The letter was addressed to “Morris the Kike Whale.”
It called the Anti-Defamation League a “Commie-kike outfit” and threatened the lives of those working in the agency’s San Diego office.
Signed by Alex Curtis of the Lemon Grove Ku Klux Klan, it closed with the words “Thank you.”
“I could tell this was a very polite young man,” Morris Casuto, the letter’s recipient, told the S.F.-based ADL staff and board members last week.
“I could take the kike part — that goes with the job — but it really hurt me that he called me a whale,” said Casuto, who directs the San Diego ADL office. “I was on a diet at the time.”
Apologizing for his humor, Casuto explained that “it’s a defense mechanism,” developed to help him cope with the frequent, unpleasant threats from hate-mongers and bigots.
Since his arrival in San Diego 23 years ago, the director said the ADL has become “a lightning rod” for white supremacists like Curtis.
“The cost of the professional and support staff of the ADL to do our business is a loss of safety, a loss of security and a loss of peace of mind,” added Casuto, who first joined the ADL 28 years ago.
On one hand, the threats are a compliment. “That we are seen as the primal enemy means we’re doing our job effectively.”
On the other hand, he noted without hesitation, “no one wants to be a target.”
It’s hard to believe someone would target Casuto personally. A short, jolly, bespectacled man, the husband and father of two sons has a winning personality and an immediate ability to bring a smile to those around him.
Yet that same man recently found his photo posted on a white supremacist Internet site with blood gushing out of his ears. His youngest son once found an 8-1/2-by-11-inch swastika pasted to the front-door window. Anti-Semitic graffiti, which included death threats to Casuto, were scrawled on a San Diego school. His name was added to countless magazine subscription lists. The ADL office door was smeared with feces.
And he did, at one time, have a contract put on his head.
“Something like that changes the way you deal with reality,” Casuto said. “Not only was it frightening, but it was insulting when I found out the amount — it should have been much higher.”
But in all seriousness, “it’s difficult to explain to children why you have to have armed guards outside your house,” said Casuto, whose sons are now 13 and 18.
The letter from Curtis came on April 6, 1993.
Curtis, who began publishing the white-supremacist National Observer magazine, following a previous conviction and three-month probation, describes himself on the site as a “self-educated racist by age 13.” He refers to Casuto as “kikesuto” and promotes Tom Metzger, a well-known Klansman.
Last November, Curtis was arrested for conspiracy to violate the civil rights of various institutions and individuals, including synagogues and public officials. He pled guilty in March and was sentenced last month to three years in prison, followed by three years probation.
Perhaps what is the most disturbing about Curtis, said Casuto, is that on the surface he seems like an upstanding citizen. An honor student in high school, Curtis, now 26, comes from a family of professionals: His mom is a teacher, his dad an engineer.
“So from whence,” asked Casuto, “came this bigotry?”
It turns out, said Casuto, that during Curtis’ trial “it came out that his mom and dad are both bigots. Perhaps he was doomed from the start.”
Even with Curtis behind bars, Casuto does not feel completely safe. Curtis is not, after all, the only white supremacist in the region. And the hateful messages he spread will continue to loom in cyberspace.
“If I had known when I was first hired what I was about to experience, I wouldn’t be speaking here today,” said Casuto, who was addressing the annual San Francisco meeting of the ADL’s Central Pacific region. “But now it’s too late to stop me. We must stand firm in the face of potential violence.”
It’s not an easy task for Casuto and his wife to conceal their fears from their children. Every single unsolicited magazine subscription he receives at his home, for instance, serves as a reminder: “Morris Casuto, we know where you live.”