White supremacist hurts himself in jail

Injury comes prior to hearing in firearms case
Milwaukee Journal Sentinel, Dec. 27, 2002
http://www.jsonline.com/
By GINA BARTON

Michael Kenneth Faust, a white supremacist facing federal firearms charges, appeared in federal court in a wheelchair Friday morning.

Faust, 35, jumped from the second tier of the Dodge County Jail before the hearing and sprained both his ankles, a deputy from the U.S. Marshals Service said. Apparently, Faust took the leap because he had not received his psychotropic medication, the Marshals Service said.

Before the hearing began, Faust told his attorney he had been subject to “abuse and names” while in Dodge County.

“My client is very, very undone. I don’t know if I should fear for him at his own hands,” defense attorney William Burke told U.S. Magistrate Judge William E. Callahan Jr.

Faust is taking several different medications and had been under the care of both a psychiatrist and a psychologist before his arrest Monday, Burke said.

“I have serious reservations about the defendant’s competency,” Burke said.

Callahan ordered Faust to be committed to a mental hospital for not more than 30 days to undergo a psychological evaluation.

Faust’s mental problems date back to at least 1990. That year, he was convicted of attempted first-degree intentional homicide for shooting a 14-year-old Kenosha boy twice in the chest. He was sentenced to eight years in prison and ordered to continue psychiatric treatment, court records show.

His lawyer at the time said the shooting was prompted by psychiatric problems and fear of persecution for being Jewish.

Faust was in court Friday on federal charges of being a felon in possession of a firearm. Federal and local authorities on Monday seized nine firearms, including an AK-47-style assault weapon, from the Racine County home he shares with his grandmother. Faust allegedly used the farm as a shooting range and taught teenage neo-Nazis to shoot there, court records say.

Faust ran a white supremacist campaign for the Caledonia Town Board in 1990. His campaign platform included preserving the white race, keeping minorities out of town government and opposing integration.

Faust, then known as Kenneth Michael Botsch, got 50 of 1,135 votes and finished third among three candidates. He changed his name last year, court records show.

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