FBI searches home after reported cross-burning as part of "criminal civil rights investigation"

The Federal Bureau of Investigation searched a house in South Carolina as a part of an "ongoing criminal civil rights investigation involving allegations of racial discrimination" on Wednesday. 

The search comes shortly after two residents of Horry County, Alexis Paige Hartnett and Worden Evander Butler, were charged with harassment for allegedly setting up a cross facing a Black neighbor's home on Corbett Drive and setting it on fire in late November, according to incident reports reviewed by CBS News. 

Butler and Hartnett, who are both White, were outside the home as it was searched, CBS News affiliate WBTW reported. Hartnett was heard threatening to kill everyone at the scene, including law enforcement and media, WBTW said, and Butler kept his hands in the air in an effort to keep a photographer from recording or taking pictures of him. 

In addition to the alleged cross-burning, Hartnett and Butler had "harassed and stalked" the neighbors "with racially motivated words and actions," according to the incident report. The day before the alleged cross burning, Butler entered the neighbor's property without permission and tried to interrupt work being done on the neighbor's home before shouting racial slurs. 

According to the police report, the neighbors said they were afraid that Hartnett and Butler "may escalate their behavior beyond cross burning," and said that their behavior is becoming "more frequent and threatening." 

In a body-camera recorded police interview after the alleged cross-burning, Hartnett was heard repeatedly using a racial slur towards her neighbor's family, even as they were interviewed by police officers, and ignored orders from police to go back into her home. After the alleged cross-burning, Butler posted his neighbor's address on social media and said he was "summoning the devil's army and I dont care if they and I both go down in the same boat." He also said he was "about to make them pay" and complained that the neighbors "come on holidays to start a fight" with him. Police said this comment refers to the neighbors' property being a second home that they visit occasionally. 

In a second incident report, officers noted that Hartnett was screaming at officers "believing they shouldn't be on the property" and observed that Butler had hand-dug a moat around the property.  

Arrest warrants were issued for the couple on Nov. 24, and they were arrested Nov. 30. Hartnett was charged with harassment in the second degree and third-degree assault and battery, according to online records. Butler was charged with harassment in the second degree. Both were released on Dec. 1, according to the records. 

The arrest warrant noted that Hartnett had said in a police interview that she had killed a Black woman in the past. No further information about that incident was available. 

South Carolina is one of two states without hate crime laws based on race, sexual orientation, gender or gender identity, according to WBTW, but the criminal civil rights investigation being undertaken by the FBI is federal. The FBI is the primary federal agency responsible for such investigations. 

According to an FBI news release, the agency is working with the U.S. Attorney's Office and local and state partners on the investigation. 

In:
• South Carolina
• Civil Rights
• Crime

Kerry Breen

Kerry Breen is a reporter and news editor at CBSNews.com. A graduate of New York University's Arthur L. Carter School of Journalism, she previously worked at NBC News' TODAY Digital. She covers current events, breaking news and issues including substance use.

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