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BEDFORD -- The white separatist who was at the center of the 1992 Ruby Ridge
standoff says Timothy McVeigh's explanation for why he bombed the Oklahoma City
federal building rings hollow.
In a new book on the bombing, McVeigh says he targeted the federal building in
revenge for federal agents' attacks at northern Idaho's Ruby Ridge and the
Branch Davidian compound near Waco, Texas.
"What the U.S. government did at Waco and Ruby Ridge was dirty. And I gave
dirty back to them at Oklahoma City," McVeigh told the authors of
"American Terrorist: Timothy McVeigh and the Oklahoma City Bombing".
But white separatist Randy Weaver said McVeigh's explanation for why he made and
exploded a truck-bomb in front of the federal building, killing 168 people on
April 19, 1995, falls short.
"McVeigh took the law into his own hands. He had justified it in his own
mind. I don't agree with him at all," Weaver, whose wife and son died in
the Ruby Ridge shootout, said Thursday.
"He has more anger in him than I do, and I don't know how that could be."
Weaver, who is southern Indiana this weekend to appear at a gun and knife show
in Bedford, added: "What happened to me and my family is something we can
never forget."
During the Ruby Ridge conflict, Weaver's 14-year-old son, Samuel, was shot twice,
once in the arm and then fatally in the back, and his wife, Vicki, was killed by
a gunshot wound to the head fired by federal snipers.
The shooting, in which a federal Marshal also was killed, occurred three years
after Weaver allegedly sold two illegally sawed-off shotguns to undercover
federal agents.
On April 19, 1993, during an assault by federal agents, the Branch Davidian
compound near Waco, Texas, burned to the ground, killing about 80 members of the
cult.
Federal prosecutors say the Oklahoma bombing was retaliation for the Waco
catastrophe, which happened exactly two years earlier.
McVeigh is scheduled to be executed May 16 at the U.S. Penitentiary near Terre
Haute, Ind.
Weaver and his daughter, Sara, have written a book, "The Federal Siege At
Ruby Ridge," that details the events at Ruby Ridge. He will be selling his
book at the Bedford National Guard Armory Saturday and Sunday.
"We wrote the book for Sam and Vicki and to let people know something like
this can happen to anyone and that we must keep an eye on our civil servants,"
Weaver said.
BUFFALO, N.Y. - A remorseless Timothy McVeigh calls the children killed in
the Oklahoma City bombing "collateral damage," regretting only that
their deaths detracted from his bid to avenge federal agents' raid at Waco, Tex.,
according to a new book.
American Terrorist: Timothy McVeigh and the Oklahoma City Bombing is the first
time McVeigh has publicly and explicitly admitted to the crime and given his
reasons for the attack.
"I understand what they felt in Oklahoma City. I have no sympathy for them,"
McVeigh told authors Lou Michel and Dan Herbeck, reporters for The Buffalo News.
McVeigh claimed he did not know there was a daycare centre inside the Alfred P.
Murrah Federal Building, the authors said yesterday on PrimeTime Thursday.
"I recognized beforehand that someone might be ... bringing their kid to
work," McVeigh said. "However, if I had known there was an entire day
care centre, it might have given me pause to switch targets.
"That's a large amount of collateral damage."
McVeigh chose the Alfred P. Murrah Federal Building, he said, because it had
everything he wanted -- federal agents and glass in the front, making it
vulnerable and giving TV cameras a good shot.
But the FBI's lead investigator dismissed the bomber's claims he did not know
there was a daycare on site.
"No matter what ... if you look at the building, you're going to see all
the little cut-out hands, all the little apples and flowers showing that there's
a kindergarten there -- that there are children in that building," FBI
agent Danny Defenbaugh told CNN.
Mr. Michel said McVeigh's only regret was the children's deaths proved to be a
public relations nightmare that undercut his cause.
He added he was disappointed when part of the building remained standing after
his 3,000-kilogram bomb went off. "Damn, I didn't knock the building down.
I didn't take it down," McVeigh said.
The April 19, 1995, bombing killed 168 people, 19 of them children. McVeigh, 32,
is scheduled to be executed on May 16.
McVeigh said he was the sole architect of the plan, resorting to threats against
Terry Nichols' family when his army buddy hesitated before helping to load the
explosives into the rental truck.
In 75 hours of prison interviews with the Buffalo reporters, McVeigh, who was
raised in Pendleton, N.Y., outside Buffalo, got choked up while talking about
killing a gopher, but never expressed remorse for the bombing.
However, he had been brought to tears two years earlier while watching the
disaster at the Branch Davidian compound near Waco, Tex., in which 80 cult
members died in a fire as federal agents raided their compound. The Gulf War
veteran, a model soldier, carried out his attack two years to the day after
Waco.
Before deciding to bomb the Murrah building, McVeigh considered a number of
different possibilities, including assassinating elected officials, Mr. Michel
said.
As he fled after the explosion, McVeigh recalled the song Dirty for Dirty by Bad
Company. "What the U.S. government did at Waco and Ruby Ridge was dirty.
And I gave dirty back to them at Oklahoma City," he said.
In 1992 at Ruby Ridge, Idaho, the wife and son of white separatist Randy Weaver
were killed by federal agents during a standoff.
McVeigh told the authors he knew he would get caught and even anticipated
execution as a form of "state-assisted suicide."
He dismissed those who do not believe he planned the bombing alone, Mr. Michel
said, quoting the film, A Few Good Men: "You can't handle the truth.
"The truth is, I blew up the Murrah building," McVeigh said, "and
isn't it kind of scary that one man could reap this kind of hell?"
The book is to be published on April 3.
TIMOTHY McVEIGH, the Oklahoma City bomber, has hinted for the first time that
he carried out the 1995 truck bombing in retaliation for the cult disaster in
Waco, Texas. McVeigh has never before explained his motives for the attack that
killed 168 people, including 19 children.
In a series of letters to a reporter, published in Esquire magazine, he has
indicated that he was motivated by the FBI siege of the Branch Davidian compound
in Waco. The siege ended in a fire killing about 80 cult members in 1993, two
years to the day before the Oklahoma blast.
“The public . . . didn’t care when these families died a slow, tortuous
death at the hands of the FBI,” he wrote.
The prosecution at McVeigh’s trial alleged that he was motivated by Waco.
McVeigh, 32, is due to die by lethal injection on May 16.