Currently in pre-production, Murdered on Fourth of July explores the circumstances surrounding the ambush-style murders of two anti-racist activists by neo-Nazi skinheads in the desert outside Las Vegas on July 4, 1998, including that of a Black poet, punk rocker, and new father, Lin “Spit” Newborn.
The Story
In the wee hours of July 4, 1998, two young men–Lin “Spit” Newborn, a Black poet and musician, and Daniel Shersty, a white U.S. Air Force serviceman–were ambushed and murdered by white supremacist skinheads in the desert on the edge of Las Vegas. Both Newborn and Shersty were members of Skinheads Against Racial Prejudice (S.H.A.R.P.), the former being targeted particularly due to not only his ethnicity, but his huge standing in the community as a vocal anti-racist activist.
This horrific act was ultimately the culmination of troubles that had been boiling for decades. Throughout the 1980s and early 1990s, neo-Nazi skinheads were a troublesome presence at punk rock shows in the Las Vegas area, even as they formed their own White Power bands and built a small but strong following for both the music and the hateful message.
The murders of Newborn and Shersty came on the heels of several other tragic events in Las Vegas, including the kidnapping and murder of a young woman, dancer Ginger Rios, who was attached to the same intertwined scene of poets, artists, musicians, writers, and misfits of which Newborn was an active part. But Newborn and Shersty’s killings reverberated far beyond their local community.
“Nobody took the white supremacist threat seriously,” said Heidi Beirich, Ph.D., chief strategy officer and co-founder of the Global Project Against Hate and Extremism. “They treated it like it was some just silly gang warfare. They didn’t understand what they were dealing with.”
That all changed after what happened 25 years ago on the Fourth of July.
Murdered on the Fourth of July will explore the environment that fomented the growing presence of neo-Nazi skinheads, especially in the 1980s and 1990s punk rock scene, how that spurred the emergence of reactionary groups such as the Anti-Racist Action and S.H.A.R.P., and how the deaths of Newborn and Shersty made a lasting impact on not only the anti-racist activist community, but on the burgeoning Las Vegas cultural scene of the 1990s.
With both the dramatic rise in reported hate crimes and the increased media awareness of neo-Nazi and white nationalist groups in the post-Trump era, the story of this racially motivated double murder is, sadly, more relevant than ever.