-Caveat Lector-
www.washingtonpost.com/wp-srv/aponline/20010511/aponline105907_000.htm
Friday, May 11, 2001; 10:59 a.m. EDT
Justice Department Wants McVeigh Delay
By Ron Fournier
AP White House Correspondent
WASHINGTON -- Justice Department lawyers have recommended that Attorney
General John Ashcroft delay the execution of convicted Oklahoma City
bomber Timothy McVeigh for 30 days, two government officials said Friday.
The officials, speaking on condition of anonymity, said Attorney General
John Ashcroft was expected to approve the request later Friday. The
recommendation came one day after the FBI disclosed that it had failed to
turn over documents to McVeigh's defense.
McVeigh, 33, is scheduled to die Wednesday at a federal prison in Terre
Haute, Ind.
The belated uncovering of the documents embarrassed the government and
angered victims and their families. But it was not immediately clear
whether McVeigh -- who had waived appeals in the past few months and
claimed responsibility for the bombing -- would himself now seek a
delay.
"We needed this death penalty," said Aren Almon Kok, whose baby daughter
came to symbolize the 1995 blast through a photograph of her lifeless
body in the arms of a firefighter.
"For someone to make this mistake ... to find them less than a week
before he dies ... is unbelievably unfair," she said in Oklahoma City.
The Justice Department handed McVeigh's lawyers 3,135 documents it said
should have been provided during the discovery phase of his 1997 trial in
Denver. The existence of the documents was disclosed Thursday by CBS.
Kathleen Treanor, who lost her 4-year-old daughter and in-laws in the
April 19, 1995, bombing, criticized the FBI as bungling the case and
giving McVeigh the chance to extend his life.
"I'm appalled," she said. "The FBI knew from the very beginning that this
was a huge case. How could they have possibly made a mistake this huge?"
In a letter to McVeigh's attorneys, the Justice Department said the
documents consist of FBI reports, including interview notes known as
"302s," and photocopies of physical evidence such as "photographs,
written correspondence and tapes."
The documents came from 45 FBI offices in the United States and one in
Paris.
A lawyer familiar with the case told The Associated Press that the
materials contain information generated by thousands of phone calls made
to the FBI after the bombing. They range from identifying a composite
drawing of a possible suspect known as John Doe No. 2 to claims of seeing
McVeigh elsewhere on the day of the bombing.
Legal analysts said the mistake could delay what would be the first
federal execution since 1963, though it was unlikely to overturn
McVeigh's conviction.
An attorney for McVeigh said the materials may prompt a request for a
stay.
"We're considering all our options," McVeigh lawyer Nathan Chambers said
after the documents were delivered to his office in Denver.
Chambers spoke to McVeigh about the documents, but he declined to
elaborate except to say he couldn't rule anything out yet.
Asked Friday on CBS' "The Early Show" whether McVeigh would seek a stay,
he said: "The honest question to that is we don't know at this point.
There are a number of options that may be available to Mr. McVeigh, and
we have a lot of work to do." He gave a similar answer when asked if
McVeigh would fight if the government sought a stay.
Another McVeigh attorney, Rob Nigh, arrived Thursday night in Indiana.
In a recently published book, McVeigh claimed sole responsibility for the
bombing of the Alfred P. Murrah Federal Building, which killed 168 people
and injured hundreds. Since December, when he first asked to end his
appeals, he had not shown any interest in fighting his conviction or
death sentence.
McVeigh's trial judge, U.S. District Judge Richard Matsch of Denver,
could not be reached for comment. Court clerk James Manspeaker said the
defense would have to go to the 10th U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals, also
in Denver, to file a motion to consider new evidence.
Matsch planned no action unless an appeal is filed. "If something is
filed he'll take a look at it," Manspeaker said.
The legal standard for granting such a motion requires the court to
determine the verdict could have been different if the jury had been
allowed to see the documents.
"The prosecution proved everything to me," said McVeigh juror Doug Carr,
45. "If there was something left out that's in those files, I don't think
it was that significant."
McVeigh's former trial lawyer, Stephen Jones, said he wouldn't be
surprised if the execution was stayed until the documents are reviewed.
"There could be a benign interpretation and it could all be irrelevant,"
Jones said. "On the other hand, it could be a malignant failure to turn
over."
The Justice Department said the mistake was discovered after an FBI
archivist requested bombing-related materials be sent to the Oklahoma
field office.
The department asked defense attorneys to notify them if they believe the
documents throw McVeigh's guilt into question.
"While the department is confident the documents do not in any way create
any reasonable doubt about McVeigh's guilt and do not contradict his
repeated confessions of guilt, the department is concerned that McVeigh's
attorneys were not able to review them at the appropriate time," the
agency said.
Chambers, who has worked on McVeigh's case since December 1998, said he
learned about the documents Wednesday, when he received a telephone call
from Sean Connelly, a prosecutor in the U.S. attorney's office in Denver.
"Here we are a full six years after the bombing and less than a week
before Mr. McVeigh's scheduled execution and these reports mysteriously
appear. So it's a cause for concern," Chambers said.
The lead prosecutor in the trial, Joseph Hartzler, told NBC News that
McVeigh is "a master of self-deception and self-worship."
"If he wanted the death penalty, he could have stayed in the truck, or
walked into the building," Hartzler said. "He doesn't want to die, he's
just giving into it because it's inevitable and somehow he thinks this is
his way of declaring victory or something."
The documents also were delivered Thursday to lawyers for co-defendant
Terry Nichols, who was convicted of conspiracy and involuntary
manslaughter and sentenced to life in prison.
Similar documents formed the basis of a previous, unsuccessful appeal by
Nichols, who claimed the papers could have cleared him.
-------
Associated Press reporters Karen Gullo in Washington and P. Solomon Banda
in Denver contributed to this report.
*******
On the Net:
Justice Department: http://www.usdoj.gov
Prisons Bureau: http://www.bop.gov
Bombing memorial: http://www.oklahomacitynationalmemorial.org
Death-penalty links:
http://www.clarkprosecutor.org/html/links/dplinks.htm
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