Image Credit: screenshot/Atlanta Police Department 
Update (03/07/2023): Southern Poverty Law Center lawyer Thomas Webb Jurgens, who charged with domestic terrorism for participating in a violent coordinated attack against a police training center in Atlanta, was granted a $5,000 bond on Tuesday.
Jurgens’s attorneys argued that he joined the attack on Sunday evening as a legal observer with brightly colored clothing identifying him as such.
Meanwhile, Judge Anna Davis denied bond for the other perpetrators of the attack on the Atlanta Public Safety Training Center, The Post Millennial reported.
The SPLC issued a statement defending Jurgens’ actions.
“An employee at the SPLC was arrested while acting — and identifying — as a legal observer on behalf of the National Lawyers Guild (NLG). The employee is an experienced legal observer, and their arrest is not evidence of any crime, but of heavy-handed law enforcement intervention against protesters.”
“This is part of a months-long escalation of policing tactics against protesters and observers who oppose the destruction of the Weelaunee Forest to build a police training facility. The SPLC has and will continue to urge de-escalation of violence and police use of force against Black, Brown, and Indigenous communities — working in partnership with these communities to dismantle white supremacy, strengthen intersectional movements and advance the human rights of all people,” the statement added.
Original story below:
A lawyer for the Southern Poverty Law Center (SPLC) was among a group of 23 arrested for domestic terrorism Monday after launching a coordinated attack on a police training center in Atlanta, Georgia.
The SPLC is a far-left civil rights group and extremism watchdog the FBI has frequently cited when categorizing “hate” groups.
SPLC staff attorney Thomas Webb Jurgens was charged with domestic terrorism after joining dozens of rioters dressed in black who stormed the Atlanta Public Safety Training Center and launched fireworks, Molotov cocktails, bricks and rocks at officers.
One of the Antifa members arrested on domestic terrorism charges in Atlanta last night is a staff attorney with the Southern Poverty Law Center.
The FBI has historically used the SPLC as a source for who should be considered domestic terrorists. pic.twitter.com/y5isk5AHaq
— Greg Price (@greg_price11) March 6, 2023
Jurgens obtained his law degree from the University of Georgia, is an active member of the Georgia bar and the Florida bar, according to his his LinkedIn profile and other publicly available profiles.
The attacks were reportedly carried out by far-left group Defend ATL Forest, which has been protesting the development of the training center — they call “Cop City” — for years in the name of protecting Atlanta forests.
So far the SPLC has not responded to Jurgens’ domestic terrorism charges.
The irony of a member of a so-called anti-extremist organization carrying out a domestic terrorist attack against police officers may be lost on federal agencies like the Department of Justice, who’ve been giving far-left groups a free pass to commit political violence since Merrick Garland was appointed attorney general.
Should the DOJ open an investigation into the SPLC for harboring actual domestic terrorists? Yes.
But will they? Not likely.