nYMXJGGmua https://t.co/qNg5G4RAEb

— ADL (@ADL_National) August 28, 2018

Mark Pitcavage is very proud of putting together this fake news story:

Thread 4. Tweet 1 (my final thread, so don't worry). The last thing I want to say related to this horrific murder involves my colleagues. I mentioned yesterday that ADL's Center on Extremism staff were all meeting in New York (off-site). So when newshttps://t.co/D68nPiPG0B

— Mark Pitcavage (@egavactip) August 28, 2018

Thread 4. Tweet 2. of this incident emerged, every one of us was away from our files and notes and records. But my colleagues have so much knowledge and experience that one of them–my friend Carla Hill–actually recognized the perpetrator by his name, remembered that his son was

— Mark Pitcavage (@egavactip) August 28, 2018

Thread 4. Tweet 3. also an extremist who had pleaded guilty years before to his own hate crime against a black man, and who remembered that the family had Christian Identity connections. Now this perpetrator was not some famous extremist, or leader of a group. He was just a guy.

— Mark Pitcavage (@egavactip) August 28, 2018

Thread 4. Tweet 4. But my friend and colleague Carla Hill *knew* him. And she was able to help ADL get that info out and provide some much-needed context for this tragic incident. I am so proud to have the colleagues that I do.

— Mark Pitcavage (@egavactip) August 28, 2018

So a white supremacist burned a black man alive earlier this year in Tennessee. https://t.co/0Ol5dT1arg

— Christopher Mathias (@letsgomathias) August 28, 2018

Whole story here: https://t.co/0Ol5dT1arg

— Christopher Mathias (@letsgomathias) August 28, 2018

NEW from me: The Tennessee man accused of burning a black man alive earlier this year is a known white supremacist, according to intel collected by @ADL_National. https://t.co/0Ol5dT1arg

— Christopher Mathias (@letsgomathias) August 28, 2018

John Daniel Carothers allegedly sent a jailhouse letter, intercepted by authorities, in which he confesses to the murder.

"I believe the Bible is about white people and for white people…. I set him on fire with lighter fluid poured on his head.” https://t.co/0Ol5dT1arg pic.twitter.com/BclTOp6QAm

— Christopher Mathias (@letsgomathias) August 28, 2018

According to @ADL_National researcher Carla Hill, the letter was addressed to a Christian Identity church in Arizona.

Adherents of Christian Identity teachings believes Jews are Satanic, non-whites are sub-human, & that whites are the "true Israelites." https://t.co/0Ol5dT1arg pic.twitter.com/grvBuD1KgM

— Christopher Mathias (@letsgomathias) August 28, 2018

Carothers had been on @ADL_National 's radar for quite some time. He goes by the name "Horst Fisher" on Facebook, a reference to a Nazi concentration camp doctor executed after the war for his part in killing thousands. https://t.co/0Ol5dT1arg pic.twitter.com/rZWYIIZ8zX

— Christopher Mathias (@letsgomathias) August 28, 2018

Carothers' son, Michael Weaver, pleaded guilty to aggravated assault in 2011 after pepper-spraying a black man. Weaver was once named "activist of the year" by National Alliance, a neo-Nazi group. https://t.co/0Ol5dT1arg pic.twitter.com/LRERX6Om0s

— Christopher Mathias (@letsgomathias) August 28, 2018

We’re horrified by the vicious murder of Robert Miller. Our experts from our Center on Extremism confirmed today with @letsgomathias at @HuffPost that the suspect is an active white supremacist. We call on this to be investigated as a hate crime. https://t.co/2LteW3KFYZ

— Jonathan Greenblatt (@JGreenblattADL) August 28, 2018

If the experts at the ADL’s Center on Extremism who are responsible for policing Facebook, Twitter and Google/YouTube are saying it, it must be true, right?

My jaw dropped when I saw that Michael Weaver was mentioned in this. I clicked on the story to find out that Huff Post is accusing his father of burning a black man alive in Tennessee.

I thought to myself: this can’t be right, I have met Michael Weaver’s father several times who is from my area, he doesn’t look like this guy, I have never known him to travel outside of Georgia and I certainly would have heard about this if there was any truth to the story.

I texted Michael Weaver about this:

Note: This is a bad article and a good example of how not to cover white supremacy, Huff Post and ADL. You are accusing the wrong man of being a murderer. I’ve archived this in case Mr. Carothers wants to sue the ADL and Huff Post for libel.

This is a bad article & is a good example of how not to cover white supremacy https://t.co/lXZ3VkEfVv pic.twitter.com/kQ29c6kQ3R

— Christopher Mathias (@letsgomathias) August 13, 2018

Update: BTW, Mark Pitcavage and Carla Hill are also experts on South Africa.

1, Do you want to know why American white supremacists obsess on and promote the (false) notion of "white genocide" in South Africa?

This piece by myself and my friend and colleague Carla Hill explains why. https://t.co/fjG5teAdly

— Mark Pitcavage (@egavactip) August 24, 2018