-Caveat Lector-

McVeigh reveals details of Oklahoma blast

By Ellen Wulfhorst
Tuesday April 3, 04:01 AM
http://uk.news.yahoo.com/010403/80/bhonc.html

      NEW YORK (Reuters) - Oklahoma City bomber Timothy McVeigh says
he always expected to be caught, convicted and executed for the
deadly 1995 blast, which he claims sent a powerful anti-government
message like a "shot heard around the world," according to a new
book.

      Awaiting his scheduled May 16 execution, McVeigh says he looks
forward to his death as a relief but regrets never having a family
and once asked if his sperm could be sent from prison to impregnate a
woman, according to "American Terrorist" (HarperCollins) by Lou
Michel and Dan Herbeck.

      He later reconsidered, deciding the life of his child "would be
hell."

      Of his death, McVeigh said in the book: "I'll be glad to leave
this ... world. Truth is, I determined mostly through my travels that
this world just doesn't hold anything for me.

      "I knew I wanted this before it happened," he added. "I knew my
objective was a state- assisted suicide."

      At his execution, McVeigh said he plans to quote from
"Invictus" by William Ernest Henley, which reads, in part: "I am the
master of my fate. I am the captain of my soul."

      The two authors of "American Terrorist," both of whom work at
the Buffalo News in western New York, held days of interviews and
exchanged hundreds of letters with McVeigh, who was raised outside
Buffalo in Pendleton, New York.

      McVeigh was convicted in 1997 of bombing the Alfred P. Murrah
federal building in Oklahoma City and sentenced to death. Saying he
had expected to be caught, McVeigh said he purposely left
anti-government literature in his car.

      MCVEIGH EXPECTED TO BE EXECUTED

      He told a prison psychiatrist: "I expect to be convicted for
the bombing, and I expect to receive the death penalty."

      The bomb, which he describes in detail assembling in the back
of a rented truck, killed 168 people, including 19 children.

      In quotes released last week from the book, McVeigh said he
considered the children's deaths "collateral damage" but regretted
they may have soured the public response to his act.

      Markedly stoic during his federal trial in Denver, McVeigh
revealed he was frequently furious during the proceedings.

      "There were times when I felt like jumping to my feet and
screaming, 'Knock it off! Everyone here knows I'm guilty! Let's get
on with it!'" he said.

      McVeigh said he was angered by his defence team, led by
attorney Stephen Jones, whom he felt was disorganised and
publicity-seeking and who would not let him mount his "necessity
defence" -- that he bombed the Murrah building because America was in
imminent danger at the hands of its government.

      McVeigh also said he grew angry when prosecutor Joseph Hartzler
called him a coward.

      Sparking his anger, according to McVeigh and to prosecutors,
was the 1993 government siege and raid in Waco, Texas, that led to
the deaths of Branch Davidian cult members.

      "NO BIG CONSPIRACY"

      "To these people in Oklahoma who have lost a loved one, I'm
sorry but it happens every day," he said. "You're not the first
mother to lose a kid, or the first grandparent to lose a grandson or
granddaughter. It happens every day, somewhere in the world. I'm not
going to go into that courtroom, curl into a foetal ball, and cry
just because the victims want me to do that."

      McVeigh did reserve sympathy for Terry Nichols, convicted for
helping plan the bombing, and Michael Fortier, who admitted knowing
about the bombing and reached a plea deal with the government in
exchange for testifying against McVeigh.

      "There was no big conspiracy. It was mostly me. The few friends
who helped me were acting under duress, and none of them had any
control over when I was going to blow up the Murrah building,"
McVeigh said.

      He said Nichols helped him buy ingredients and assemble the
bomb only after McVeigh threatened him and his family.

      Filling in gaps prior to the bombing, McVeigh said he slept in
the truck the night before, parked near a roadside motel in northern
Oklahoma.

      He said he originally planned to blow up the building at 11
a.m. but moved the explosion two hours earlier because he did not
want to risk staying by the motel any longer.

      Had he not been caught, McVeigh considered a campaign of
murdering individual government officials, the book said.

      In prison, he became acquainted with Unabomber Ted Kaczynski,
and the book contains a letter in which Kaczynski said he liked
McVeigh but found the Murrah bombing "unnecessarily inhumane."

      "A more effective protest could have been made with far less
harm to innocent people," Kaczynski wrote. "It is safe to assume that
many antigovernment people who might have accepted violence that was
more limited and carefully directed were repelled by the large loss
of life at Oklahoma City."

Copyright � 2001 Reuters Limited.

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