OKLAHOMA
BOMBING GRAND JURY LOSES CREDIBILITYOKLAHOMA
BOMBING GRAND JURY LOSES CREDIBILITY
The Oklahoma County Grand Jury recently concluded its 133-day inquiry into the bombing of the federal building. Governor Frank Keating praised the group by saying: "Their conclusions and their very thorough report will hopefully put an end to unfounded conspiracy theories and irresponsible claims about the bombing."
While public officials in Oklahoma express satisfaction with the grand jury's efforts and continue working to put the the matter to final rest, the unanswered questions still persist. Although McVeigh and Nichols have been convicted as the sole perpetrators of the bombing, and the grand jury has issued its concluding report and disbanded, still, the troubling questions that have plagued this investigation from its tragic origin, have not been answered. The disturbing questions have been covered and silenced under a continuing shroud of official denial.
The immediate response to the bombing was the formation of a federal grand jury. It was organized to investigate the bombing and issue indictments against all perpetrators of the deadly terrorist attack. Hoppy Heidelberg was a member of that original grand jury. Heidelburg told The WINDS of his experience as a grand juror, the response of officials to his appeal for a comprehensive, independent investigation, and his removal from that position due to his insistence on conscientiously fulfilling his responsibilities.
During the initial investigative phase of the grand jury, Heidelburg's attempts to have specific witnesses called, which were considered critical to the establishment of the basic facts, were obstructed. He said these witnesses would have substantiated whether the degree and pattern of damage to the Murrah building was compatible with a truck bomb.
"I tried to call the architect of the [Murrah] building because I needed to know how strong the columns were," said Heidelburg. "I needed to know what they could withstand in pounds per square inch pressure. I wanted a structural engineer to tell whether the building was built according to specifications. I wanted the structural engineer to analyze the [column] stumps and also the remaining columns to determine whether they could withstand that kind of pressure. Then I needed an explosives expert to tell me how many pounds per square inch 4800 pounds of ammonium nitrate produced at ground zero. Then I needed a mathematician or an explosives expert, whoever could give me the formula for the dissipation of energy over distance. Then you have to plug in all the numbers and you can determine which, if any, of the columns could have been destroyed by a truck bomb."
Heidelburg says, "as a grand juror, I had every right to call any witness that was involved, any expert I needed. I was prevented from doing all of that." He was further prohibited from showing the police sketch of John Doe II to any of the witnesses. "They did not want me to pursue John Doe II at all," said the former grand juror.
It was his attempts to discover these fundamental facts which brought about Heidelburg's sudden removal from the grand jury. After repeated attempts to have these crucial expert witnesses called he said, "I finally wrote the presiding judge a letter and told him. Once the judge had that letter he had a problem. If he had denied me those witnesses, then he would have been guilty of obstruction of justice, but if he had allowed me to have those witnesses, then I would have it figured out. So he didn't have any choice but to kick me off; that way he could prevent either one of those [allowing the expert witness testimony or the obstruction of justice charge] from happening. That's how he got out from between his rock and hard place."
Heidelburg said the judge didn't explain his dismissal, "He just wrote me a letter and said, 'you're out.'" Heidelburg said the threats and intimidation attempts were both overt and forceful. The base conduct of the FBI and federal officials toward Heidelburg is reminiscent of tactics used against some who have been labeled as Mr. Clinton's foes.
Following Heidelburg's dismissal, federal prosecutors proceeded to prevent every witness to any "John Does" from appearing before the Federal Grand Jury. There exist more than twenty such witnesses, yet not one was allowed to tell the grand jury what they saw. Federal prosecutors prohibited those witnesses from being seen or heard by grand jurors.
Former Oklahoma State Representative Charles Key stated that "the federal grand jury wanted to interview both the eye witnesses and the sketch artist who drew the John Doe composites but they were flatly refused by the federal 'authorities.' Clearly they were blatantly deprived of their basic constitutional rights as grand jurors. Why? Just what is it that they are trying to accomplish? Or, perhaps more pointedly, just who are they trying to protect? And what all are they trying to hide?"[1]
With Heidelburg off the grand jury and other dissenting voices overwhelmed by official pressure and media silence, the indictment and conviction solely of McVeigh and Nichols went forward according to plan. This essentially assured that the one-man, one-bomb theory would prevail, suppressing all knowledge of wider involvement.
With the federal trials successfully behind them, public officials were still faced with scrutiny from independent investigators and concerned citizens. The impanelment of the Oklahoma County Grand Jury brought strenuous objections from some officials. District Attorney Bob Macy, Attorney General Drew Edmondson and Governor Frank Keating were all severely critical of citizen involvement. State officials initiated court action to halt efforts to impanel the grand jury, but their petition was overturned at the state court of appeals level.
Then came the assault on supporters of the grand jury in the press. Charles Key observed: "People in powerful positions have repeatedly attacked those of us who have been scrutinizing the federal investigation. Governor Keating went so far as to say that 'raising questions would not bring one whit of intelligence to the process.' He later escalated his attacks saying those who were raising serious questions were 'howling at the moon' and 'off the reservation.'" [2] Drew Edmondson, Attorney General, maligned efforts to impanel the grand jury, saying it was proposing a "wasteful witch hunt" and pushing "the worst kind of paranoid conspiracy pandering."
A significant acknowledgment was published in the Washington Weekly. It constitutes the "lying excuse" that those in powerful positions use to justify their deception. The report states that, "ABC was getting ready to run a major story on the prior knowledge issue. The Justice Department became aware of it and contacted some of the executives at ABC. After acknowledging the validity of the story they put extreme pressure on ABC not to air the report saying, 'The people couldn't handle the truth.'" [3]
Another pretext employed by officials to evade unwanted examination is the "national security" ruse. A prime example of this ploy is reported in the Chicago Tribune. Congressman Henry Hyde said his committee was planning a top to bottom review of Justice Department spending. The Tribune quotes Abner Mikva, a former White House counsel as saying: "Congress must move cautiously, Justice [Department] handles sensitive investigations...and many techniques must remain secret. If Chairman Hyde starts asking about all the dollars they spent in Oklahoma City, that can compromise some very, very delicate information." [4]
Responding to Mikva's " national security concerns," Cate McCauley of the Oklahoma Bombing Investigation Committee (OKBIC) said, "I've heard this over and over again, 'No, you can't question certain people about things for national security reasons.' Well, if it's two guys and a Ryder truck, what are they so worried about?" [5]
The Oklahoma County grand jury issued a 21-page report concluding its session. As one seasoned observer put it, "There was not one single new development on the bombing." Irven Box, a criminal attorney who sat through the trials of Timothy McVeigh and Terry Nichols stated: "Basically the grand jury validated the federal government's theory of the case." [6] Considering the nature of the testimony which they were exposed to, much of which was diametric to government theory, the grand jury's conclusions were surprising to many; yet there were forces at work on the grand jury which may not have been readily apparent on the surface. The WINDS interviewed numerous witnesses who testified, and serious doubts were expressed about the independence of the grand jury.
The presiding judge over the grand jury was William Burkett who displayed his bias against those who question the government's version of events. Cate McCauley recalled that "Burkett made very inappropriate public statements at Southern Nazarene University which is in Rep. Charles Key's district. He said the grand jurors, instead of investigating the bombing case, should indict Charles Key. It's very discouraging to hear of that type of conduct from the judge who is in charge of this grand jury." [7]
Independent investigator Pat Briley told The WINDS that Judge Burkett made a statement to a group of reporters at a major radio station in Oklahoma City to the effect that "I'm going to make certain that this grand jury does nothing but follow the official line of the Justice Department."
Briley says, "If you read the grand jury report, everything this judge has said since that time and his violation of the statutes, clearly showed that's what his intention was, and he did carry it out. He said in advance that he was going to do it, he had the means to do it, and he did it. Now that's just the beginning. If you look at the instruction he gave to the grand jurors that were published, they were in absolute violation of the statutes.
"Basically, jurors were not allowed to consider any hearsay evidence," Briley continued. "That totally undercuts the way grand juries run, state and federal. The way you get firsthand witnesses is that you call credible, secondhand, hearsay witnesses to get closer to firsthand witnesses, you do an investigation, that's the function of a grand jury."
Briley also said that "Judge Burkett told the jurors in their instructions that they could not consider hearsay evidence or witness testimony. They could hear it, but they could not use it to either come up with indictments or use it as a basis for calling other witnesses.
"The other thing that happened in the grand jury process was very, very clear to many witnesses that I've talked to. All of them characterized treatment in the jury room by the District Attorneys [who were legal advisors to the jurors] as prosecutorial and adversarial, attempting to discredit what they said."
Oklahoma County District Attorney Bob Macy's opposition to impaneling the grand jury was no secret. From the first he withstood the Oklahoma Bombing Investigation Committee's efforts to encourage an independent investigation into the many unanswered questions and inconsistencies that have dogged the official probe. Charles Key says members of the committee have been "dragged through the mud, court battles, and a bogus multi-county investigation" by Bob Macy and others.
Only after the OKBIC won the appeal to impanel the grand jury did Bob Macy seemingly drop his opposition to their work. Why would he relinquish his "principled" stand? Could it be that his opportunity of presenting the case to the grand jury placed him in a position to neutralize any real independent work which they might do?
That is, in fact, what several who testified before the grand jury observed. In both overt and covert ways the legal advisors worked to insinuate doubt and question toward anyone who suggested deviation from the government's simplistic one-man, one-bomb theory.
Cate McCauley said: "We've never criticized the grand jurors but as far as the prosecutors, the judge in the case, the Oklahoma Attorney General, and on down the list, these people have tried to sway this grand jury more than anyone else. They've said ordinary people cannot investigate a crime of this magnitude, that we are nothing more than a bunch of conspiracy nuts, that we have no legitimate interest in this.
"I know for a fact from having been in the grand jury room that the so-called legal advisors have overstepped their boundaries," McCauley said. "According to the criminal procedure code of Oklahoma, they are not supposed to run this like a trial and they are not supposed to give their opinion on evidence even when asked. I know that they have done both because one of them did it in front of me. I think these prosecutors have swayed this grand jury into thinking that anything that comes from our committee or anything that comes from people who disagree with the government's party line is not credible.
"Are the grand jurors part of some grand conspiracy? No, not at all," McCauley continued. "I believe this is simply a case of good people trusting and relying on their legal advisors. They [the advisors] most likely told them the government's case had no flaws and there was no need to investigate it any further since the prosecutors had already done that in the federal trials. It's not a farfetched assumption to assume the jurors depended on that advice." [8]
Another who testified before the grand jury told The WINDS anonymously that "there were several legal problems with that grand jury and the manner in which the process was conducted inside the grand jury room that I think were indicative of decided predetermination of outcome regardless of witness testimony, and problems with the adversarial nature of the DA's office representatives and their manner of 'assisting.'
"We are all the 'bad guys' because we didn't believe the 'official story.' They listened to us, but they could not accept any of it, and they decided we were all lacking in credibility... which is incredulous to me because of all of the solid indisputable evidence that was laid at their feet.
"That final [grand jury] report is a DISGRACE and a scandal all of its own...but it does most clearly demonstrate the power wielded to keep this matter closed, witnesses silenced, the evidence suppressed...that kind of suppression doesn't happen by itself."
OKBIC's Cate McCauley tells of a woman named Tiffany Bible, "an Emergency Medical Services worker who was on the scene within five minutes of the explosion. She was in the station south of the Murrah Building, and she responded immediately. She saw ATF agents on the scene in very clean black jump suits. They had not been in the building, because they were clean. She noticed that because there was dust everywhere. She had a conversation after the [second] bomb scare which occurred at 10:15 or 10:30. She was standing there with an ATF agent and a law enforcement person, by the federal courthouse on the south side, waiting for the all clear. They were saying, 'Yeah, there was a device strapped to a gas line, underneath the stairwell.' And she distinctly remembers that statement because she had spent most of her time in that stairwell, trying to recover people. She said, 'I could have got blown to kingdom come.' She came forward to us, and she has since testified to the grand jury. It is that kind of testimony that is really hard to ignore." [9]
Evidence abounds of the involvement of others in the federal building bombing. Many sources have solid information relating to the participation of "Middle Eastern types." One such individual is a man in a position to have firsthand knowledge; he was an undercover agent hired to inform the government of just such threats.
Cary Gagan, a man in his early 50's, is a federal informant who had received immunity from the U.S. Justice Department when he provided them with specific information regarding plans to blow up a federal building in April 1995--months before the bombing actually took place. [10]
In September, 1994, U.S. Attorney for Colorado Henry Solano and Assistant U.S. Attorney James Allison prepared a letter of immunity for Gagan. The letter is an agreement detailing "information concerning a conspiracy and/or attempt to destroy United States court facilities in Denver and possibly other cities." Under the terms of their pledge, Gagan was assured, "the United States agrees that no evidence derived from the information or statements provided by you will be used in any way against you."
Gagan claimed to have been recruited by Arabs or Iranians operating through Mexico to deliver explosives for a series of planned bombings of federal buildings in Denver, Phoenix, and Oklahoma City. At various meetings in Las Vegas, Denver, and Kingman, Arizona, he met with Omar, Ahmad, and other representatives of the Hizbollah terrorist organization, as well as male Caucasian American citizens. [11]
Referring to himself as "plaintiff," Gagan relates details of a meeting he attended near Denver just one month prior to the bombing in Oklahoma City. "On March 17, 1995, in this meeting at the Hilton Inn South in Greenwood Village, Colorado, where the plaintiff was present with three members of this terrorist organization, displayed on the table were the construction plans of the Alfred Murrah Federal Building bearing the name J.W. Bateson Company of Dallas, Texas, with one of these terrorists allegedly traveling to Denver for this meeting from Oklahoma City.
"On March 27, 1995, and again on April 6, 1995, Gagan delivered urgent written warnings to federal authorities in Denver alerting them to an imminent bombing attack. He insists that he followed these up with repeated telephone calls, all of which were ignored. His handwritten warning of April 1st to U.S. Marshall Tina Rowe Gagan said:
Dear Ms. Rowe: After leaving Denver for what I thought would be for a long time, I returned here last night because I have specific information that within two weeks a federal building(s) is to be bombed in the area or nearby. The previous requests I made for you to contact me, 27th & 28th of [March] 95, were ignored by you, Mr. Allison and my friends at the FBI. I would not ignore this specific request for you personally to contact me immediately regarding a plot to blow up a federal building. If the information is false, request Mr. Allison to charge me accordingly. If you and/or your office does not contact me as I so request herein I will never again contact any law enforcement agency, federal or state, regarding those matters set out in the letter of immunity. -- Cary Gagan." [12]
In an extraordinary example of betrayal, the U.S. Attorneys rescinded their earlier pledge of immunity to Gagan after he had at great personal risk, repeatedly delivered prior warning of the bombing plot, which officials chose to ignore. In a February 1, 1996 letter to Gagan, Solano and Allison wrote: 'Attempts by federal law enforcement officers to meaningfully corroborate information you have alleged to be true have been unsuccessful.... Therefore, the immunity granted by the letter of September 14, 1994 is hereby revoked.' Moreover, wrote the pair, 'You are warned that any statement you make which would incriminate you in illegal conduct, past, present or future can be used against you. You are no longer protected by the immunity granted by letter on September 14, 1994.'" [13]
Cate McCauley says Mr. Gagan is currently unprotected. "He is guilty of actively participating in the preparations for both the internal and external explosions that destroyed the Murrah Building; he is without cover; he is surveilled and stalked by both his so-called friends and his enemies because of what he knows, and what he did, and who he is telling. The fact that he did what he did with the blessing of United States federal government agencies -- and on their behalf -- doesn't seem to matter to them anymore." [14]
Pat Briley says there were numerous witnesses who saw Timothy McVeigh with those who appeared to be Middle Eastern in Oklahoma City before the bombing and the day of the bombing. These witnesses were never called before the grand jury.
In other cases where witnesses identify involvement of multiple "John Does" they were decidedly prevented from testifying. Jane Graham is one of those. She was witness to significant events which overturn the story officials have constructed; yet Graham can hardly be construed to be an extremist or "conspiracy nut" as so many others have been. Graham is local president of the American Federation of Government Workers and is an employee of the Department of Housing and Urban Development (HUD). She was at work in the Murrah Building at the time of the bombing. In a video affidavit, she gives a vivid and detailed description of events she witnessed in the days prior to the bombing.
The Friday prior to the bombing Graham drove into the parking garage which is below ground level. She pulled into her parking spot and discovered three men in the basement. She noticed one of them was holding plans for the building. She saw that the other two had wire and some kind of putty-colored substance. She watched them from her car as they argued. When they saw that she was watching them, the man who appeared to be in charge told the other two to put the materials away in a dirty, older model sedan. She wasn't able to see the car's license plate. Graham became uneasy when the three men began watching her. They wore street cloths and were not repairmen or telephone people, who would have been dressed in uniforms. She was wary about the incident, but let it drop at the time. There were four others who also saw these three men the same day in the parking garage.
Graham also saw two men rush past her on the morning of the bombing. They were coming out of a stairwell that could be accessed only from a secure area of the building. These men wore General Services Administration maintenance uniforms but she recognized they were not the regular maintenance men who were normally in the building. The "coincidence" of two GSA maintenance men being replaced on the same day seemed unlikely and Graham was puzzled. She had no explanation for the strange people doing strange things in the federal building, that is, until 9:02 AM when the building was heavily damaged by two powerful explosions.
Graham told The WINDS she felt the activities she had observed, the firsthand eyewitness testimony would be critical to a valid, aboveboard grand jury investigation. She contacted District Attorney Bob Macy's office to make request for a presentation to the jurors. After repeated futile attempts, it became obvious that the DA's office was unyielding in its opposition to her testimony. The jurors were prevented from hearing what she had to say.
The efforts to impanel the county grand jury began after the failure of the federal grand jury to act in an independent manner in determining what actually happened in the OKC bombing. Many of these same forces have come to bear upon the county grand jury, rendering it merely the instrument of powerful forces bent on covering up the truth.
The government's $50 million dollar investment to ensure that their "two boys and a Ryder truck" theory is not debunked has become transparent. The actual details of the deadly attack may not be available at this time, but as Cate McCauley said, "I think there was a network of people who had access to the inside of that building. Whether this is a bigger, badder set of terrorists than anything they've come up with yet, I don't know. Who hired these people to go do this? That's what makes it so difficult - that you have, probably, layers between the free-lancers and the evil genius, as we tend to call him. Somebody got in that building, and the list narrows down when you consider means, motive, opportunity, and expertise. It's not something you walk off the street and do." [15]
The Final Jihad is said to be a fictional account of terror and intrigue authored by Oklahoma governor Frank Keating's brother, Martin Keating. Written in 1991, but not released until 1996, it has been called prophetic because of the many terrorist crimes which have been perpetrated with amazing similarity to its story line.
Four years before the devastating Oklahoma City bombing Martin Keating wrote of a terrorist network in Oklahoma with a central figure named Tom McVey. He tells of the terrorist's arrest based on a minor traffic violation by an unsuspecting highway patrolman.
At the time Timothy McVeigh was originally apprehended by an unsuspecting state trooper near Perry Oklahoma- only an hour and a half after the bombing- televised news accounts for several hours thereafter were reporting the arrest of "Thomas McVeigh" (Tom McVey?). Was this a simple mistake or an unplanned slip?
Is this a bizarre, uncanny coincidence or is there some strange connection? The publicity notes which promote the book on an Internet site claim that "Martin Keating is a master storyteller with unique access to government intelligence agencies and clandestine terrorist groups. His brother Frank Keating, currently governor of Oklahoma, is a former FBI agent and assistant secretary of the Treasury who supervised the Secret Service, U.S. Customs, and the Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco, and Firearms."
The notes further reveal that Keating was "introduced to the intelligence community through generations of family involvement. Martin Keating knows intimate details of what the rest of us can only imagine. Armed with firsthand knowledge...Keating accurately reveals what the highest government officials have known."
Keatings book was completed in 1991, prior to the acts of terrorism he describes. In 1991 Keating "accurately reveals what the highest government officials have known." He detailed beforehand in The Final Jihad, a whole series of terrorist activities including the OKC bombing, the Arizona Amtrak derailment, the plane crash into the White House, the World Trade Center bombing and TWA Flight 800. What does this say for all the government's denial of prior knowledge in the OKC bombing?
This book corroberates the suspicions of many independent investigators who believe that high government officials had prior knowledge of the planned bombing.
Based on their past record, their strongest denials are tantamount to admission, which Keating's work only corroborates. This pattern of "denial equates admission" has been repeatedly demonstrated before the American people by their current president.
The final Jihad or holy war is, in reality, now being played out. Officials and individuals at every level of society who participate in corruption, be it seemingly minor or serious, are following the same script. They imagine that they will be safe if they can destroy enough evidence and deceive enough people. Instead, they find this policy only accomplishes their destruction.
From the top to the bottom of society everyone is following the Commander-in-Chief they have chosen. Some compromise themselves in the Oval Office, others compromise themselves at school or in their homes, but all who consent to compromise in any way, be it child, youth or adult, must first compromise the inner voice of conscience.
The final Jihad is described as a bitter, unyielding struggle to the death, in this case either of conscience or compromise. This unyielding struggle involves every individual, because one Voice or the other is forever terminated. When the quiet voice of conscience has been silenced, and it is now almost universally silent, it portends the end.
The Scriptures say: "Do not seal up the words of the prophesy; to the contrary, announce and declare them, for the time when things will be brought to a crisis is near [here]. "At this time, let the evildoers persist in doing evil and the filthy-minded continue in their filth, but let the righteous continue in right standing with God and the holy continue in holiness. "I am even now coming, bringing wages and rewards, rendering to each one just what his own actions have created." Revelation 22:10-12
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