Aryan Freedom Network North Carolina Exposed

A fourteen-year-old boy who lives in Raleigh and Benson, North Carolina, has claimed he is the youth director for the neo-Nazi Aryan Freedom Network. We have found these claims to be legitimate. Per the AFN website, youth membership requires parental membership:

“White Aryan Youth both boys and girls of good character between the ages of 14-17, and who’s (sic) parent or guardian is also a member of the Aryan Freedom Network, and also who believes in the principles, values above all, the future of our racial heritage.”

With the support and aid of adults in his life, this young person appears to have spoken from behind a podium at “AryanFest” in Lexington, Georgia in October, 2024, and to have been spreading neo-Nazi recruiting propaganda in multiple NC counties over the past few months. While we won’t be naming the 14yo or showing his face, we do want to make communities aware of this obvious threat by highlighting some of the adults who seem hellbent on helping the kid immerse himself in hate and destroy his future.

The Aryan Freedom Network is an explicitly neo-Nazi organization with chapters across the continental United States, though many chapters might consist of one or two people. AFN holds white power rallies, swastika burnings, and trainings for an imagined racial holy war. Members engage in street activism and flyer drops. They are networked with the worst of the worst in the white power movement, including the Ku Klux Klan.

Shannon Dale Coats – father of “Ohpeak”

Jennifer Woodall is the AFN youth director’s mother, and Shannon Dale “Shane” Coats is his longtime chosen father. Both are registered to vote at the same address in Benson, NC. We believe based on her social media posts that Jennifer now works at a cemetary/memorial park in Raleigh and has lived in Wake County since November, 2022, though board of elections records show that she early-voted on October 28, 2024, from Shannon’s address in Johnston County. According to the AFN website, Jennifer Woodall and/or Shannon Dale Coats must be a member of Aryan Freedom Network.

Our understanding is that this family unit is complicated, non-traditional, and centers on co-parenting and “homeschooling” Ohpeak. We will follow the family’s lead by referring to Shane as the child’s father. We do not know if Shane has legal guardianship or if he has legally adopted the boy, but he is not the boy’s biological father. Based on Jennifer’s statements and court records, we believe that Ohpeak’s biological father is not currently a part of his life. It is not clear whether this is by choice.

Identifying Ohpeak, Coats, and Woodall

Antifascists first became aware of the 14yo–Ohpeak–while tracking a neo-Nazi accelerationist chat on Telegram, where he posted a video of himself in skinhead gear burning a flag of the state of Israel and a Pride flag. He told the other chat members that his father took the video, in which a male voice makes an anti-Semitic statement using an anti-gay slur, followed by a song with the opening lyrics, “Are you ready to have fun tonight? Wear your boots & laces and bring rope tonight.” The song celebrates chasing and beating Black people while repeating a refrain telling Black people to “Run {slur} {slur}.”

Because Ohpeak is so active online and too young to appreciate the riskiness of his behavior, it was not hard to find and track his many social media and gaming accounts. This led us to his father. In the comments on one of Ohpeak’s TikToks, a user called JC76 commented with apparent intimate knowledge about Ohpeak’s finances, leaving behind the familiar stench of rightwing desperation and defensiveness that outweighed keeping JC76‘s own followers in the dark about his and his son’s skinhead nazi fanaticism. Some sort of strong connection between JC76 and Ohpeak was confirmed in another of JC76‘s videos that shows the location where Ohpeak stated his father filmed the flag burning. This connection is illustrated in the video below:

JC76‘s TikTok bio included a link that led us to his legal name, Shannon Dale Coats. The identification was confirmed via Facebook, his multiple other TikTok accounts, county land records, NC Department of Secretary of State records, and a lengthy criminal history.

Nobody has time to watch all of Shannon Dale Coats’s TikTok videos across multiple accounts that mostly consist of flat-earth conspiracy theories, bootlicking for Trump, and other weird political diatribes. Unlike on Ohpeak’s page, Coats’s MAGA commenters do not seem to be explicitly white nationalist.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

On Facebook we found Shannon “Shane” Coats in full support of Ohpeak’s neo-Nazi garbage. We have not confirmed whether Jennifer is as fully immersed in white nationalism, but she is aware of–and shares in–at least some of her son’s activities and interests. In June, 2024, she posted a “white heterosexual pride” graphic, to which Ohpeak responded, “Happy White Aryan pride month 1488.” Jennifer left a heart emoji in response to her son’s neo-Nazi signal.

1488 is a common white supremacist code. 14 stands for the “14 words” slogan coined by David Lane, the ill-famed white supremacist who died while serving a 190-year sentence for his part in the assassination of a Jewish talk show host. H is the eighth letter of the alphabet; among white supremacists, “88” stands for “HH” or “Heil Hitler.”

Radicalization

As a pre-teen, Ohpeak went to public schools and may have participated in church activities with his mother, who has recently attended Barbours Chapel Advent Christian Church in nearby Four Oaks, NC. Throughout 2020, Jennifer posted on Facebook with increasing despair about children being asked to wear masks at school during an international pandemic, and frustration with what she perceives as anti-white racism. Anti-white racism doesn’t exist.

In July, 2021, Jennifer wrote that her then eleven-year-old son (Ohpeak) would begin homeschooling. By this time, she and Shane had ended their years-long relationship, but she encouraged the father-son relationship that continues to the present. In January, 2022, Jennifer posted that her son and her ex-partner remained “inseparable,” which we found to be a credible statement when reviewing their social media.

In November 2022, Jennifer moved out of Shane’s home, apparently to a tiny house in Wake County. Ohpeak remained living with Shane for the most part, and also spends time in Raleigh. Ohpeak’s white power radicalization seems to have begun in earnest during this period.

Gaming and Online Presence

In August, 2022, as user @OGcuziMan on Elon Musk’s X (formerly Twitter), Ohpeak boosted his “Ohpeak” YouTube channel. On April 6, 2023, OGcuziMan tagged white supremacist online grifter Gypsy Crusader on X, welcoming him back to the platform after his release from prison to community supervision. Eight days later, Ohpeak tagged Gypsy Crusader on the Gab social media platform, asking when he would start streaming again. Ohpeak had just joined Gab with a bio that read, “13 year old neo nazi.” OGcuziMan also had an account on Steam–a platform Gypsy Crusader and others have successfully used to recruit gamers into white nationalism. Here, OG/Ohpeak’s profile picture was a Sonnenrad, a German Nazi symbol that is now widely used by neo-Nazis. On other sites, he had included his full name and/or picture.

The earliest viewable profile picture on Ohpeak’s Telegram account is a swastika, dated July 31, 2023. By November, 2023, Ohpeak had shaved his long hair to the buzzcut popular with white power skinheads. Shortly thereafter his eyebrows had been shaved off and he was completely bald.

In April 2022, Ohpeak was 12 and posting videos of his dogs, gaming, and lipsyncing to AC/DC, though Jennifer was already lamenting that he’d been “brainwashed” by certain video games. By June 2024, Ohpeak had created X (formerly Twitter) and Telegram accounts for a North Carolina-based Confederate Skinheads group. (The group did not get much attention.) He was posting TikTok videos featuring white power bands, pictures of himself wearing skinhead gear and various Nazi and Klan regalia, and photos of his ever-growing collection of Nazi and Klan memorabilia.

It is very very hard to fathom the amount of money someone has wasted on this obsession with all things white power and terror.

On the Ground

Propaganda Distribution and Networking

In late summer 2024, Ohpeak began posting about his association with Aryan Freedom Network, including media showing the printing and dissemination of flyers in Johnston and Wake Counties.

In early September, 2024, he posted a video to TikTok and tagged users Elksman (identified, below) and Hatred&Proud (unidentified), thanking them for help with one of the flyer projects.

On September 5, 2024, Ohpeak posted a TikTok featuring a Confederate battle flag. One of Ohpeak’s commenters asked, “As a Hispanic, am I welcome?” Elksman responded, “No. The war for my folk’s survival and hegemony will not end until every foe is vanquished.”

We have identified Elksman as nineteen-year-old Jonathan Lee Hardie, registered to vote in Knightdale, NC. Hardie has alternately used Elksman.88 (88 = “heil hitler”) and Elksman.NS (NS = “national socialist” or Nazi) as his username on TikTok, and has also been active as Elksman on Telegram. Jonathan Hardie recently made his TikTok account private and deleted his Facebook account, where he claimed to be a commercial driver living in Roxboro. Jonathan Hardie should reconsider his choice to assist in the grooming of someone else’s child into a life ruined by hate.

On September 14, 2024, Ohpeak told Southern Sons neo-Nazi skinhead David Fair, aka Oi!ster or Oyster, that he and Zolar (identity unconfirmed) were “about to throw 120 flyers.” Two days later, Aryan Freedom Network posted a video to their official Telegram account with the message, “AFN Aryan Youth members spreading thousands of Pro-White flyers across North Carolina, Georgia and Pennsylvania.” The video included several clips featuring fourteen-year-old Ohpeak and another neo-Nazi.

The first clips show Ohpeak and the other person in the backseat of a car throwing bagged propaganda out the window and doing a Sieg Heil (Nazi) salute. Additional images from the compilation show the same two people doing a Sieg Heil salute while holding a swastika flag at a location we identified as the Family Fare at the corner of Hwy 210 and N. Pleasant Coates Road in Benson, NC. The driver of the car is not visible, but based on an analysis of the interior, we believe the vehicle is a crossover SUV, possibly a ~2011-2014 Chevrolet Equinox.

On October 13, 2024, AFN posted on Telegram: “Aryan Freedom Network – North Carolina Chapter spreading hundreds of pro-White flyers.” The post included a photograph of Ohpeak putting a flyer on a car in Raleigh, NC, with a North Carolina State University bus visible in the background.

Aryan Freedom Network is led by Texans Tonia Sue Berry, Dalton Henry Stout, and George Bois Stout. They’ve chosen to have children represent their group as chapter members and they’ve encouraged those youth to do propaganda drops and illegal littering campaigns for the benefit of their membership-driven white power organization.

Aryan Fest October 2024

On October 26, 2024, Atlanta Antifascists surveilled and recorded drone footage of the Aryan Freedom Network “Aryan Fest” that took place in Lexington, Georgia. Ohpeak posted photographs taken in Georgia at that time. In one image, a group of 4-5 skinheads including Ohpeak and David Fair sit in what appears to be a hotel lobby. A second image shows Fair and Ohpeak engaging in the destruction of flags for Pride, the state of Israel, and Harris for President. And in a third image, fourteen-year-old Ohpeak is standing behind an Aryan Freedom Network podium and microphone, apparently giving a speech, wearing his black hat with a WWII German Army (Heer) Breast Eagle replica on the front.

Shannon Dale Coats had posted a video taken in a hotel room on October 24, saying he was in Athens, Georgia. Ohpeak’s hat can be seen in the background.  We were able to match this hotel room and the lobby from Ohpeak’s pictures to the Hampton Inn Athens, which is 25 minutes from the Aryan Fest location. This seems to confirm that Shannon Dale Coats took Ohpeak from his home in North Carolina to the weekend neo-Nazi/Klan meetup in Georgia.

In the days after the event, Coats continued with his regular conspiracy theory, anti-Kamala Harris, pro-Trump videos on TikTok, but included some clues about his white power belief system, writing “We must secure the existence” and “NC Sovereignty Skins” on the videos. His commenters did not show signs of understanding what he was doing here: signaling the 14 Words and referring to an alleged racist skinhead group.

 

 

 

 

David Fair, who has been written about by Atlanta Antifascists and Jordan Green with Raw Story, should also reconsider encouraging the descent of children children into a world mired in delinquency, drug use, abuse, and incarceration. Ohpeak and Fair also attended “Dixiefest” in Traveller’s Rest, South Carolina, in July, 2024, where Aryan Freedom Network took pictures for their Telegram channel.

In the Community

We are aware of three businesses run by Shannon Dale Coats. Most alarming is the Bent Creek Labs dog breeding operation out of his home in Benson, NC. Ohpeak has had a role in this business in the past; we are uncertain of the current status. Visitors to the property would be met with a revolving collection of flags outside, including Trump flags, a Confederate battle flag, and a combination CBF/Nazi Totenkopf flag. A German SS bolts flag hangs in the office.

In addition to the dog breeding operation, Shannon Dale Coats has had a yard maintenance business called “S&J Lawncare.” Neither of these seem to be incorporated, but we did find that Shannon and a niece co-signed a business called “42 Nutrition, LLC.”

Ohpeak and Shannon Dale Coats are known to spend time in Benson, Four Oaks, and increasingly, in Raleigh, NC. We are particularly concerned about time they have spent at Blackmon’s Crossroads at the corner of Stricklands Crossroads Road and Highway 96 in Four Oaks. Ohpeak has posted a picture of one of his flags–a contradictory mashup of the Confederacy and Nazi Germany–taken from this location. A few months later, Shannon Coats posted a video of multiple state troopers detaining a single Black man at this same location.

A Racist Wedding

In September 2024, Ohpeak posted a picture of a group of skinheads, neo-Nazis, and white power bandmates, with several doing Sieg Heil salutes. We’ve been able to confirm the identities of all but three people in this troubling picture, which was taken at the Atlanta-area wedding celebration for skinhead William David “Davey” Locks and  Deirdre Faith Burn/Vickerman. Previously unidentified as a UTR attendee, we believe Deirdre Vickerman may be #TWPHelmetBlondeUTR, who marched with the neo-Nazi Traditionalist Worker Party. Shannon Dale Coats commented on 14yo Ohpeak’s picture with a celebration of skinhead culture and Hitler: “Oi! Oi! 88!” Ohpeak’s mother, Jennifer Woodall, saw this picture and reacted with a sad-face emoji. We hope she sees this wake-up call and removes her son from this world of toxic bigotry.

Klan Connections

Johnston County, NC, has a long history of Klan activity. While Ohpeak claims he is not a member of the Ku Klux Klan, he has remarkable access to their robes, hoods, and patches. In one of these photos, he wears the black hood and robe of a “Nighthawk.” A patch reads, “Ku Klux Klan; Realm of No. Carolina.”

 

 

 

 

 

 

On November 11, 2024, Ohpeak posted a video of himself at the North Carolina State Fairgrounds. He commented, “Well for the better part of 2 years now I’ve worn my skinhead attire around Raleigh…I’ve put of dozens of flyers stickers etc.” We are fairly certain any propaganda he has placed in Raleigh did not last long.

Conclusion

Community and family members should be aware that Ohpeak is being raised to prepare for a “racial holy war,” through which he hopes violence will give rise to a white ethnostate. When asked in September 2024 if he had red laces on his boots, Ohpeak replied, “I haven’t earned my reds yet, no.” Racist skinheads ‘earn’ the right to wear red shoelaces by engaging in racist violence against another person, which they cast as shedding blood for the skinhead movement. We believe that non-white children and adults and lgbtqia people are physically unsafe in his and his father’s presence.

Shannon Dale Coats goes by Shannon, Shane, and Shaun. His current TikTok accounts are:  J.C.76..2, S.D.C.76, SDC0476, and NCBIRDDOG. Please report all four of these accounts for harmful misinformation.

Thank you to the many people who helped make this write-up happen with their labor, advice, and solidarity. An especially big thank you to the fine folks over at Appalachia Research Club.

Finally, a note directly to Ohpeak and those who may be concerned about the path he is on: There are ways out of this and a future that is a bit less bleak.

1. Parents for Peace runs a toll free, confidential hotline for those with concerns about someone needing an exit from extremism. The number is 1-884-497-3223. You can also email them at help@parents4peace.org.
2. Scott Kelley Ernest at Hands of Eir, Inc, is a former white nationalist recruiter who now helps people get out of the white power movement. Scott can be reached via DM on X (formerly Twitter) or Bluesky.

We can be reached at arelephanteau.bsky.social and blueberry92@protonmail.com.