At a KKK rally in Anaheim, Calif., one KKK member stabbed a counter-protester with the decorative end of a flag pole, setting off a vicious brawl where three people were stabbed, one critically, and two were assaulted. (Reuters) 
 
 In 1924, the Ku Klux Klan quietly took control of Anaheim, Calif. 
 
 As historian Shawn Lay details in “The Invisible Empire in the West,” the Klan membership roster in Orange County was 1,280 names-strong, and it was in that same year that four of five City Council seats were occupied by Klansmen. A police statement said the clash, which erupted after six Klan members arrived at a park Saturday for an anti-immigration rally, was started by a group of 10 to 20 counter-protesters who had "the intent of perpetrating violence." When the Klan members pulled up in an SUV wearing black outfits with Confederate flag patches, the protesters had already been peacefully gathered for hours. Witnesses told Reuters and the Associated Press that the protesters began throwing sticks and other items when the KKK car appeared with signs that read “White Lives Matter.” 
 
 The encounter quickly descended into violence, as one Klan member was seen with a knife and another using the decorative end of a flag pole as a weapon. Wyatt said police were there and engaged with people at one end of the fight, and called for additional resources to deploy to the other end. A Ku Klux Klansman, left, struggles with a protester for an American flag after members of the KKK tried to start a "White Lives Matter" rally at Pearson Park in Anaheim on Saturday. (Published Monday, Feb. 29, 2016) 
 
 After a violent brawl broke out at an Orange County park between KKK members and counter-protesters, Anaheim police released the Klan members Sunday, saying evidence supports they acted in self-defense. The seven people who remained in custody were booked for assault with a deadly weapon or elder abuse for stomping on a Klan member who's older than 65 years old, police said. "(The counter-protesters) were so angry, they would have torn these folks limb from limb," said Brian Levin, who directs the Center for the Study of Hate and Extremism at California State University, San Bernardino. On a video Levin shot and posted to Twitter, he later asked one of them, "How do you feel that a Jewish person helped save your life today?" To this, the man responded: “Thank you.” 
 
 Anaheim police have been criticized for their response, which left chaos in its wake. Yet, without the authorities, Levin told the Times, the KKK members “would have been torn limb from limb.” Police said in a statement Saturday that they were aware of the planned rally and counter-protest and had assigned officers to the location. “Even if the vast majority of our community disagrees with a particular group who visits our city we cannot stop them from lawfully gathering to express their opinions,” Police Chief Raul Quezada said in the statement. When the melee started, Levin said he saw no uniformed officers. KKK membership has been on the decline for decades, falling from a peak of 4 million in 1925 to between 5,000 and 8,000 Klansmen today, according to the Southern Poverty Law Center.
– A California Ku Klux Klan rally on Saturday ended with three anti-KKK protesters stabbed and five KKK members arrested. But Anaheim cops now say those five have been released after evidence shows they acted in self-defense, the Los Angeles Times reports. "The totality of the evidence, including videos, still pictures, and interviews, paints a pretty clear picture as to who the aggressors were," an Anaheim police sergeant says. The demonstration, which the Chicago Tribune says was meant to be an anti-immigration rally, turned violent from the get-go after six KKK members showed up around noon. Witnesses say some of the anti-protesters—who the Washington Post says numbered in the "several dozen"—started kicking a Klansman wearing a "Grand Dragon" shirt, and soon the stabbings began, including one by a KKK member using the decorative end of a flagpole. "[The counter-protesters] were so angry, they would have torn these folks limb from limb," Brian Levin, the director of Center for the Study of Hate and Extremism at California State University-San Bernardino, tells NBC Los Angeles. Levin, who was there to record the rally for research purposes, says he ended up shielding KKK members until police could get there. "I was afraid for their lives." Levin later posted on Twitter a video of him asking one of the KKK members: "How do you feel that a Jewish person helped save your life today?" (The Klansman thanked him.) "Regardless of an individual or group's beliefs or ideologies, they are entitled to live without the fear of physical violence and have the right, under the law, to defend themselves when attacked," a police statement read, per NBC. The seven counter-protesters who remain jailed are being held on charges of assault with a deadly weapon or elder abuse for attacking a Klan member older than 65. The three people stabbed were in stable condition at a local hospital.