La Mesa, CA (special) -- Alexander Curtis, 21, is a known neo-nazi. He doesn't hide it. Hate literature that had been dumped in neighborhoods throughout San Diego County often included a telephone number. The telephone number in turn referred callers to a Post Office Box. Alexander Curtis' box.

The literature usually was tossed on neighborhood streets late at night or during the early morning hours, when no one was around to observe who was doing it. Was Alexander Curtis himself distributing the literature? Or were other people doing it with or without his knowledge?

Since the beginning of the year when the literature began making its appearance, police have been at a loss to say. As annoying and infuriating as the literature denigrating Jews, Blacks and Mexicans might have been, the U.S. Constitution considers the messages no less legal than any other kind of free speech. 

Police took no action, explaining that if they went around arresting for littering people who put tracts defaming Jews onto streets and lawns, they also would have to arrest for littering people who distribute flyers for church bazaars, garage sales, lost puppies and free real estate appraisals. Harassment of minorities was not confined to literature distributions. A community center in La Mesa was defaced the night (or early morning) prior to a commemoration planned there to

ALEX CURTIS

honor the late civil rights leader Rev. Martin Luther King Jr. The spraypainted messages included "Die Niggers!" "White Power" and "Coon Fest."

Hate literature defaming Mexicans was left on the lawn and stuck into the door of La Mesa Mayor Art Madrid's home, after he had denounced the spray painting of the community center, likening its perpetrators to "animals that come slithering out of the rocks, and spew their venom at night."

One piece of literature "was a caricature of a person depicted as a Mexican and as a greasy sloppy person who needed a shave," Madrid recalled. Mexican women were depicted as "breeding animals, spitting out kids" and "we were just eating up all the taxes," said the mayor.

Another time, "they pasted a sign on my door with a swastika and sa skull and bones and it said 'Get out beaner scum,' Madrid said.

Meanwhile, anti-Semitic stickers, including one urging "kill every Jew", were placed on the door of the district office in Chula Vista of Rep. Bob Filner, D-San Diego, who is Jewish. 

Tifereth Israel Synagogue in the San Carlos section of San Diego was spraypainted with nazi symbols and slogans like "Die Jew Boy." 

A package with a red bow, containing a practice hand grenade, was placed on the lawn of Mayor Madrid. When the mayor felt the box, he guessed there was a rock with a note inside. Seeing the practice grenade "shocked the hell out of me. I thought 'this is not a rock,' and then a rush of fear went through me. I should have known that these guys will stop at nothing including or maiming somebody."

Did Curtis or his associates have anything to do with these hate incidents? Police had no way of telling. At this writing, they apparently still don't. But because of his hate literature activities, they kept watch on him.

They knew he lives in Lemon Grove with his parents. They knew that while an honors student at Helix High School, he had been arrested for stuffing hate literature into student lockers. They knew that you could find his hate messages on the internet, or hear his voice on the message machine advertised on the litter-hate-ure. 

They knew that on March 10 he was distributing hate literature at Cal State San Marcos when a campus police officer told him to leave. They knew that when he returned about an hour later, he was arrested for defying a policeman's orders. Convicted of trespassing, he was fined $100 and placed on probation.

And La Mesa Police also knew that Detective Dan Willis had talked to Curtis recently while Curtis was distributing hate flyers at the Grossmont Shopping Center. Willis reportedly told Curtis that passing out flyers was a form of constitutionally protected free speech. But he was not free to harrass anyone.

Subsequently, a new flyer appeared. It was the one that reproduced the La Mesa Police Department badge. It urged readers to "Help stop non-white crime. Support the La Mesa Police Department." And it gave Willis' phone number, prompting some 100 angry phone calls to Willis from people who thought it really represented his sentiments.

It appeared to La Mesa police that the badge on the flyer might have been reproduced from a business card -- the one Willis had given to Curtis at the Grossmont Shopping Center. Armed with warrants, police came knocking at the homes of Curtis and of Walter Kuttner, 19, shortly after 7 a.m. on Tuesday, Aug. 26.

After searching both homes, the police arrested Curtis on suspicion of possession of brass knuckles, suspicion of possession of stolen property, suspicion of possession of illegal fireworks and explosive materials. They reported that among items gathered up in the search was the master for the latest hate flyer.

Kuttner was arrested on suspicion of possession of dangerous weapons, described as two assault weapons and a throwing star.

Neither man offered any resistance. As apparently is his custom whenever he is questioned by police, Curtis said: "I have a right not to make any statements." 

Police said they were not surprised to find that both men had nazi and Ku Klux Klan banners in their rooms. Local news media were surprised that neighbors generally considered Curtis to be a polite young man. The neighbors didn't suspect he also was a neo-nazi.

Subsequently, police arrested Rebekah Davis, 18, charging her with false use of the police insignia. She lives with her parents in an apartment in El Cajon.

On Thursday, Aug. 28, Curtis, Kuttner and Davis were arraigned by El Cajon Municipal Court Commissioner Gary Bloch on the misdemeanor charges to which an additional complaint of misdemeanor battery was levied against Curtis resulting from an alleged altercation with Grossmont Center security guard Barbi Hopkins.

The defendants all pleaded "not guilty" and were released on their own recognizance. 

Bloch denied motions by Prosecutor Craig Rooten that the defendants be ordered to refrain from leafleting pending trial, and that they permit further searches of their premises without a prior showing of probable cause. 

But Bloch did impose a 10 p.m. to 6 a.m. curfew on the trio, during which time they are supposed to remain at their parents' homes except to work or go to school.

The arraignment, which was performed by video-conferencing from another room in the courthouse, attracted not only members of the news media but former Ku Klux Klan Grand Dragon Tom Metzger, now head of the White Aryan Resistance (WAR) group.

Metzger vowed to "raise the race issue even higher" in protest of what he described as an abrogation of the trio's right to free speech.

San Diego Police want to talk to the defendants about the Tifereth Israel Synagogue desecration. Chula Vista authorities and the FBI are interested in learning what they know about the stickering of Congressman Filner's office. A meeting among law enforcement agencies' representatives to review hate crimes and to compare evidence is scheduled this week.

On Tuesday, Sept. 2, La Mesa Police arrested Michael Moore, 22, of San Diego, and Michael DaSilva, 18, of El Cajon in connection with the distribution of the flyer using the La Mesa police badge.