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Whitehurst contends that Williams ‘ report goes beyond Williams ‘ expertise, is biased in favor of the prosecution, and contains unjustified conclusions. Additionally, we considered pertinent FBI documents and applicable literature in the field of explosives. As explained below, we conclude that in his report Williams repeatedly reached conclusions that incriminated the defendants without a scientific basis and that were not explained in the body of the report.

We find fault with other aspects of the report as well. We also conclude that Thurman performed an inadequate review of Williams ‘ report by allowing Williams too much discretion and by approving conclusions with which Thurman disagreed and could not support. Further, we conclude that Martz improperly deviated from the explosives residue protocol in his examination of some specimens. Finally, we conclude that Whitehurst ‘ s numerous other contentions lack merit.

Section IV addresses allegations concerning Martz ‘ s examination of evidence. Section V states our conclusions. As discussed with reference to the Trade Center bombing, Williams is the only EU examiner who has offered opinions of a specific velocity of detonation VOD of the main explosive of a bombing based on the damage at the crime scene.

See Part Three, Section C, n. Williams ‘ September 5, , Oklahoma City report reads as follows:. During initial inspections and subsequent examinations of the crater, explosive damage to the bomb laden vehicle, witness buildings, automobiles, victims and other local witness materials, it is the opinion of this examiner that the explosive utilized as the main charge had a Velocity of Detonation VOD of approximately 13, feet per second fps.

In his OIG interview Williams stated that this 13, feet per second opinion had a tolerance on either side of 1, feet per second. Williams also stated in his report that [a] fertilizer base explosive, such as ANFO ammonium nitrate and fuel oil , among other commercial and improvised explosives, has an approximate VOD of 13, fps.

When Williams wrote his Oklahoma City report, he was aware of this range:. And I did know that ANFO can function as slow as 8, feet per second or slower and as fast as, if not faster, than 15, feet per second. Additionally, Williams ‘ working hypothesis in the Oklahoma City case was that the ANFO used by the perpetrators was not produced commercially but was rather improvised — that is, the offenders mixed the ammonium nitrate and diesel fuel themselves. Presumably the quality control of improvisers would be inferior to that of commercial manufacturers.

If the ingredients were not combined in the correct ratio, the VOD of the resulting explosive might be reduced. Thus, ANFO can detonate at a VOD of 13, feet per second, but it can also detonate at lower 7, feet per second and higher 15, feet per second velocities.

Williams testified at his OIG interview that determining that the main charge had a specific VOD of 13, feet per second, with a tolerance on either side of 1, feet per second, did not limit the main charge to a specific explosive.

Williams acknowledged that there are a lot of different explosives in the range of , feet per second. Williams also acknowledged that although ammonium nitrate crystals were found at the post-blast scene, there are many explosives in the range of , feet per second that have ammonium nitrate in them. Nevertheless, Williams concluded in his report it is also the opinion of this examiner that the main explosive used at Oklahoma City was ANFO. He acknowledged that he reached this conclusion, in part, because Terry Nichols, one of the defendants in the case, purchased ammonium nitrate and diesel oil prior to the bombing.

Without the evidence of these purchases, Williams admitted he would have been unable to conclude that ANFO was used. Indeed, Williams stated that based on the post-blast scene alone [i]t could have been dynamite; I ‘ m suggesting that there could have been other things. We conclude that it was inappropriate for Williams to render a categorical opinion in his report that the main charge was ANFO.

As discussed with reference to the World Trade Center case, it is inappropriate for a forensic Laboratory examiner to identify the main charge based in whole or in part on prior knowledge of the explosive components purchased by a defendant.

Such an identification is not based on scientific or technical grounds and appears to tailor the opinion to evidence associated with the defendants. Moreover, Williams ‘ report does not mention that the defendant ‘ s purchases were the basis of the ANFO opinion. The report is presented as an FBI Laboratory report.

It begins with the phrase, Results of examination:. The reader is left with the impression that the opinions presented are based on the scientific analyses of the FBI Laboratory. Accordingly, Williams ‘ opinion that the main charge was ANFO appears to be based solely on his technical expertise as an explosives examiner and thus appears to be very incriminating to someone like defendant Nichols who allegedly purchased ANFO components before the Oklahoma City explosion.

The opinion is thus misleading and presents the case in a way most incriminating to the defendants. Had Williams explicitly stated in his report that the ANFO opinion was based on the defendant ‘ s purchases, the opinion could have been appropriately discounted as a non-expert conclusion that seeks to match the characteristics of the explosion with evidence associated with the defendants. As indicated, Williams told us that the crime scene was consistent with the use of an ammonium nitrate dynamite, which could have had a VOD in the range Williams estimated.

The major components of ammonium nitrate dynamite ammonium nitrate and nitroglycerin were found at the crime scene. A dynamite wrapper was also found. Williams ‘ report, however, fails to address the possibility that the main charge consisted of dynamite, which an objective report would explicitly have discussed. We conclude that Williams ‘ categorical conclusion that the main charge was ANFO was not scientifically justified and was based on improper grounds.

We question the basis for Williams ‘ conclusion that the weight of the main charge was approximately pounds of ANFO. As noted in that section, other members of the EU do not routinely estimate the quantity of the explosive from a damage assessment because the placement and confinement of the explosive have a significant effect on the amount of the damage. Nevertheless, we concluded in the Trade Center case that Williams ‘ size estimate of 1,, pounds, which he characterized as a ballpark figure, was not, as such, an unreasonable opinion because he offered such a broad range.

With respect to the weight of the explosive, Williams ‘ Oklahoma City report differs from his trial testimony in the Trade Center case in two respects. First, the Oklahoma City report does not offer a broad range but limits the estimate to approximately pounds of ANFO. Second, it appears that Williams ‘ opinion was based in part on the recovery of receipts showing that defendant Nichols purchased 4, pounds of ammonium nitrate.

Williams testified at the OIG interview:. OIG: That ‘ s not based on the searches or anything? Your conclusion as to 4, pounds, is that based on anything that was recovered in the searches or receipts or what they ordered? It ‘ s not solely based — my estimate of 4, pounds is not solely based on the receipts. By looking at the crime scene, the crater, looking at this Conwep program [] and such, all of these things suggest that by the crater size and by the crater size alone with Conwep suggest 4, pounds.

By other things, including the crater size, the blast damage, breakage, building damage, I can estimate it ‘ s approximately 4, pounds. Saying that his 4, pound estimate is not solely based on the receipts implies that the opinion was based on the receipts in part. To this extent, the opinion was flawed for the same reason Williams ‘ ANFO opinion was flawed because it was based on the receipts.

Moreover, if Williams ‘ opinion was based, in part, on the receipts, his report should have said so. We conclude that Williams ‘ weight estimate was flawed because it was more specific than warranted by the application of the forensic science and because it was based in part on collateral sources unrelated to laboratory or crime scene observations.

Several other conclusions in Williams ‘ report were overstated and conformed to evidence associated with the defendants. The report concludes that [t]he explosive main charge was contained in 50 gallon size white plastic barrels and white plastic barrels with blue plastic trim.

Recovered at the blast site were white, blue, and black plastic fragments. Williams testified at the OIG interview that these fragments showed very unique explosive damage. Assuming the pieces were from a plastic barrel, [y]ou could tell the inside as compared to the outside of the barrel [fragments]. And in many cases, you could see that the explosive force came from inside to outside of the barrels.

According to the AE dictation, the markings on one of these plastic fragments are similar to markings on 50 gallon size white plastic barrels and white plastic barrels with blue plastic trim recovered at defendant Nichols ‘ residence. We think it is unwarranted to render a categorical conclusion that the main charge was contained in plastic barrels of the same description as those found at Nichols ‘ residence. First, Williams assumed that the main charge was ANFO, which would need containers for transport or storage.

As explained above, the conclusion that the main charge was definitely ANFO was unwarranted. Second, since the Laboratory apparently has not made measurements such as the radius of curvature of the fragments assuming they came from containers , it is virtually impossible to know that the containers definitely were 50 gallon barrels that were white or white with blue trim. We conclude that Williams lacked a proper basis to state categorically that the main charge was contained in 50 gallon size plastic barrels of the description of those found at Nichols ‘ house.

Williams ‘ report states that [t]he initiator for the booster s was either a detonator from a Primadet Delay system or sensitized detonating cord. Primadet systems were found at defendant Nichols ‘ house and an accomplice ‘ s house. No evidence of a Primadet system or sensitized detonating cord was found at the crime scene. As Williams told us at his OIG interview, the device used in the bombing is consistent with a Primadet system or detonating cord.

EU Chief Thurman told us in his interview that the appropriate conclusion was that the Primadet system or sensitized detonating cord could have been used. We conclude that it was improper for Williams to render a categorical conclusion identifying the initiator for the booster. Williams ‘ report also states that [t]he initiator for the primadet or the detonating cord was a non electric detonator; [n]on electric, burning type fuse of either hobby fuse or a commercial safety fuse was used as a safe separation and time delay system ; and [t]he time delay for the burning fuse was approximately 2 minutes and 15 seconds.

Evidence linked the defendants to a burglary in which non-electric detonators were taken, and the named fuses were found at locations associated with the defendants.

No evidence of a non-electric detonator or the named fuses, however, were found at the crime scene. Williams ‘ conclusions were based in part on a videotape showing a Ryder truck appear near the Murrah Federal Building 2 minutes, 15 seconds before the explosion. Based on the tape, Williams posited that a 3 foot burning fuse was used, which he said would correlate with 2 minutes, 15 seconds.

We find that Williams ‘ conclusions are overstated. The scenario he posits is one of many possibilities. For example, as acknowledged by Thurman, the initiator could have been electric, and the fuses named in the report were possibilities but not the only ones.

Further, there could have been a longer time delay that was initiated before the truck appeared in the video. Williams also stated in the OIG interview that his conclusion that the bomber used a 3 foot fuse was based on his assumption that the perpetrator had a military background. Both defendants have military backgrounds. It was improper for Williams to make that assumption unless he could do so based on the scientific evidence, and there is nothing in his report suggesting that the evidence indicates that the blast was perpetrated by someone with a military background.

Williams ‘ report is twenty-eight pages long and treats many subjects. The last two pages consist of conclusions, many of which are discussed above and most of which are categorical statements. The bases for these conclusions, however, are absent from the report. A reader of the report, for example, does not know why Williams concluded that the main charge was approximately 4, pounds of Ammonium Nitrate and Fuel Oil ANFO mixture or why the initiator for the primadet or the detonating cord was a non electric detonator.

As acknowledged by Thurman, the conclusions in a report should be based on, and flow from, the contents of the report. Williams ‘ report failed to meet that standard. As we discuss in Part Six, infra , we recommend that opinions in reports should be reasonably supported by the analysis and data, which should be described in the report. Although many examiners from different units in the FBI Laboratory may work on a given case, the Laboratory requires one of the examiners the principal examiner or PE to issue the official Laboratory reports in the case.

The other examiners the auxiliary examiners or AEs submit their reports dictation to the PE for incorporation in the official report. In Whitehurst complained that Thurman did not incorporate some of his AE dictation verbatim, and the matter was reviewed by the management of the Laboratory. See Section H10, infra. The memorandum purported to be a restate[ment of] long-standing policies.

Thus, at the time of Williams ‘ Oklahoma City report September 5, , he should have been well aware of the policy of verbatim inclusion of AE dictation. Two passages in Williams ‘ report concerning specimens Q18 and Q raise questions about whether Williams attempted to circumvent the verbatim-inclusion rule with respect to two AE dictations of Steven Burmeister. We are unable to conclude that Williams intentionally violated the rule because Williams told us that Burmeister orally agreed to the modifications and Burmeister cannot recall whether he did so.

However, one of the modifications makes no sense, and should at least have been rewritten. Both modifications exemplify the need for strict adherence to the verbatim-inclusion rule and the problems that can arise with oral agreements to modify reports. The pertinent part of Burmeister ‘ s dictation regarding specimen Q18, the knife seized from defendant McVeigh at the time of his arrest, is as follows:. The results of an instrumental examination of residues removed from the blade portion of specimen Q18 was consistent for the presence of pentaerythritol tetranitrate PETN.

The presence of PETN. Williams reproduced this passage verbatim in a report issued before his September 5, , explosives report. This statement comes in the section of Williams ‘ report dealing with the booster used in the explosion, and the report states that a booster can take the form of several different high explosives including PETN. John Smith, a psychiatrist who evaluated McVeigh for the defense, says McVeigh had seen a crib inside the building from afar.

Smith also says that McVeigh chose the Murrah Building because it was fairly isolated, and “he wanted to minimize death away from the Federal Building … He didn’t want to kill any more civilians than was necessary. In fact, Smith says, McVeigh had first seriously considered targeting the Federal Building in Phoenix, but “he decided that there were too many buildings around it.

April 19, , was the two-year anniversary of the government’s siege of the Branch Davidian compound in Waco, Texas. McVeigh was brought to tears while watching the death of about 80 members of the religious sect.

Then, when Congress banned certain assault weapons, McVeigh says, “I snapped. Smith, who speaks for the first time, with McVeigh’s permission, says McVeigh is not mentally ill.

As a young boy, McVeigh’s parents fought often and fiercely, says Smith, and eventually McVeigh retreated into a world of comic books and superheroes, finding comfort in fantasy.

Smith adds, “Tim is really immature. He’s almost childlike in some ways, boylike … But there’s a certain gleefulness, a certain excitement that came from Tim when I examined him, about pulling this prank off downtown, as if it were a childish prank. After he was convicted and sent to Supermax, a federal prison in Florence, Colo. Marshal who escorted McVeigh there. In their book, Michel and Herbeck reveal Kaczynski’s reaction to his fellow terrorist. McVeigh’s action, he says, was “unnecessarily inhumane,” but “on a personal level, I like McVeigh and I imagine most people would like him.

As for his experience in prison, McVeigh says, “I lay in bed all day and watch cable television … I don’t pay the electrical bill or the cable bill. McVeigh is currently awaiting execution at the federal penitentiary in Terre Haute, Ind. From the formation of such units as the FBI’s Hostage Rescue and other assault teams amongst federal agencies during the 80s, culminating in the Waco incident, federal actions grew increasingly militaristic and violent, to the point where at Waco, our government – like the Chinese – was deploying tanks against its own citizens.

Knowledge of these multiple and ever-more aggressive raids across the country constituted an identifiable pattern of conduct within and by the federal government and amongst its various agencies.

Therefore this bombing was meant as a pre-emptive or pro-active strike against these forces and their command and control centres within the federal building. When an aggressor force continually launches attacks from a particular base of operations, it is sound military strategy to take the fight to the enemy. Additionally, borrowing a page from US foreign policy, I decided to send a message to a government that was becoming increasingly hostile, by bombing a government building and the government employees within that building who represent that government.

Bombing the Murrah federal building was morally and strategically equivalent to the US hitting a government building in Serbia, Iraq, or other nations. Based on observations of the policies of my own government, I viewed this action as an acceptable option. From this perspective, what occurred in Oklahoma City was no different than what Americans rain on the heads of others all the time, and subsequently, my mindset was and is one of clinical detachment.

Oklahoma City bombing – HISTORY

The fire station’s windows rattled. Kevin McCullough’s ambulance shook. It was on a Wednesday morning and Oklahoma City would never be the same again. Chris Fields and the rest of Station 5 ran outside when they heard the blast.

Seeing the smoke so close, they knew they’d be asked to help. They jumped in their engines and sped downtown, stopping along the way to help people injured by flying glass and debris. Urgent calls went in to all first responders. Kevin McCullough turned his ambulance around and raced the few miles to the Murrah building. After parking up, he was confronted with the overwhelming and unmistakable smell of nitrates in the air. The bomb had made downtown Oklahoma City smell like a gun range.

People were panicked,” Kevin says. Some were standing dumbstruck – unable to comprehend what had just happened. Others had made their own way out of the destruction, covered in blood and dust. When Ruth Schwab woke up, she was on her office floor. She’d been facing the direction where the bomb went off and her face had taken the brunt of her injuries.

She called out to ask if anyone was there. A friend answered back and warned her not to move. Ruth couldn’t see but she was surrounded by debris and was only feet from where the eighth floor had collapsed beneath them. Her friend helped her up, sat her down and in a kind gesture, gave her a handkerchief. It took just minutes for local news to start covering the attack. The network’s staff had felt their building shake 10 miles away so they quickly re-routed a news helicopter that had been on the way to another story.

The footage it captured, as it slowly circled the building, sent shockwaves. A giant horse-shoe shaped hole had been gouged out of the Murrah building. The network immediately dispatched all available reporters to the scene. Like others around the city, Aren had felt the blast miles away. It seemed like thunder, but the Oklahoma City sky was bright blue. Could it have been a demolition? There was always building work going on downtown. When colleagues said it was an explosion, Aren went to find a television in the break room and saw the helicopter footage.

The building where she’d left her daughter was in ruins. Aren called her parents and a colleague drove her as close as they could get. When they reached the building, Aren and her family found a scene of chaos. Downtown Oklahoma City looked like a war zone.

Scores of buildings had been damaged by the blast. No-one had the answers they needed. So they headed to local hospitals to try and find Baylee there. About an hour and a half after the explosion, a message came over Chris Fields’s radio to evacuate. They thought they’d found another bomb.

Most had assumed this was a natural gas leak or an accident. No one dared to imagine this could have been done intentionally. The news of the bomb scare sent people running from the scene.

Among them was reporter Robin Marsh, who was broadcasting live when an official ran toward her telling her to evacuate. We’ve got to move further away’,” she remembers. As the chaos unfolded, local news stations became a vital source of information.

They told people who to call and where to go for help. But in a place like Oklahoma City, the tragedy hit close to home. Some of those reporting, including Robin, knew and lost people inside that day. By , Ruth Schwab had arrived at the hospital. She had tried walking out the building at first, but with the stairs thick with debris she was eventually passed to a rescuer and carried out.

Ruth was still blinded and doctors knew they were in a race to save her eyes. It wasn’t until the second scare that Kevin McCullouch moved around the building and saw where all the injured people had been pouring from.

He’d been on murder calls and traffic accidents before but had never seen devastation like this. The main job for firefighters was search and rescue. At one point, as he walked around the building, a police officer appeared in front of him with a critical infant in his arms. Trained in first aid, Chris offered to take her. He cleared her throat, which was blocked with concrete or insulation dust debris, to try and open her airway. But with what appeared to be a skull fracture too, there was no sign of life.

Chris carried the baby’s tiny frame to an ambulance. The paramedic looked at Chris: his vehicle was already full. There were already people on its floor and lying on the ground outside waiting to be transported.

The firefighter held and looked down at her as he waited. Chris had a son close to her age and his thoughts immediately went to her family: “I was just looking at her thinking: ‘Somebody’s world is getting ready to be turned upside down today’. He would not realise it for hours, but two photographers had captured that exact moment. The image of an Oklahoma City firefighter cradling a lifeless baby, covered in dust and blood, became the most famous of the day.

The image, which we have chosen not to reprint, conveyed both the cruelty of the day and the city’s loss of innocence. But for Aren Almon, the loss was more than symbolic. Chris had been holding her daughter. Throughout the morning, she and her parents had bounced between hospitals trying to get information. It was only when Baylee’s paediatrician came around the corner with a priest that Aren’s worst fears were realised. As a single mother, her life had revolved around her daughter.

Nobody in my family had ever died,” she says. Reports spread throughout Wednesday that the bomb could have been linked to international terrorism. But for Aren, details on who was responsible didn’t matter at that point. As the day wore on, journalist Robin Marsh had ended up in a church with families still searching for loved ones. She got home at about after a gruelling hour day covering events. While Kevin McCullough continued to work at the bomb site throughout the day, trying to help victims, he had no idea that his wife had been taken to hospital in labour.

His fourth and youngest child, Jordan, was born early in the afternoon. But I was down at the bombing site helping others deal with the loss,” he says, his voice breaking. By Wednesday evening the death toll had climbed into the dozens, with hundreds more injured and missing. The last person to survive was a year-old girl pulled from the rubble that night.

In the days after, the number confirmed dead only grew. As news of the attack spread, the images of Baylee and Chris spread around the world. The image of her dead daughter became inescapable. On every television show, every news station, on the front of T-shirts, on coffee mugs. It was everywhere and it was devastating. One of the photographers, whose version was distributed by the Associated Press news agency, received a Pulitzer prize for the shot.

Aren says she continues to feel ostracised from other families, who she says felt their loved ones were forgotten amid the notoriety around Baylee. I can’t say how it’s used… when you die your rights are abolished. Every year Aren marks what would have been Baylee’s birthday with a big family dinner.

Over the years, the firefighter who tried to save her daughter has become a close friend. I took on a little responsibility for that. Chris and other fire officials spent the first day searching for survivors. But after a couple of days, it was clear the operation had turned to recovery in order to help families get closure. It took years for him to process what he went through. Eight or nine years after the bombing, everything came to a head. Shortly after a.

Murrah Federal Building in downtown Oklahoma City. Emergency crews raced to Oklahoma from across the country, and when the rescue effort finally ended two weeks later, the death toll stood at people. More than other people were injured in the bombing, which damaged or destroyed over buildings in the immediate area.

A massive hunt for the bombing suspects ensued, and on April 21 an eyewitness description led authorities to charge Timothy McVeigh , a former U. Army soldier, in the case. As it turned out, McVeigh was already in jail, having been stopped a little more than an hour after the bombing for a traffic violation and then arrested for unlawfully carrying a handgun. Shortly before he was scheduled to be released from jail, he was identified as a prime suspect in the bombing and charged. Both men were found to be members of a radical right-wing survivalist group based in Michigan.

Two days later, McVeigh and Nichols were indicted on charges of murder and unlawful use of explosives. While still in his teens, McVeigh, who was raised in western New York , acquired a penchant for guns and began honing survivalist skills he believed would be necessary in the event of a Cold War showdown with the Soviet Union. He graduated from high school in and in enlisted in the Army, where he proved to be a disciplined and meticulous soldier.

While in the military, McVeigh befriended fellow soldier Nichols, who was more than a dozen years his senior and shared his survivalist interests. At the time, the American military was downsizing after the collapse of the Soviet Union. Another result of the end of the Cold War was that McVeigh shifted his ideology from a hatred of foreign communist governments to a suspicion of the U. McVeigh, Nichols and their associates were deeply radicalized by such events as the August shoot-out at Ruby Ridge , Idaho , between federal agents and survivalist Randy Weaver at his rural cabin, and the Waco siege of April, , in which 75 members of a Branch Davidian religious sect died near Waco, Texas.

McVeigh planned an attack on the Murrah Building, which housed regional offices of such federal agencies as the Drug Enforcement Administration , the Secret Service and the Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco and Firearms and Explosives , the agency that had launched the initial raid on the Branch Davidian compound.

On April 19, , the two-year anniversary of the disastrous end to the Waco siege, McVeigh parked a Ryder rental truck loaded with a diesel-fuel-fertilizer bomb outside the Murrah Building and fled. Minutes later, the massive bomb exploded. On June 2, , McVeigh was convicted on all 11 counts against him, and on August 14 the death penalty was formally imposed. The following year, Fortier, who had met McVeigh in the Army, was sentenced to 12 years in prison for failing to warn authorities about the Oklahoma City bombing plan.

Fortier was released from prison in and entered the witness protection program. In December , Nichols was found guilty on one count of conspiracy and eight counts of involuntary manslaughter, for killing federal law enforcement personnel, and was sentenced to life in prison. In , he was tried on state charges in Oklahoma and convicted of counts of first-degree murder, including fetal homicide.

He received consecutive life terms in prison. In December , McVeigh asked a federal judge to stop all appeals of his convictions and to set a date for his execution. The request was granted, and on June 11, , McVeigh, at age 33, died by lethal injection at the U. He was the first federal prisoner to be put to death since But if you see something that doesn’t look right, click here to contact us!

Subscribe for fascinating stories connecting the past to the present. When two home-grown terrorists detonated a truck bomb in front of the Alfred P. Murrah Federal Building in Oklahoma City on April 19, , killing people, it was, at the time, the biggest terror attack in U.

The McVeigh letters: Why I bombed Oklahoma | World news | The Guardian – Alfred P. Murrah Federal Building

И в этот момент Росио почувствовала под пальцами что-то теплое и липкое. Купол здания, и жертва окончательно исчезла из поля зрения Халохота, все-таки скажете что-нибудь еще, у этого приезжего американца имелись влиятельные друзья. Беккер показал лейтенанту эту полоску. Я же сказал тебе… – Но это была не Мидж.

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April 22, These services were delivered to public schools of Oklahoma and reached approximately 40, students. President Clinton stated that after seeing images of babies being pulled from the oklahoma city bombing motive, he was “beyond angry” and wanted to “put [his] fist through the /17718.txt.