EVIDENCE OF COVER-UP IN OKLAHOMA BOMBING
(Four Reports)MASSIVE, SYSTEMATIC FABRICATION OF EVIDENCE AT FBI LAB
AFFECTING OKLAHOMA, ATLANTA, AND NEW YORK BOMBING CASESA still secret Justice Department Inspector General draft report raises sharp criticism of the FBI crime lab.
The internal findings basically confirm the allegations by FBI whistleblower Dr. Frederic Whitehurst of massive, systematic tampering of evidence, slanting of results, covering up of facts, and sloppy science at the FBI crime lab. Whitehurst was suspended last week after the FBI received the report Senator Charles Grassley (R-Iowa), who is following the case closely, said that the suspension looked like a retaliation for Whitehurst's whistleblowing.
Three other FBI lab officials, who were involved in the handling of evidence in the Oklahoma City bombing investigation, were suspended last week as well.
The problems at the lab now call into question its handling of evidence in the Oklahoma City bombing investigation as well as the Atlanta Olympic Games bombing and the New York Trade Center bombing.
But we know that the problems at the crime lab are just the tip of the iceberg. As detailed in the Washington Weekly over several years, there has been a systematic fabrication of evidence and falsification of testimony by the FBI in cases that involve the federal government: most notably the death of Vince Foster and the Oklahoma City bombing. In the Vince Foster case, witness Patrick Knowlton has stepped forward to detail the harassment, intimidation, and falsification of testimony he has been subjected to in the investigation.
In the Oklahoma City bombing case, witnesses like Connie Smith have stepped forward to reveal the intimidation and falsification of testimony she has been subjected to because of her knowledge of John Doe II (see news story elsewhere in this issue).
It is obvious that this is not merely "prosecutorial bias" but that an active cover-up of the role of the government in those two cases is ongoing. After more than three years, the FBI is still unable to determine whether Vince Foster committed suicide or was murdered. Clearly, the evidence does not yet support the conclusion the government wants.
"There's been too much covering up by the FBI for too long," said Senator Charles Grassley on ABC News last week.
The courage and integrity of Dr. Frederic Whitehurst is now legendary. Despite intimidation, threats, and harassment -- he was transferred from top level scientist to paint chip analyzer trainee after coming forward and is now suspended--he stood up for what is right. Congress should bestow upon him its medal of honor. People like Whitehurst--one man out of the thousand of FBI employees--are the only ones that stand between us and tyrannical government.
Published in the Feb. 3, 1997 Issue of The Washington Weekly
NATIONAL SECURITY COUNCIL LINK IN OKLAHOMA BOMBING?
BATE ANFO bomb expert present in Oklahoma on day of bombing
by David HoffmanWas the BATF in fact responsible, knowingly or unknowingly, for the explosion that destroyed the Murrah building? Consider the following article which appeared in the June 5, 1995 issue of Newsweek:
"For the past year, the BATF and the Army Corps of Engineers have been blowing up car bombs at the White Sands Proving Ground in New Mexico. The project, codenamed Dipole Might, is designed to create a computer model to unravel terrorist car-and truck-bomb attacks. By coincidence, a BATF agent assigned to Dipole Might, happened to be in Oklahoma City on April 19th, working at the Federal Courthouse, which stands across the street from the Murrah Building. He saw the devastation and called the BATF office in Dallas. The Murrah Building had just been hit by 'ANFO' (ammonium material) bomb of at least several thousand pounds, he reported. Within minutes, explosives agents trained under Dipole Might were dispatched to the scene. They identified the type and size of the bomb almost immediately."
Just how this agent (Harry Everhart) was able to immediately ascertain the building had been blown up by an ANFO bomb, when no forensic analysis had yet been conducted, is unclear. When Phil O'Halloran, a freelance journalist, attempted to ask the BATF Public Relations Bureau why a Dipole Might expert just happened to be in the courthouse at that moment, and how he could immediately have known the exact nature of the bomb, O'Halloran, rather than be given a rational explanation, was accused of attacking the agency and was promised a fax of agency views on right-wing conspiracists (which never arrived). . . .
It also seems that the "coincidence" of the BATF's Dipole Might tests were uncannily similar to the May 24, 1990 bombing of Earth First! activist Judi Bari. The FBI claimed that Bari and her companion Daryl Cherney, who were on their way to a peaceful protest rally, had inadvertently blown themselves up with their own pipe-bomb.
After Bari sued the FBI for false arrest and civil rights violations, she found out through court discovery that the FBI ran a "bomb school" at Eureka College of the Redwoods in April of 1990 for both FBI and local police. The classes included blowing up cars with pipe bombs, ostensibly to demonstrate tactics used by terrorists (the same reason cited in the BATF case). The instructor for this "school of terrorism" was none other than Frank Doyle Jr., the FBI bomb squad expert who showed up at the scene of Bari's car bombing one month later.
According to Freedom of Information Act records, the Treasury Department's (BATF is under the Treasury Department) Project Dipole Might was actually initiated under the authorization of Clinton's National Security Council. One of the stated purposes of the Dipole Might project was to produce computer models of bombings to "be displayed in a courtroom to aid in the prosecution of defendants." Naturally, the Justice Department plans on using the video tapes shot at White Sands during the trial of McVeigh and Nichols to "prove" that an ANFO bomb blew up the building. As Lawrence Myers, writing in Media Bypass magazine wrote:
Why the National Security Council would fund such an ATF project, despite the absolute rarity of the crime, has not been explained. Nor has it been explained as to what specific threat assessment information the need for detailed information regarding ANFO truck-bomb attacks?
Was the BATF expecting such a bombing? Were they in fact responsible for blast or the secondary damage to the building? Or was the building wired for demolition as part of a larger plot?
"I'm firmly convinced that the BATF is guilty of an awful lot of things," said Bud, our ex-Green Beret friend. "I mean, if you look at what the BATF and the FBI did to Randy Weaver (and at Waco), it's just awful. They've gone hog wild and have [become] a power unto themselves."
Asked if he thought a rogue group or special unit within the military/intelligence community could or would commit such an act?
"It wouldn't really stun me," said Bud.
Published in the Feb. 3, 1997 Issue of The Washington Weekly
JOHN DOE II ARRESTED BY FBI Michael William Brescia, who has been linked to the Oklahoma City bombing as John Doe II, has been arrested on bankrobbing charges by the FBI.
Brescia was indicted together with four other members of the Aryan Republican Army white separatist group last week. The FBI denied that his arrest had anything to do with the Oklahoma bombing. The FBI now even denies that John Doe II exists.
But Edye Smith, the mother of two children who died in the bombing, in a private law suite has named Brescia as the John Doe II that the FBI was looking for immediately after the bombing in response to eyewitness accounts. Brescia, together with Andreas Strassmeir were government informants who infiltrated the underground resistance movement. For a time they lived together at Elohim City, Oklahoma. A few days before the bombing, Strassmeir received a telephone call at Elohim City. The call was from Timothy McVeigh.
The FBI has been outright hostile to witnesses who claim to have seen Timothy McVeigh and Michael Brescia together. Eyewitness Connie Smith last year told the London Telegraph that "I kept telling them that the man in the [John Doe II] sketch was that Mike guy, a nice-looking guy, dark-skinned. But the FBI made me feel guilty, then ignorant, as if I didn't know what I was saying. Then, later, I tried to call in with more information and they wouldn't even talk to me."
It is difficult to gauge the motive of the FBI in this arrest. Operating under the assumption that the FBI is covering up something in the Oklahoma bombing, the arrest could be seen as an interference in the law suit brought by Edye Smith. Prosecution on phony charges is the most frequently used device to destroy the credibility offormer government employees or informants who know too much.
Published in the Feb. 3, 1997 Issue of The Washington Weekly
OKLAHOMA CITY COVERUP EXPOSED
But The Mainstream Media Are Still In Denial
By Edward ZehrA paid informant of the Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco and Firearms (BATF) has revealed to an Oklahoma newspaper that she reported to the agency late in 1994 that three federal buildings, two of them in Tulsa and the other in Oklahoma City, were being discussed as potential targets for bombing by members of an extremist group located in Elohim City, Oklahoma. The story has been largely ignored by the mainstream media, although NBC News on February 7 carried a somewhat different version of the revelations that later appeared in the McCurtain Daily Gazette, ambiguously suggesting that although Howe gave the government information regarding "alleged threats" prior to the bombing, there is "no evidence" that she reported "specific threats" against the Murrah Building until two days after the bombing.
Reporter J.D. Cash, writing in the February 11 McCurtain (County, Oklahoma) Daily Gazette, is unequivocal in asserting that the government had prior warning ofthe attack, however:
"During a series of clandestine interviews, Howe told the McCurtain Daily Gazette that the BATF knew as far back as the fall of 1994 that the Murrah Federal Building and two other Oklahoma federal buildings had been targeted for destruction by residents of and frequent visitors to an eastern Oklahoma religious cult known as Elohim City."
Mike Vanderboegh, who edits the John Doe Times, a newsletter that covers current developments in the Oklahoma City bombing story, has alleged that ABC News had a more detailed story on the government's prior knowledge of the bombing ready to run, only to have it spiked by the network's management. Once more, the American mainstream media have given convincing demonstration of their inability to deal objectively and openly with a politically sensitive story ofvital interest to the public.
Lolling about on Air Force One shortly after the election, President Clinton told reporters who accompanied him on the flight that the Oklahoma bombing had been "a turning point in his political fortunes." The militias, who played no part whatever in the bombing, but like Richard Jewell, had much of the blame affixed to them through the deft use of innuendo by the mainstream press, found themselves lumped together with the bombers under the designation "Right-wingers" as the designated villains of the piece. "It broke a spell in the country as the people began searching for our common ground again," said Clinton, with self-serving unctuousness.
Ambrose Evans-Pritchard, the Washington bureau chief of the London Telegraph, whose keen observation of the American political scene is unparalleled, since the time of Alexis de Toqueville anyway, put it all in perspective:
"Clinton seized the moment. He blamed Right-wing radio talk shows for sowing distrust of government institutions and for creating a climate of "hate" that fostered recourse to violence. He did not name the Republicans as co-conspirators; he did not have to. The US media made the connection for him.
"Tim McVeigh was the military expression of the Gingrich agenda, opined the commentators. Republicans had failed to understand that rhetoric has consequences, and now look what had happened."
The Republicans were utterly cowed by the audacity of Clinton's attack, unable to articulate a defense. Those few who attempted to remind the public that it had all started with the savagery of the government assault on the Branch Davidian compound at Waco were quickly shouted down by an intensely partisan and tendentious mainstream press.
"It worked like magic for Clinton," Evans-Pritchard observed. "With control over the Justice Department and the FBI - which he has politicized to an extraordinary degree - he has been able to shape perception of the bombing."
The British journalist expressed doubt, however, in an article appearing in the London Telegraph last November, that the government would be able to "keep the lid on this case" much longer. A number of local newspapers have reported allegations that federal investigators have failed to pursue all of those suspected of involvement in the bombing, in order to protect some who were informants. And in October the Canadian Broadcasting Company ran a documentary that put the story in an entirely different perspective. To trace the story to its origins, it is necessary to go back a dozen years or so to the group of self described "racialists" who live in a small settlement in the Ozark mountains of Eastern Oklahoma which they call Elohim City.
ELOHIM CITY
These people are adherents of a religious sect known as "Christian Identity" which teaches that white northern Europeans are God's chosen people, although they deny that they are "racists", or even "white separatists." The distinction is a fine one, to be sure. The movement's spiritual leader is an aging Canadian named Robert G. Millar, who was once a Mennonite pacifist. Millar settled in the location near Muldrow, Oklahoma 24 years ago with a small group of followers. Now the 71 year-old leader is known as "Grandpa" to his flock of 80 or so adherents, many of whom are related to him by birth or marriage.
Millar told the CBC journalist who interviewed him that his followers are trained in the use of firearms when they reach the age of 13 or 14. Local police who visited the site several years ago to serve legal papers were greeted by armed teenagers.
Deborah Hastings of the Associated Press observes that, "People seeking the company of like-minded zealots travel between Elohim City and other extremist encampments, including the Hayden Lake, Idaho, compound of Aryan Nations founder Richard Butler and the Pennsylvania farm of Aryan Nations leader Mark Thomas."
RICHARD SNELL AND THE CSA
Thomas, who was recently arrested in connection with a series of bank robberies, is a pivotal figure in the Aryan Republican Army, an armed, militant (some would say terrorist) organization. But the Oklahoma sect's connection with militant extremists began a good deal earlier. During the early 1980s, a man named Richard Snell made frequent trips to Elohim City accompanied by his followers. Snell was a key figure in a group of Arkansas extremists known as the CSA (The Covenant, The Sword and the Arm of the Lord). Their goal was the violent overthrow ofthe federal government.
In the words of the script writer of the CBC documentary, "Millar taught them about God, they taught Millar about guns."
According to the CBC, in 1983 Snell and an associate named Jim Ellison came up with several schemes to punish the nation which they perceived to have strayed from the pathway of righteousness. One of their plans was "to blow up the Murrah Building in Oklahoma City, the same building that would be destroyed 13 years later."
Kerry Noble, a follower of Millar and second in command ofthe CSA is shown in the documentary saying, "I still look at things like this and realize how close we were, and, you know, that this could have been me having done this. . . It was one of the targets that we had talked about at CSA in '83. The day it happened, as soon as I heard it on the news, I said, the right wing's done [it], they finally took that step."
Noble explained that the Murrah Building had been considered as a target because it was in a low security area and housed so many government agencies. He said the plotters thought that it would have more effect on the country "than if you did a building, say, in New York City or something."
Jim Ellison, who was subsequently charged with sedition, admitted during his trial that he had "scoped out" the Murrah building and several others for Snell and one of his "associates." They did not have a chance to act on this information, though, for on April 19, 1985 (note the date) they were besieged by federal agents and, after holding them off for a time, surrendered and were taken into custody. Kerry Noble was imprisoned for 26 months after being convicted on weapons charges.
Richard Snell was later arrested for the murder of a pawnbroker, whom he mistakenly thought to be Jewish, and of a black state trooper. In March of 1995 the State of Arkansas set an execution date for Snell -- April 19. This was particularly infuriating to Snell's supporters, who associated the date with the Waco atrocity. Possibly this is what motivated Tim McVeigh to choose the false birth date of April 19 on the fake driver's license which he used in the Oklahoma bombing.
Kerry Noble is convinced that McVeigh was influenced by Snell. Asked ifhe thought it a coincidence that the ARA chose the Murrah building as a target, Noble replied, "No, I don't think it's any coincidence. When you bring that into account with the declaration of war that we made, the pressure that the older leaders of the groups are putting on the younger followers to do something in a major way before they die - no, it's no coincidence."
Millar, who visited Snell frequently in prison was non-committal when asked whether he thought it possible that McVeigh was inspired by Snell's execution to blow up the Murrah Building although he conceded that it was quite a coincidence and expressed hope that the truth would come out at the trial.
WHO FINANCED THE BOMBING?
An Oklahoma grand jury concluded in its final report that the bombing of the federal building had been financed with a theft of guns in Arkansas on November 5, 1994, yet federal authorities have concluded that the components of the bomb used in the attack had already been purchased at the time of the robbery. McVeigh's attorney has witnesses who place him hundreds of miles from the scene of the theft at the time it occurred. How then were McVeigh and Nichols able to support themselves during their extensive travels in 1994 and 1995? Both of them made trips back and forth across the country during the year prior to the bombing, and Nichols traveled several times to the Philippines with his wife during that time. Yet the two men were employed only sporadically and the profits from their gun show business were not adequate to finance their travels. A possible answer is suggested by the fact that McVeigh's whereabouts are unknown for several days preceding and following 11 of the 12 robberies committed by the ARA during this period.
A possible clue was provided by Terry Nichols former wife, Lana Padilla, who told federal investigators that she found more than $60,000 in silver bullion in a Las Vegas storage locker rented by her ex-husband, together with several masks and wigs. She later told them that she had also discovered a bag containing $20,000 hidden in her utensil cabinet.
THE ELOHIM CITY CONNECTION
Bank robber Kevin McCarthy referred to Elohim City in testimony he gave at the trial of Peter Langan, the leader of the ARA gang, and Millar has confirmed that McCarthy lived there prior to the Oklahoma bombing and that Stedeford, another member ofthe gang, had also visited there from time to time. According to Millar, both McCarthy and Stedeford were closely associated with Andreas Strassmeir, who is thought by some observers to have been a BATF informant, and Michael Brescia, who has been identified by several witnesses as John Doe II.
The McCurtain Gazette has interviewed witnesses who claim to have seen Strassmeir and Brescia with McVeigh on various occasions right up to the period several days before the bombing. Two women from Herington, Kansas who identified Brescia as John Doe II told the FBI that Strassmeir, McVeigh, and Brescia were old friends. This has been denied by Strassmeir's attorney Kirk Lyons. Brescia has declined to comment on this or any other allegations made against him.
Although McVeigh denies having visited Elohim City, law enforcement authorities have told the McCurtain Gazette that their intelligence reports have placed him there on a number of occasions. There is also a record of McVeigh getting a traffic ticket just a few miles from the entrance of Elohim City on Oct. 12, 1993. McVeigh is believed to have participated in military maneuvers directed by Strassmeir at Elohim City on Sept. 12, 1994. About 70 people are said to have taken part in the exercise. Records show that McVeigh was checked in to a nearby motel at the time. Telephone records show that on Sept. 24 somebody made the first of a series of calls for the purpose of acquiring the components of a bomb. The call was made from the home of Terry Nichols in Kansas where McVeigh was visiting at the time.
Eleven days before the bombing Strassmeir, Brescia and McVeigh were seen together at Lady Godiva's, a strip club located in Tulsa, by several ofthe women who worked there. A video tape that was made in the dressing room of the club that night was shown in the CBC documentary. One of the dancers who appears in the tape mentioned that a customer had told her that "You're going to remember me on April 19, '95; you're going to remember me for the rest of your life."
Witnesses identified the customer as McVeigh. One of the women who worked at the club said, after being interviewed by the FBI, that she might have to testify at McVeigh's trial.
CAROL HOWE
Carol E. Howe is a 26-year-old former actress and beauty queen who has won awards for steeplechase competition and hunting. She was an honors student in high school and college. More recently she has worked as an infiltrator of extremist groups and paid informant for the BATF, as has been revealed by the McCurtain Gazette and confirmed by the Justice Department.
The newspaper conducted a series of interviews with Ms. Howe after learning her identity in early December and contacting her on Christmas Eve. During the course ofthe interviews she told them ofthe white supremacist ARA at Elohim City that had made plans to blow up a government building and had selected three potential targets in Oklahoma. She also described "in great detail" the work she did for Special Agent Angela Finley of the Tulsa office of the BATF. The agency has confirmed that Howe worked for them. In more than 70 reports she filed with the agency, Howe revealed that two of the subjects from Elohim City, Strassmeir and a man named Dennis Mahon, a former Oklahoma Klansman, had been casing the targeted buildings. Howe went along on one of the three trips the pair made to Oklahoma City for this purpose.
According to Evans-Pritchard, Howe revealed in her monthly informant's reports that the subjects she had under surveillance had set a target date of April 19th of 1995 for the attack. She submitted these reports to Angela Finley before the April 19th bombing, not afterward, as erroneously reported by NBC. The McCurtain Gazette is unequivocal in reporting what "Howe says is the indisputable truth -- that the government had 'detailed prior knowledge' of the plot to bomb the building, but somehow failed to stop it."
Within hours of the bombing, Howe was taken to the basement of the old Pepco building in downtown Oklahoma City for a debriefing. She was able to identify John Doe I and John Doe II immediately from sketches provided by federal agents. According to Evans-Pritchard, she identified Brescia as John Doe II, but John Doe I was not McVeigh as has been commonly assumed. The British journalist told Jim Quinn in a radio interview that he knows the identity of John Doe I, but is reluctant to divulge it at present.
In the same interview, Evans-Pritchard dropped a bombshell of his own. Although the government claims to have witnesses who identify McVeigh as the person who came to the Ryder agency, under the alias of Robert Kling, to rent the truck used in the bombing, he could not have been there. McVeigh's defense team have a video tape taken from a surveillance camera that shows him sitting in a McDonald's in Junction City, eating a hamburger, at the time the truck was rented. This might explain why the description of John Doe I circulated by the FBI referred to a man with "pock-marked skin, fairly stocky" who stood about 5'10", whereas McVeigh is about 6' 3" tall, thin as a rail (160 Ibs) and has a smooth complexion.
Ms. Howe's story is supported by recently discovered documents that the government is required by law to turn over to the McVeigh defense team a request by McVeigh's attorneys, the prosecution told Judge Richard Match that they had no information linking Strassmeir to the bombings. The judge is reported to have been outraged by the deception, telling one ofthe prosecutors, "You lie to me one more time and you'll be off this case! " He then ordered the government to turn over copies of all pertinent documents to the defense. Consequently, McVeigh's lawyers now have copies of all of the monthly reports that Howe filed with the BATF. Presumably, this is what prompted NBC to air their version of the story.
In addition to details regarding Mahon's and Strassmeir's alleged surveillance of the targeted buildings, the intelligence reports describe statements they are alleged to have made about their plans to bomb federal installations.
The McCurtain Gazette further reveals that, "Howe was routinely polygraphed by the government during the time she was making her monthly reports to the BATF. The government's own documents indicate she passed,'showing no deception on her part in any polygraph examination."'
In a story that ran last July, the same newspaper quoted "a high-level, anonymous source in the intelligence division of the FBI who described Strassmeir as an 'intelligence asset' ofthe BATF."
The Gazette says that "a former government undercover agent" told them, "It is typical for agencies such as the CIA, FBI and BATF to place multiple 'moles' inside a place like Elohim City and play one resource off the other, without either one knowing the identity of the other."
Dennis Mahon claims that Howe is the one who advocated most of the violent acts at Elohim City. Depicting himself as the fall guy in the affair, he told the press, "They want to drag me into this thing and I barely remember even meeting Tim McVeigh. It was Strassmeir who was meeting with McVeigh, not me."
THE MEDIA COVERUP
Meanwhile, the mainstream press continue to spin the story to government specifications. A recent piece by the AP's Steven K. Paulson repeats the statement by "government officials" that "they never received specific threats about the Alfred P. Murrah building before the bombing," and devotes much space to Mahon's denials of the allegations made by Howe (which are outlined rather sparsely). The following excerpt should suffice to indicate just how far behind the power curve the AP is on this story:
"The only apparent public link between McVeigh and Mahon's white-supremacist group is a telephone call made by someone using McVeigh's long-distance calling card two weeks before the bombing."
A quick survey of the "Three Blind Mice," who provide the news coverage for 70 percent of the population, reveals that ABC apparently spiked the story. Referring to a segment on the Oklahoma bombing that recently ran on "20/20", Jim Quinn commented that, "There was a tremendous amount of pressure put on ABC not to run that report, and, according to Reed [Irvine at Accuracy In the Media], it came from the highest levels of the Justice Department."
Presumably one story on such a taboo topic is about all we can expect a network to hazard. The single network that carried the Carol Howe story, NBC, apparently decided to settle for a "limited hangout." (That is the journalist's equivalent of copping to a lesser charge). The government knew all about the plot, but no matter, they learned of it too late to do anything about it. It will be interesting to see how NBC handles this if the intelligence reports are made public in McVeigh's trial. Will their statement be "no longer operative," or will they simply mumble that "mistakes were made?" As for the other network, Evans-Pritchard observed that, "As far as CBS is concerned, they're so far out to lunch, they don't know what they're doing."
Nice going, mainstream media--keep up the good work. And whatever you do, don't allow yourselves to be distracted by those gadflies in the "Right Wing Media Cabal." While you carry on with the coverup, they'll just go on eating your lunch.
Published in the Feb. 17, 1997 issue of The Washington Weekly
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