Eric Shawn reports: The case against James Fields, Jr.
Ed Davis on possible domestic terrorism or hate crime charges
James Alex Fields Jr., the driver charged with killing a woman at the white nationalist rally in Charlottesville, was previously accused of beating his mother and threatening her with a 12-inch knife, according to transcripts from dramatic 911 calls released Monday.
Samantha Bloom, who is disabled and uses a wheelchair, repeatedly called police about her son, in 2010 and 2011, telling officers he was on medication to control his temper, transcripts from 911 calls show.
Records show that Fields was arrested and put in juvenile detention after his mother reported in 2011 that he stood behind her wielding a knife. Earlier in the year, she called 911 to say that her son was “being very threatening toward her” and that she didn't feel “in control on the situation,” according to a dispatcher’s notes obtained by The Washington Post.
In another incident in 2010, the mom said her son smacked her in the head and locked her in the bathroom after she told him to stop playing video games.
There was no indication in the records that he was arrested. Nine calls from the home to law enforcement have been logged since 2010, the Toledo Blade added.
Securitas Security Services confirmed it fired him from his job as a security officer after the Charlottesville crash. The company added that he was on "vacation" at the time, and performed his job "satisfactorily" while he was employed there.
FIELDS' MOTHER TOLD HIM TO PROTEST 'PEACEFULLY'
Fields, 20, was accused of ramming his car into a crowd of counter-protesters on Saturday in Charlottesville, killing 32-year-old Heather Heyer.
Fields, described by a former high school teacher as an admirer of Adolf Hitler and Nazi Germany, was charged with second-degree murder.
A judge denied him bail Monday after the public defender's office said it couldn't represent him because a relative of someone in the office was injured in Saturday's protest. Fields was assigned a local attorney, and another hearing was set for Aug. 25.
The car ramming into the crowd in Charlottesville on Saturday. (The Daily Progress via AP)
Also Monday, a former classmate told The Associated Press that on a school trip to Europe in 2015, a teenage Fields couldn't stand the French and said he only went on the trip so that he could visit "the Fatherland" -- Germany.
"He just really laid on about the French being lower than us and inferior to us," said Keegan McGrath.
McGrath, now 18, said he challenged Fields on his beliefs, and the animosity between them grew so heated that it came to a boil at dinner on their second day. He said he went home after three or four days because he couldn't handle being in a room with Fields.
The incident shocked McGrath because he had been in German class with Fields for two unremarkable years.
"He was just a normal dude" most of the time, though he occasionally made "dark" jokes that put his class on edge, including one "offhand joke" about the Holocaust, McGrath said.
Fox News' Meghan Welsh and The Associated Press contributed to this report.
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