Johnny Lee Clary

Johnny Lee Clary (June 18, 1959 – October 21, 2014) was an American professional wrestler, white supremacist, and later preacher. Clary served as a Ku Klux Klan leader before he became a Pentecostal Christian, traveling around the world preaching the gospel and teaching against racism and hate groups such as the Ku Klux Klan, neo-Nazis, and Aryan Nations. Clary, under the stage name Johnny Angel, also wrestled in the National Wrestling Federation (NWF) during the 1980s.

Early life Johnny Lee Clary was born on June 18, 1959, in Martinez, California. He was reportedly raised in a racist home, where his father encouraged racist language and abusive treatment of black people and saw to it that Clary attended an all-white church. Although Clary's father, a Catholic, was not a Klansman, Clary claimed that his paternal uncle, Harold, was a member and that Harold boasted to Clary's father of shooting an African-American man. Johnny's father sent his son on the Sunday school bus every week to the First Baptist Church. During his leadership the White Knights did not garner much media attention for their activities, but Clary was an active spokesperson for the Klan, defending racism and violence against non-white peoples. In this role he appeared on syndicated talk shows including those hosted by Oprah Winfrey and Morton Downey.

In interviews Clary asserts that he left the KKK for good in 1990 and joined an evangelical church. This time he stayed with the church and in 1991 he began preaching. He teamed up with Wade Watts, a preacher and former leader of the Oklahoma chapter of the National Association for the Advancement of Colored People (NAACP) with whom he had previously sparred on numerous occasions during his time in the KKK.

The story of Clary's conversion from a Klansman to an anti-racism preacher has drawn the attention of numerous Christian media outlets and several national Australian talk shows. He appeared on talk shows such as Donahue, and Geraldo, discussing racial issues in the U.S.

Clary was an ordained minister under World Evangelism Fellowship and Church Of God In Christ and lived in Baton Rouge, Louisiana. In 2009, he joined Jimmy Swaggart Ministries' Family Worship Center, where his wife is employed and began to preach and teach part-time there. He had been an active member there appearing on their Christian Network Sonlife Broadcasting Network on occasion.

Death At his home in Baton Rouge, Louisiana, Clary suddenly died of a massive heart attack on October 21, 2014.