Town Police looking into personnel matter related to officer Twitter posts

Royal Examiner was recently contacted on our website regarding social media posts of a somewhat inflammatory political nature alleged to have been made by a Front Royal Police Officer. The link and query as to whether we knew if the Town Police Department was addressing the matter after having been contacted by the posting source was actually found in our website SPAM folder, as the email inquiry to us was from anonymous@anonymous.com.

“Thought you should be aware of this: (followed by LINK) I know that the police chief has been contacted and has not responded. What actions are they taking?” we were asked by Mister or Missus “Anonymous”.

It’s always something – almost out of the Town needs to pay for its police station controversy, now FRPD has received a complaint about the political Tweets of an officer. Royal Examiner Photos by Roger Bianchini

The LINK took us to a Twitter page with a double flagged “Content Warning” from the posting source “Firestorm on Fascism@AntifascistF12” which self-identified to the right of the page stating, “We ID fascists, bigots, supremacists, propagandists & funders. Not organized/funded. 100% outraged”.

Okay then – this reporter found himself wondering if he had landed at an ANTIFA or ANTIFA offshoot site, ANTIFA being an acronym for “Anti-fascist” as the site was identified. From information I have read, Antifa’s original MO or Mode of Operation was the outing of members of neo-fascist organizations to their employers as such.

Below that was the apparent Twitter handle of the alleged FRPD officer who had aroused this group’s ire. Since Royal Examiner has not independently verified if the named officer actually made the featured posts, we will not use his name in this story. However, we will note that the officer included in his self-identification as a “Common Sense Conservative” and that, “Tweets are my own, not of my agency or other personnel.”

And it did not appear there was any claim this officer was a member of any known neo-fascist group; rather suggestions his anti-BLM posts indicated racism and his intolerance for opposing political views, a tendency toward right-wing fascism.

A quick scroll through of posted Tweets opened with a reference to a story lead “Police union to replace American flags on NJ Turnpike after official …” above which the officer allegedly posted, “Local governments are now banning the American Flag.. Line these scum up and shoot them for treason!”

Several negative references to the Black Lives Matter movement were posted, including, “Now that BLM and Antifa have served their usefulness to the Democrats, will they now issue stand down orders to their commanders in the field? Retire your banners and send your mentally-challenged foot soldiers back into their basements until they are needed for another election.”

Scene of 1960’s civil rights protest referencing ‘illegal police activity’ – things change but they stay the same, a wise man once observed.

Another accusation was the officer’s repeated posting of retired professional wrestler Hulk Hogan memes, which the “Firestorm on Fascism” posters alleged is often used by American neo-fascists as an “HH” code to mean Heil Hitler”. Or also self-identifying as “a fitness guru” I guess he could just be a pro-wrestling fan of the “27-inch pythons”.

We did notice in another post where the officer references a protester running a vehicle into police vehicles and/or officers, the observation, “A vehicle is the preferred method lately of radical extremists…this is another example. Don’t care if the driver is BLM, Antifa, Neo Nazi or a PETA member. The driver should be put down immediately!” – Not sure how PETA got drug into the conversation, but the post perhaps suggested little patience with radicals of the left or right – “Neo Nazi” being referenced – clashing violently with police.

Vehicles have long been involved in protests – here in the 1960’s one is being rocked by demonstrators.

Okay, was the FRPD Administration aware of these allegations. We decided to inquire of Chief Kahle Magalis and Communications Officer Crystal Cline by email Thursday afternoon, October 12. A short time later we received this reply from Captain Cline:

“Recently, the Front Royal Police Department was made aware of posts made on the personal social media account of one of our officers. We appreciate your concern and have taken steps to open an investigation into this personnel matter. The Front Royal Police Department strives to maintain a professional and unbiased agency and recognizes that all actions by police officers can impact community relations. We take this matter very seriously and will be conducting a thorough investigation. Due to this being a personnel matter, no further information on the investigation may be released at this time.”

So I guess that answers anonymous@anonymous.com’s question posed to us under the SUBJECT field “Racist FR police officer”.

As to the allegation of racism, we noticed a post by the officer acknowledging the on-duty shooting death of a black St. Louis police officer with the notation, “RIP Officer… Anyone else getting tired of this? How about you BLM?”

Black and white police officers in line confronting demonstrators, again circa 1960’s.

The entire experience of sifting through both the quite shrill posts against BLM, Democrats and leftist politics in general by the officer and equally shrill accusatory posts of his critics on the opposite end of the political spectrum reminded me of lyrics from a song from another era of sometimes violent political unrest in the late 1960’s, early ‘70’s. Stephen Stills of the Buffalo Springfield penned the song “For What It’s Worth” which included some timeless lyrics:

“What a field day for the heat; A thousand people in the street; Singing songs and a carrying signs mostly say ‘Hooray for our side’ …

“There’s battle lines being drawn; Nobody’s right if everybody’s wrong …”

Postscript

Stephen Stills of the Buffalo Springfield from video of the 1967 song ‘For What It’s Worth’ from which above demonstration photos were taken. Look it up on YouTube, its lyrics ring true to this day.

When opposing political sides lose the ability to rationally converse over differing philosophical perspectives without immediate deterioration into demonization and vilification, the odds become increasingly slim that a democratically based, representative republic form of government will continue to function as planned.

From Twitter posts and claims about a Front Royal Police officer to the ongoing Tweets from a “white house” 70 miles to our east, is it any wonder that the post-2020 national Election conversation has drifted from a peaceful transfer of power towards the potential of an attempted coup to overturn the electoral result due to unsubstantiated claims of fraud by an incumbent installing loyalist civilians at the Pentagon to join others already in place at the Justice and State Departments and U.S. Supreme Court?

Asked on Wednesday, November 11, by reporters about a “smooth transition” of power to a Biden Administration, Secretary of State Mike Pompeo actually said, “There will be a smooth transition to a second Trump Administration.”

And I thought the LBJ and Nixon eras were weird.