Heidi Beirich, a 59-year-old former director of intelligence at the Southern Poverty Law Center (SPLC), has been arrested and charged with wire fraud, conspiracy to submit false statements to a federally insured bank, and conspiracy to commit concealment money laundering. The charges were announced Wednesday by the US Department of Justice as part of its broader ongoing criminal case against the SPLC, a prominent civil rights nonprofit headquartered in Montgomery, Alabama, that has long tracked and published reports on hate groups in the United States.

Beirich, who left the SPLC roughly six years ago and co-founded the Global Project Against Hate and Extremism in 2020, appeared in court in Riverside, California, wearing ankle cuffs. She did not enter a plea. A federal magistrate judge released her on her own recognizance and ordered her to surrender her passport and appear in court in Alabama within two weeks. Attorney General Todd Blanche, announcing the new charges at a Washington briefing, said the case would continue to expand: