SEATTLE — Federal Agent Bradford Devlin has worn a Nazi-themed tattoo — which shows a “German Eagle SS Lightning Bolt” — since the early 2000s, when he says he got it while working undercover with “The Order of Blood,” an outlaw white-supremacist biker gang in Ohio.
Though his supervisors have said they are “appalled,” Devlin hasn’t had the tattoo removed. He’s now a senior supervisor in the Seattle Field Division of the Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco, Firearms and Explosives. Devlin says there is a cadre of other former undercover ATF agents with similar Nazi tattoos, that it was a “war trophy” from his undercover days, and he won’t remove his until they remove theirs.
That tattoo, along with a series of emails sent from Devlin’s ATF account mocking black people and then-President Barack Obama, are at the heart of a federal lawsuit filed by Cheryl Bishop, an African-American ATF supervisor and former bomb-dog handler. She claims the agency scuttled her prestigious appointment to work at its Washington, D.C., headquarters after she complained in 2016 about alleged abuse by Devlin, who was her supervisor in Seattle from 2009 to 2011 and who she claims has disparaged her work since.
Bishop’s lawsuit, filed in 2018, gained traction Sept. 12 when U.S. District Judge Thomas Zilly denied a government motion to dismiss her claims. Zilly swept aside hundreds of pages of briefs and exhibits filed by government lawyers seeking summary judgment in the case, issuing an unusually brief one-page, single-sentence order stating that “Genuine disputes of material fact preclude summary judgment.” He also refused to postpone the case, ordering attorneys to be prepared for a seven-day trial beginning Oct. 28.
The government on Thursday sought another delay, stating that the two sides are in settlement talks.
Bishop is a senior supervisory agent and former bomb-dog handler who has also worked gang investigations, gun crimes and as a member of the agency’s Special Response Team — ATF’s version of SWAT. In her lawsuit, she says the agency abruptly decided she could no longer be a canine handler if she took a one-year assignment and promotion to work in the ATF’s Science and Technology division, after previously telling her she could do both. The about-face came weeks after she had filed a complaint alleging racial harassment by Devlin.
The government says in court filings a decision was made that Bishop could not do both jobs at the same time.
Bishop has since retired her bomb dog, “Allegra,” and has been promoted as supervisor of the Seattle division’s Crime Gun Intelligence Center.
After the agency learned in 2016 that Devlin still had the Nazi tattoo and had sent the emails, the ATF withdrew his pending promotion to the agency’s Internal Affairs division. As a result, Devlin has claimed in a letter to ATF that he is being discriminated against “based upon my race” as a white male because he expressed his opinion about Bishop’s qualifications. Devlin currently works as ATF’s resident agent in charge in Eugene, Ore.
Devlin did not respond to multiple messages seeking comment.
The large tattoo on Devlin’s left shoulder depicts an eagle and shield bearing twin lightning bolts — a stylized “SS,” which he acknowledged in a deposition references the brutal “Schutzstaffel,” Hitler’s notorious secret police responsible for murdering millions of Jews and ethnic minorities during World War II. Devlin said in the deposition he got the tattoo while working undercover with an Aryan biker group in Ohio in the early 2000s. He said he was one of three agents who infiltrated the group, and getting the tattoo was part of the gang’s initiation.
Bishop learned of the tattoo in 2009, when she was assigned to a group Devlin supervised. She said she complained to another supervisor at the time after a confrontation with Devlin, but nothing was done, although Devlin was transferred to Oregon not long afterward. Bishop claims that she saw Devlin show off the tattoo in public, including at a retirement party for an agent in 2011 where she says he rolled up his sleeve and showed other colleagues “while eyeing (Bishop) with a grin.”
