The man allegedly responsible for killing one woman and injuring 19 others when he plowed his car into them had idolized Hitler and had a fascination with Nazis, his teacher claims.
James Alex Fields Jr, 20, is accused of driving his Dodge Challenger into a crowd of peaceful counter-protesters in Charlottesville, Virginia, on Saturday afternoon.
Horrific videos show the car accelerating into the crowd before the vehicle reverses and drives off, leaving behind injured people screaming in pain.
The man from Maumee, Ohio, had been pictured marching with a racist, right-wing group known as Vanguard America, a few hours before the deadly attack.
Now, Fields’ former high school teacher claims that Fields admired Adolf Hitler, sympathized with Nazi views and wrote a paper that was a ‘lovefest’ for the racist group.
Derek Weimer told the Washington Post he taught history to Fields during his junior and senior years at Randall K. Cooper High School in Kentucky.
The teacher said Fields once wrote a lengthy research paper about the Nazi military.
Weimer said: ‘It was obvious that he had this fascination with Nazism and a big idolatry of Adolf Hitler. He had white supremacist views. He really believed in that stuff.’
He added that Fields’ paper was a ‘big lovefest for the German military and the Waffen-SS.’
Weimer said he blames himself for not being able to steer Fields’ away from these views, saying: ‘When you’re a teacher and you see one of your former students do this, it’s a nightmare scenario. This was something that was growing in him.
‘I admit I failed. I tried my best. But this is definitely a teachable moment and something we need to be vigilant about because this stuff is tearing up our country.’
The teacher added to WCPO that Fields had ‘radical ideas on race’ and he wanted to join the Army but wasn’t allowed to enlist because of his mental health history.
Fields’ mother said she was shocked about her son’s affiliation with extremist groups, admitting she thought he was going to the rally because it involved Trump.
His mother, Samantha Bloom, said in an interview Saturday night: ‘I just knew he was going to a rally. I mean, I try to stay out of his political views. You know, we don’t, I don’t really get too involved, I moved him out to his own apartment, so I’m watching his cat.’
Bloom was informed during the interview by an AP reporter that the rally was indeed organized by white nationalists. ‘I thought it had something to do with Trump. Trump’s not a white supremacist,’ she said.