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Virgil Griffin's obituary doesn't mention the event that brought him national headlines: the Nov. 3, 1979 , Klan-Nazi shootings, Greensboro's most notorious crime.

The former Ku Klux Klan leader , who died Wednesday , became one of the most recognizable names and faces emerging from the 88-second shootout in the city's Morningside Homes community.

The incident left five Communist Workers Party members dead and 10 other people injured.

Griffin, who lived in Charlotte , led a caravan of Klansmen and Nazis to the CWP's anti-Klan march. Both sides carried guns.

Griffin's family remembered the 64-year-old former Imperial Wizard as "a God-fearing, God-loving man."

Said Griffin's son, James , in an interview with the Gaston Gazette : "He was a kind, loving man. Everyone who knew him - blacks and whites alike - loved him."

Others recalled Griffin differently. They remembered him as a man whose racial views had not changed in the nearly 30 years since the shootout.

"I think he was just an unrepentant, misguided racist," said Signe Waller Foxworth , whose husband, Jim Waller , died in the shootings. "I am sorry that he passed over so many opportunities ... to ask forgiveness for his crimes.

"It is too bad he couldn't get right with his soul. I am really sorry. I am not gloating that he is dead."

Rev. Nelson Johnson , one of the organizers of the anti-Klan rally, also expressed sorrow that Griffin's views hadn't changed.

"I had a radical difference with him in terms of how society operated," said Johnson, pastor of Faith Community Church , "but I have come to respect his humanity and would choose to share my condolences with his family and those who loved him in hopes that his children and grandchildren will be part of making a better society."

The aftermath of the shootings has played out for years.

In 1980 , in a state trial in Greensboro, an all-white jury acquitted six Klansmen and Nazis of first-degree murder in the case. Authorities did not charge Griffin.

In 1984 , a federal court jury found him and others not guilty of conspiracy to violate the demonstrators' civil rights.

Griffin was also named as a defendant in a federal civil suit, claiming that he and others violated the CWP members' civil rights.

But when the case came to trial in 1985 , he was found not liable.

Over the years, Griffin blamed the Communists for the incident.

In 2005 , he told the Greensboro Truth and Reconciliation Commission , an independent panel investigating the shootings, that CWP members had issued a challenge to the Klan weeks before the march.

When the caravan showed up at Morningside, Griffin told the commission, "They started beatin' the cars with sticks and clubs, and all hell broke loose."

Asked why none of the Klansmen or Nazis died, Griffin replied: "Maybe God guided the bullets. I don't know."

Griffin, who worked in textile mills and as an auto mechanic, retired from the Klan in 2007 for health reasons.

He had numerous heart operations over the years and also suffered from emphysema.

He smoked heavily and had been disabled for 15 years.

His obituary did not list a cause of death. He died in Gaston Memorial Hospital . A funeral will be at 2 p.m. today at Woodlawn Funeral Home in Mount Holly .

Griffin's son, James, said his father stood by his Klan beliefs.

"I don't believe he ever regretted it," James Griffin told the Gaston Gazette. "Why should he?"

Contact Donald W. Patterson at 373-7027 or don.patterson@news-record.com