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| Judge: Inmate Can Speak at Trial |
| By Associated Press |
| Published: 03/01/2004 |
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A federal death row inmate who claims Timothy McVeigh told him others were involved in the Oklahoma City bombing can rebut the state's star witness at bombing conspirator Terry Nichols' trial, a judge ruled last Thursday. But Nichols' attorneys lost their bid to postpone the trial, scheduled to begin this week. They had argued a delay was needed because of previously unknown FBI documents, recently obtained by The Associated Press, that raise the possibility that a gang of white supremacist bank robbers may have helped McVeigh. Nichols, serving a life prison sentence on federal bombing convictions, is charged with 161 state counts of first-degree murder in the April 19, 1995, bombing, which killed 168. Prosecutors are seeking the death penalty. The testimony of David Paul Hammer, a former Oklahoma prisoner scheduled to be executed in June at a federal prison in Terre Haute, Ind., will be allowed to rebut prosecution witness Michael Fortier, serving a 12-year sentence on bombing-related charges, District Judge Steven Taylor said. Fortier, who testified at the federal trials of McVeigh and Nichols, is expected to testify that McVeigh told him Nichols was deeply involved in planning the bombing of the Alfred P. Murrah Federal Building. Hammer spent time with McVeigh on federal death row before McVeigh was executed in 2001. Hammer claims McVeigh gave him the identities of coconspirators including John Doe 2, a mystery man some claim to have seen with McVeigh on the day of the bombing, defense attorney Mark Earnest said. Nichols' attorneys contend Nichols was set up by unknown coconspirators involved with McVeigh in the plot to bomb the building. Hammer's testimony was bitterly opposed by prosecutors, who described Hammer as "one of the least credible sources ever to serve time" in an Oklahoma prison. Assistant District Attorney Lou Keel said Hammer once threatened to kill him and a judge and blow up the Oklahoma County Courthouse. Hammer is on federal death row for the 1996 murder of his cellmate, Andrew Marti, at the Allenwood Federal Penitentiary outside Williamsport, Pa. |
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