The yellowed "eyes" of the Volkswagen Beetle that serial killer Ted Bundy used to kidnap his victims still watch over a grisly display of crime artifacts: Unabomber letters. The noose from a Ku Klux Klan lynching. Rubble from 9/11.
And now, the gun used by homosexual activist Floyd Lee Corkins in his attack on the Family Research Council has joined the collection of the Crime Museum in Washington, D.C., as part of the exhibit "Domestic Terrorism and Hate Crimes," which opened to the public on March 18.
As WND reported, on Aug. 15, 2012, Corkins wasked into the headquarters of the Family Research Council armed with a semi-automatic pistol, 95 bullets and a sack of Chick-fil-A sandwiches with the intent, he later confessed, of killing "as many people as I could."
He managed to shoot and injure just one person, facilities manager Leo Johnson, who is credited with heroically stopping the attack.
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Corkins admitted he picked FRC, which promotes traditional Judeo-Christian beliefs about family and sexuality, because the organization was listed as an "anti-gay" hate group by the Southern Poverty Law Center on its website.
Retired Lt. Gen. William G. "Jerry" Boykin, FRC executive vice president and a member of the board of WND.com, told WND the exhibit's inclusion of the FRC attack makes sense in a domestic terror and hate crime display.
"This museum exhibit is a testament to Leo Johnson's heroism, the dedication of the law enforcement officers working the case and most importantly, the protective hand of the Lord," Boykin said. "The exhibit stands as a reminder that in a civil society we must never allow free and open debate to be shut down through acts of terrorism. Floyd Corkins, through the inspiration of the Southern Poverty Law Center, intended to use mass murder as a means to silence those who uphold marriage as the union of a man and a woman. As Americans we will have our disagreements, but we must all boldly stand up for the freedom to debate these issues without giving in to fear and intimidation."
The museum explains this exhibit "features terrorist attacks committed on American soil and will also address a topic that is often in the headlines – hate crimes. This exhibit will educate the public on how these crimes are classified and what they look like today."
Chief Operating Officer Janine Vaccarello of the Crime Museum further explained: "It's an honor to install an exhibit that affects so many people. It will be an emotional journey – remembering where you were when 9/11 occurred or if you had a friend running in the Boston marathon. It will also challenge museum-goers to re-examine their beliefs on what constitutes a hate crime, how history has been documented and how prejudices have changed. In doing so, we hope to raise awareness and change behavior for the better."
Corkins, a former volunteer at an LGBT community center, pleaded guilty to terrorism following the FRC attack and was sentenced to 25 years in prison.
Corkins fingered the SPLC as his inspiration for the attack during an interview with the FBI.
Asked how he picked the FRC to attack, Corkins stated, "It was a, uh, Southern Poverty Law, lists, uh, anti-gay groups. I found them online. I did a little bit of research, went to the website, stuff like that."
He said he spotted the FRC on the SPLC's "hate map."
The FBI interview with Corkins included this exchange:
FBI: "What was your intention … You're … a political activist you said?"
Corkins: "Yeah, I wanted to kill the people in the building and then smear a Chicken-fil-A sandwich on their face."
FBI: "And you, what was your intention when you went in there with the gun?"
Corkins: "Uh, it was to kill as many people as I could."
At the time of the shooting, Chick-fil-A was in the headlines because of its president's opposition to gay marriage.
The SPLC still lists the FRC as a "hate group" on its "hate map."
Boykin told WND he wants the U.S. government and its agencies to stop working with SPLC and citing its work, but said his group has never appealed to the SPLC to take them off its hate map because they don't think it is legitimate.
The general called the map capricious and noted it has no definition of a hate group: "More importantly, we think what they're doing is absolutely reckless, particularly given they put us in the same category as groups like the Klu Klux Klan and the skinheads."
Pressure has to be put on the SPLC to stop this, because, Boykin said, "It is reckless behavior that has, at least in this case, incited someone to want to kill people who don't believe what they believe and stand for."