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| FBI Data Given to McVeigh Defense |
| By Associated Press |
| Published: 05/11/2001 |
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Thousands of FBI documents that were mistakenly withheld from Timothy McVeigh's trial could delay the scheduled execution of the man convicted of the deadliest attack on U.S. soil. The blunder, revealed Thursday when the materials were turned over to the Oklahoma City bomber's lawyers, has embarrassed the government and angered victims and their families. 'We needed this death penalty,' said Aren Almon Kok, whose 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. McVeigh, 33, is scheduled to die May 16 at a federal prison in Terre Haute, Ind. 'The issue really is whether McVeigh is going to decide whether to challenge this,' said Andrew Cohen, a legal analyst who has followed the case. 'The FBI through its negligence or whatever has given McVeigh the opportunity to control his immediate future.' Kathleen Treanor, who lost her 4-year-old daughter and in-laws in the April 19, 1995, bombing, criticized the FBI for bungling the case and giving McVeigh the chance to extend his life further. '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 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. |
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