KKK Flyers Delivered To Orland Park Residents

ORLAND PARK, IL — Ku Klux Klan materials were found in the driveways of a street in Orland Park this past weekend. The hate literature was distributed to three residences in town, according to the Orland Park Police Department.

But Donna Neil-Demir, who owns and rents out a home on the only street west of La Grange Road and between 135th and 131st streets near Sandburg High School, said she was told by neighbors the person who delivered the material on Sunday had dropped it off "in every driveway on the block," of which there are about a dozen, she said.

"To say it was only 3 (homes)... I'm not so sure about that," Neil-Demir said. "I haven't specifically asked, but I do know many people who received them. From what I have heard from neighbors, they were put in every other driveway on the block."

Orland Park Police Chief Tim McCarthy said the delivery "appears random" and did not come as a threat to any person in particular.

Neil-Demir said the flyers in the driveway of the home she owns were found by the renter, an African-American man. The material was delivered in plastic baggies and included three different cards and flyers containing hate speech, the village of Orland Park said in an email to residents.

The Council on American-Islamic Relations was contacted by Neil-Demir about the distribution of the flyers and have called on local police to "investigate the distribution of anti-Semitic, racist and white supremacist Ku Klux Klan materials distributed in an Orland Park, Ill. neighborhood."

“Anti-Semites, racists and white supremacists are increasingly emboldened and active across the country in the current political environment,” CAIR National Communications Director Ibrahim Hooper said. “All Americans must take a stand against the growing bigotry we are seeing nationwide, which is being promoted at the highest levels of our society.”

Neil-Demir said the white residents of the neighborhood have been more surprised about this than minorities.

"This is part of the everyday life of being an African-American," Neil-Demir said. "It is our history that if you live in a neighborhood that's not primarily African-American you don't know how you are going to be seen."

Orland Park Mayor Keith Pekau was among the public officials to condemn the hate flyer distribution.

“Public safety is a top priority in Orland Park,” Pekau said. “The Orland Park Police Department is aware of the matter and has taken initial reports.... The Village of Orland Park strongly condemns this message and any message that promotes hate of any kind.”

For Neil-Demir, this is something she has not only heard about, but experienced herself, several times in the south suburbs in recent years.

"A friend of mine had flyers put in his mailbox a few years ago... and I had a swastika put on my door in Palos Heights," she said. "There's this fallacy that this type of thing does not happen, but this does happen."