Dwight York

Dwight York (born June 26, 1945), also known as Malachi Z. York, Issa al-Haadi al-Mahdi, et alii, is an American cult leader, black supremacist, and convicted child molester, best known as the founder of the Nuwaubian Nation, a black supremacist new religious movement that has existed in some form and under various different names since the 1960s.

York's origins are contested. After converting to Islam in prison, in 1967 he began preaching to African-Americans in Brooklyn, New York, during the black power movement. He last called his group the United Nuwaubian Nation of Moors, Nuwaubian Nation, or Nuwabians. These were at first based on pseudo-Islamic themes and Judaism; later he mixed ideas taken from black nationalism, cryptozoology, Christianity, UFO religions, New Age, and popular conspiracy theories. Around 1990, York and the Nuwaubian Nation relocated to rural Putnam County, Georgia. They came under scrutiny in the early 1990s after they built Tama-Re, an Egyptian-themed park compound for about a hundred of his followers in Putnam County.

Before York's trial, the community had been joined directly and in the area by hundreds of other followers from out of State, while alienating both Black and White local residents. The community was intensively investigated after numerous reports that York had molested numerous children of his followers. York was convicted in 2004 of child molestation and violations of the Racketeer Influenced and Corrupt Organizations Act. He is serving 135 years in prison.