A Stockholm court on Tuesday jailed four men for hate crimes for assaulting immigrants in a case that has shone a spotlight on a growing movement of white supremacist fitness clubs that some experts believe have their roots in California.

The four men, aged 20 to 23, are members of an "Active Club" — loosely structured groups that meet in gyms and aim to promote white-nationalist, misogynist and hyper-masculine ideology.

They were given prison sentences ranging from three to three-and-a-half years for aggravated assault after they beat up three men of foreign origin on Aug. 27 in Stockholm.

The group first attacked a Black man with an umbrella while shouting racial slurs, prosecutors said. They then attacked a man of Syrian origin, knocking him to the ground and kicking him in the head until he lost consciousness and four teeth. Three of the four men then beat up a man on a subway train.

"The four men are of Swedish origin and have connections to Aktivklubb Sverige (AKS), which is considered a far-right organization with clear racist elements and which engages in martial arts," the court said in a statement. "At least two of the men performed Hitler salutes during the night in question. All of the victims have an ethnic background different from the defendants."

"All of the crimes for which the men are convicted have hate crime motives, except for the vandalism," the court said, referring to neo-Nazi graffiti drawn on store windows.

"Intense hatred"
During the trial, prosecutors presented material seized from the four men, including notebooks with swastikas and stickers with the inscription "Love Sweden, Hate Islam."

The victims said they had been traumatized. The man attacked in the subway said he felt "intense hatred" as he was assaulted.

"I was beaten severely ... I didn't even have time to think before he took a running start and hit me with full force," he told the court.

The victim beaten with the umbrella testified: "It was as if these people knew what they were doing, that they were practicing kickboxing or something similar, that they were training to injure."

The accused had denied the charges against them, save for the final assault, which was caught on security cameras. They claimed they acted in self-defense.

The roots and rise of white supremacist "active clubs"
According to the Swedish anti-racism watchdog Expo, "Active Club" members are encouraged to use violence outside the gym against targets including immigrants, feminists, Jewish and LGBTQ people.

They "hope to regain their masculinity by way of violence, improving their physical fitness and building a strong fraternity with other men who support each other," according to a document published by the Swedish Center for Preventing Violent Extremism.

Sweden's intelligence service Sapo has warned of the risk of radicalization of young men attracted by violence and far-right groups like Active Clubs.

Earlier this year, the U.S. legal advocacy group Southern Poverty Law Center said the prominent U.S. white nationalist hate group Patriot Front was using a network of "Active Clubs" across the country to boost its recruitment.

Robert Rundo, the founder of a white supremacist group based in Southern California, is credited with introducing the idea of the clubs, according to the Anti-Defamation League.

In 2021, Rundo started hosting a podcast called "Active Club Podcast," on which he and his co-host encouraged listeners to establish clubs. He promoted something he called "white nationalism 3.0" — a more local, decentralized approach for the white nationalist movement in the U.S.

Rundo was arrested in Romania in 2023 after the U.S. requested his extradition on federal rioting charges. He was sentenced to two years and effectively received a time-served sentence, being released in December 2024.

Source