The FBI first asked Moore to infiltrate a klan group in rural north Florida in 2007.
For nearly 10 years, Joseph Moore lived a secret double life.
At times the US Army veteran donned a white robe and hood as a hit man for the Ku Klux Klan, he attended clandestine meetings and participated in cross burnings and even helped plan the murder of a Black man.
Moore wore something else during his years in the klan — a wire for the FBI. He recorded his conversations with his fellow klansmen, and shared what he learned with federal agents trying to crack down on white supremacists in Florida law enforcement.
The married father of four helped the federal government foil at least two murder plots, according to court records. He was also an active informant when the FBI exposed klan members working as law enforcement officers in Florida at the city, county and state levels.
Apart from testifying in court, the 50-year-old has never discussed his undercover work in the KKK publicly.
But he reached out to a reporter after The Associated Press published a series of stories about white supremacists working in Florida’s prisons that were based, in part, on records and recordings detailing his work with the FBI.
“The FBI wanted me to gather as much information about these individuals and confirm their identities,” Moore said of law enforcement officers who were involved with the klan.
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Extremist network in law enforcement
The FBI first asked Moore to infiltrate a klan group in rural north Florida in 2007.
Moore said he came across dozens of police officers, prison guards, sheriff deputies and other law enforcement officers who were involved with the klan and outlaw motorcycle clubs.
He alerted the feds to a plot to murder a Hispanic truck driver, he said. Then he pointed the FBI toward a deputy with the Alachua County Sheriff’s Office who was a member of the same group. The FBI also identified a member of the klan cell working for the Fruitland Park, Florida, police department.
His years as an informant occurred during a critical time for the nation’s domestic terrorism efforts. In 2006, the FBI had circulated an intelligence assessment about the klan and other groups trying to infiltrate law enforcement ranks. The assessment said some in law enforcement were volunteering “professional resources to white supremacist causes with which they sympathize.”
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Hidden in plain sight
Moore acknowledged that successful undercover work required him to change into a wholly different person.
“I laid out a character that had been overseas. That had received medals in combat," Moore said. “That had special operations experience — more experience than I had. But someone that they would feel confident would be a useful asset to the organisation at a much higher level.”
In 2014, Moore exposed three former prison guards implicated in the murder plot of a Black man. The plot operated among a group of other officer-klan members at the Reception and Medical Center in Lake Butler, Florida, a prison where new inmates are processed. He said the officers he knew were actively recruiting at the prison.
Florida’s Department of Corrections disputes that claim but Moore insists that he saw evidence of a more pervasive problem.
After Moore testified in that case, his FBI work ended because he’d been publicly identified.
Today, he and his family live under new names.
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