White Supremacist, Wife Die in Apparent Murder-Suicide
This Monday, Feb. 18, 52-year-old white supremacist James 鈥淵ankee Jim鈥� Leshkevich sat before his computer screen and typed these words: 鈥淭his will be the last post on [Leshkevich鈥檚 blog] The Hudson Valley Freeman for a while. I鈥檓 just too depressed over all this to continue. Hopefully that will change in the future.鈥�
It didn鈥檛.
The following morning, police in West Hurley, N.Y., found Leshkevich鈥檚 body hanging in a garage attached to the home he shared with his 55-year-old wife Deborah, who was found beaten and strangled to death in the couple鈥檚 bedroom, the victim of an .
Leshkevich, a prolific white supremacist blogger, letter-to-the-editor writer and radio host, detailed what was apparently his motive in a rambling blog post spread over 10 days. Beginning Feb. 8, the post was titled,
鈥淲e continued to talk, and my wife started screaming, started walking towards the phone, said she wanted an order of protection, and threatened to call 911 ... for no reason at all, other than she was getting very uncomfortable answering my questions about getting caught red-handed in bed with the 鈥榥ice man,鈥欌�� Leshkevich wrote Feb. 14 after complaining that his wife hadn鈥檛 given him a Valentine鈥檚 Day card. 鈥淚 probably would鈥檝e still been rotting away in the Ulster County Jail had she called!鈥�
And his wife might still be alive.
鈥淚'm about to end this ... but before I do, I just wanted to point out that my wife has been the nastiest f------聽B----聽possible since she got caught,鈥� Leshkevich wrote in his final post. 鈥淲hy the f---聽did it have to end this way?鈥�
A country music singer, chronically unemployed truck driver and longtime white supremacist, Leshkevich joined the neo-Nazi group National Alliance in 2000 and attended the Aryan Nations World Congress in 2002. He quit the National Alliance in March 2005 along with many other rank-and-file members during a leadership corruption scandal but remained a deeply dedicated racist.
A frequent call-in guest on an Internet radio show hosted by neo-Nazi Hal Turner 鈥� who was revealed to be an FBI informant earlier this year 鈥� Leshkevich was perhaps best known in recent years for helping Turner organize a neo-Nazi rally outside a high school in Kingston, N.Y., in 2005.
Leshkevich was banned from the white nationalist online forum Stormfront for, as Stormfront leader Don Black put it the day after Leshkevich apparently killed his wife and then himself, 鈥渞efusing to stop promoting Hal Turner鈥檚 various events calling for assassinations of government officials and other homicides.鈥�
鈥淗e knew our policy, but kept doing it, despite warnings by moderators who liked him,鈥� Black wrote. 鈥淚 think that personality trait may be related to his end.鈥�
