After the Ku Klux Klan rally in Charlottesville, Virginia on July 8, 2017, a friend sent Regine Wright a photograph they found on social media. While we’ve been unable to identify the photographer, Wright (the officer on the left) remembers the scene. The counter-protester asked why she was helping the KKK. “I told him that I wasn’t there for the KKK, I was there to keep him safe and out of trouble,” Wright writes. Credit: Courtesy of David McNair/The DTM

by Regine Wright | Regine Wright is a private investigator, Army veteran, and former police officer who lives in the Charlottesville Albemarle area with her husband and son. She is dedicated to helping others and enjoys all things true crime.

For Charlottesville, the Unite the Right Rally was traumatizing. For me, the Ku Klux Klan rally the month before, on July 8, 2017, was equally so. It reminds me of how my time as a Charlottesville police officer was complicated by the need to live between two worlds.

That Saturday, about 50 Klansmen and 1,000 counter-protesters came to Charlottesville. I was assigned to the investigations unit — the first Black female detective in department history. The investigations unit was tasked with escorting the KKK members to and from the Robert E. Lee statue. However, when the plan for the event was released, I was the only person from the investigation unit reassigned to a patrol unit for the day. >>Continue Reading on the Charlottesville Tomorrow Website

This story was published as a part of Charlottesville Inclusive Media’s First Person Charlottesville project. Have a story to tell? Here’s how.

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