The new leader of a US-based neo-Nazi group is a black man who plans to dissolve it.

James Hart Stern took over the Detroit-based National Socialist Movement, which dates back decades and has around 40 paying members, in January.

The organisation is one of several extremist groups facing lawsuits over violence at a white supremacist rally held in Charlottesville, Virginia, in 2017.

Court documents filed by Mr Stern reveal how the group’s new leader has asked a court to rule against the group.

"It is the decision of the National Socialist Movement to plead liable to all causes of actions listed in the complaint against it," he wrote.

Mr Stern has a history of infiltrating white supremacist groups. While in prison, he befriended his cellmate, who led a Ku Klax Klan faction, and obtained his power of attorney. When his cellmate died, he used that power of attorney to shut down the faction.

News of his friendship with the former KKK leader reached the leader of the National Socialist Movement, and over the years the two exchanged views several times.

With legal claims mounting, the NSM leader confided that he had to find a way out of the organisation – prompting Mr Stern to pounce.

It is not clear how Mr Stern took control of the neo-Nazi group, which until recently used to send members wearing full Nazi uniforms to rallies.

He has since told the Washington Post that he intends to turn the group’s website into a space for Holocaust history lessons.

News of Mr Stern’s legal move prompted comparisons to Spike Lee’s recent film BlacKkKlansman, in which a black police officer manages to infiltrate a branch of the Ku Klax Klan.