Police in Seattle, Wash., seized a small cache of firearms and gun parts, including military-style rifles, from the home of Kaleb James Cole, an alleged cell leader of a neo-Nazi group, according to local media reports.
“We actually, I firmly believe, prevented a massacre,” said Seattle City Attorney Pete Holmes, whose office was involved in the investigation.
Cole, 24, is the suspected leader of The Atomwaffen Division in Washington State.
“This is a hate-filled human being but one who, unfortunately, possesses a large number of weapons,” Holmes said.
Atomwaffen is a homicidal neo-Nazi guerilla organization linked to five murders and several bomb plots across the United States.
Cole has not been charged with a crime but is named in a “extreme risk protection order” filed earlier in October.
In the petition for the ERPO, Seattle Police described Cole as "a self-admitted member of the Atomwaffen Division," and alleged that Cole had recently participated in "training and recruitment efforts at organized hate camps'" in Washington State.
Cole traveled to Eastern Europe in December 2018 to honor the sites of some of World War II’s most horrific scenes. When he re-entered the U.S., Customs and Border Patrol agents retrieved photos from Cole showing him posing in front of the Nazi death camp Auschwitz.