A federal grand jury in California has indicted two men, Matthew Allison (37) and Dallas Humber (34), for allegedly leading an online White supremacist group, the Terrorgram Collective, that sought to incite violence and terrorism against politicians, government officials, and minority communities, CNN reports.
According to prosecutors, the group subscribes to the ideology of White supremacist accelerationism, believing that violence and terrorism are necessary to spark a race war, destabilize the government, and establish a White ethnostate.
Allison and Humber are facing 15 charges, including soliciting the murder of federal officials, distributing bomb-making instructions, and conspiring to provide material support to terrorists.
They are accused of pushing their followers to attack minority communities, government infrastructure, and prominent figures, including a US senator and a federal judge, who were listed as “high value targets” for assassination.
The Terrorgram Collective used the encrypted messaging platform Telegram to communicate with members both within the US and internationally. They allegedly drafted a digital publication, “The Hard Reset,” which laid out their ideology and provided detailed instructions on how to operate a terror cell, carry out hate crimes, attack critical infrastructure, make bombs, and identify targets.
Prosecutors allege that the group produced videos and manuals on how to carry out the most lethal attacks possible, including instructions for making and detonating a “dirty bomb” to target minority communities.
Kristen Clarke, head of the Justice Department’s civil rights division, stressed the group’s effectiveness in encouraging violence. She pointed to a Terrorgram user who livestreamed himself stabbing five people outside a mosque in Turkey, and a 19-year-old Slovakian man who cited the group in a manifesto before killing two people at an LGBTQ bar in Bratislava.
“You can’t escape accountability by hiding behind a computer screen,” Clarke said.
