Police: White Nationalist’s Battery Arrest Follows Affair With Spox’s Wife

on March 5, 2018 in East Lansing, Michigan.
EAST LANSING, MI - MARCH 05: White nationalist Matthew Heimbach fights with demonstrators at Michigan State University as he and other alt-right advocates try to attend a speech by white nationalist Richard Spencer o... EAST LANSING, MI - MARCH 05: White nationalist Matthew Heimbach fights with demonstrators at Michigan State University as he and other alt-right advocates try to attend a speech by white nationalist Richard Spencer on March 5, 2018 in East Lansing, Michigan. Spencer was granted permission to speak after suing the university which is currently on spring break. (Photo by Scott Olson/Getty Images) MORE LESS
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The wife of Matthew Heimbach, who leads the neo-Nazi Traditionalist Worker Party, told police that during a domestic altercation, her husband kicked a wall, grabbed her face, and threw her violently on a bed, according to a police report obtained by TPM. The incident occurred in the presence of the couple’s two young sons.

As TPM reported, Heimbach, 26, was arrested early Tuesday morning and charged with one felony count of domestic battery in the presence of a child under 16, and one misdemeanor count of battery.

The arrest followed a bizarre sequence of events stemming from an extramarital affair Heimbach was conducting, according to the police report.

The white nationalist leader is married to Brooke Heimbach, the step-daughter of Matt Parrott, the Traditionalist Worker Party’s chief spokesman. Matthew Heimbach was also carrying on an affair with Parrott’s wife, Jessica Parrott. Per the police report, when Brooke Heimbach and Matt Parrott confronted Matthew Heimbach about the relationship, Matthew physically attacked both of them.

The group all live in the same trailer park compound in rural Paoli, Indiana, where the Traditionalist Worker Party is based. In statements to the police, all four listed their professions as “white nationalists.”

Per the report, Brooke Heimbach and Matt Parrott tried to set Matthew Heimbach up to see if he would continue the affair after agreeing to call it quits. On Tuesday, they spied on him and Jessica Parrott through the window of the Parrotts’ trailer.

Matt Parrott and Matthew Heimbach got into a physical confrontation, and Matt Parrott later told the police that Matthew Heimbach grabbed him and “choked him out,” leaving him briefly unconscious.

Shortly after police arrived on the scene, the officer heard Matthew Heimbach arguing with his wife and “scuffling.” Brooke Heimbach told the police that her husband kicked the wall, grabbed her face, and “threw me with the hand on my face onto the bed” — a violent exchange she said she recorded on her cell phone. The couple’s two young sons were present for the altercation.

Matthew Heimbach was released from Orange County jail Tuesday on $1,000 bond, according to court records.

This complicated situation leaves the future of the Traditionalist Worker Party, one of the most outspoken groups in the modern white nationalist movement, uncertain. Matt Parrott announced last week that he is resigning his post and leaving the group.

Matthew Heimbach is already on probation for a previous violent incident. Last year he pleaded guilty to disorderly conduct for shoving a young black protester at a Trump campaign rally in Louisville, Kentucky, agreeing to pay a $145 fine, take anger management classes, and stay out of trouble with the law for two years.

Read the full police report below.

This post has been updated.

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