Pittsburgh white supremacist arrested in connection to neo-Nazi flyers
While last month’s violence in Charlottesville, Virginia, proved illuminative on the state of hate in the United States, it also galvanized action from white supremacists.
On Friday, Pittsburgh-area white supremacist, Hardy Lloyd, was arrested for engaging in numerous activities that violate his probation from a 2010 federal weapons conviction.
Lloyd has long been affiliated with the Creativity Movement, a neo-Nazi organization founded in 1973 on the premise of white superiority and “creativity” with a reputation for criminal violence. According to the group’s website, “supporters of the Church of Creativity … passed out 200 stickers, 100 Tightrope.cc calling-cards and 400-500 Tightrope flyers.” Lloyd was caught on surveillance cameras participating in the flyering activity, thus violating the terms of his propbation from the 2010 charge.
Compounding the flyering allegations, Lloyd also violated his probation by appearing at a protest in Mount Lebanon, Pennsylvania, several days after the events in Charlottesville. The weekly protests, called “Mondays with Murphy,” aim to unite opposition to Rep. Tim Murphy’s Trump-aligned voting record. On this particular Monday, August 14, Hardy Lloyd walked through the crowd, yelled “white power” and performed a Nazi salute.
Additionally, in accordance with his 2016 probation, Lloyd was ordered to comply with computer monitoring restrictions. However, he violated those restrictions by using computers at public libraries in Mount Lebanon and Dormont, Pennsylvania, to order a “Blackthorn Shillelagh Fighting Stick,” which has a heavy ball on one end used for smashing car windows. His probation office also reported that Lloyd used the computers to watch video tutorials on knocking women out with chloroform. When arrested at his house, U.S. marshals discovered Lloyd to be in the possession of "prohibited weapons including a hatchet, a switch blade and a punch knife."
Prior to this most recent arrest, Lloyd built up an extensive rap sheet. Most notably, he was acquitted for the murder of his girlfriend, Lori Hann, in 2004 after claiming self-defense. However, he was found guilty of possessing an illegal handgun and was sentenced to jail time and probation. In 2009 he was found to be in violation of that probation due to the possession of 10 guns and was thus sentenced to 30 months in 2010. In 2016, Lloyd was sentenced to 14 months for online harassment, posting blogs about ambushing police officers and attempting to contact Matt Hale, the former leader of the World Church of the Creator, since renamed The Creativity Movement.
Lloyd is being detained until his preliminary hearing on Tuesday, September 19.
