Former SPLC CFO Heidi Beirich Charged in Federal Informant Payment Case
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Heidi Beirich, the ex-chief financial officer of the Southern Poverty Law Center, has been indicted on charges related to alleged use of shell companies to pay informants, part of a Justice Department investigation into the nonprofit’s practices.
Heidi Beirich, who previously served as chief financial officer of the Southern Poverty Law Center (SPLC), was indicted in federal court in Montgomery, Alabama, on charges that she helped establish bank accounts and shell companies used to pay informants who infiltrated extremist groups. Prosecutors allege the payments, totaling more than $1.2 million, were made without donor knowledge and involved a romantic relationship with one informant who infiltrated the neo-Nazi organization National Alliance.
Attorney General Todd Blanche said the case concerns “efforts to open bank accounts and fictitious company names and make payments… for reasons that were not accurately described.”
The SPLC contends that the Justice Department was aware of its informant program and that the investigation reflects political targeting. The organization’s legal team argues the program helped prevent violence and saved lives, and that the nonprofit did not mislead donors or banks.
U.S. District Judge Emily Marks recently denied a motion to dismiss the broader case against the SPLC, finding the organization had not provided sufficient evidence that it was being singled out for exercising First Amendment rights. SPLC attorney Abbe Lowell described the Beirich indictment as “legally and factually flawed” and suggested the government was “scrambling to make something stick” as the trial approaches.