Raymond “Chuck” Foster, the alleged Ku Klux Klan leader arrested Monday for killing a woman following a Klan initiation ritual near Sun, has a history of Klan activity dating back at least to January 2001, Mark Potok of Southern Poverty Law Center said.

Foster, 44, of Bogalusa, has been on the watchdog group’s radar for years, Potok said. He was the founding imperial wizard of the Southern White Knights of the Ku Klux Klan, a faction that formed on Jan. 1, 2001, in Watson, Potok said.

But Foster’s involvement in the KKK and the subsequent murder that followed came as a surprise to many officials in St. Tammany and Washington parishes, who largely thought the Klan was nonexistent in the area. “If there were any, (the current situation) would probably drive it further underground,” Washington Parish Sheriff Robert Crowe said.

St. Tammany Parish Sheriff Jack Strain agreed.

“It almost defies logic,” Strain said. “Just when you think you’ve seen it all, you find out you haven’t.”

Strain said he’s never seen any signs of an active KKK in St. Tammany Parish in his 30 years in law enforcement. In Washington Parish, where Foster and the seven others charged live, the Sheriff’s Office said it has seen only one incident in the past three decades — a lone line of graffiti.

Deputies arrested eight alleged KKK members after a woman, identified Wednesday by the St. Tammany Parish Coroner’s Office as Cynthia C. Lynch, 43, of Tulsa, Okla., was found shot to death Monday.

Authorities said she arrived by bus in Slidell last week to be initiated into the Sons of Dixie brotherhood. Her mission was to then return to Oklahoma and recruit others into the Ku Klux Klan, Strain said.

On Sunday, she underwent several rites of passage, including shaving her head and “chanting and running around,” at a sandbar in the Pearl River, a half mile from a remote boat launch in Sun where her body was discovered, Strain said.

When the woman appeared to back out a fight erupted, and Foster shot her with a .40-caliber handgun, Strain said. He then immediately tried to remove the bullet with a knife, Strain said.

After talking with family members this week, Strain said Lynch appeared to be easily influenced and likely found comfort in a support group such as the Sons of Dixie.

Lynch, who applied for initiation via the Internet, listed on the application she had an expunged felony for attempting to murder her ex-husband, said Strain.

That didn’t stop her from being accepted and having her $25 application fee waived, he said.

In 2004, Foster’s Southern White Knights had active chapters in Savannah, Ga., Homosassa Springs, Fla., and Marion, Ohio, as well as the founding chapter, which by that time had relocated to Denham Springs.

The Southern White Knights disbanded in early 2005, Potok said. Most of its members — not including Foster — resurfaced later that year as the Empire Knights of the Ku Klux Klan, a relatively large Klan group that currently has nine active chapters in eight states, none of them in Louisiana.

Potok is unaware of any Klan group by the names Dixie Brotherhood or Sons of Dixie operating anywhere in the country.

However, last year a new Klan group calling itself the Dixie Rangers Knights of the Ku Klux Klan formed in Walker, about 80 miles from the rural scene of the alleged murder.

It’s unclear at this point if the Dixie Rangers and the Dixie Brotherhood/Sons of Dixie are one and the same.

“But if this group was organized, it isn’t any longer,” Strain said.