Davidian lawsuit still pursued against U.S.
Posted on 02/10/2003 5:29:10 AM PST by MeekOneGOP
Davidian lawsuit still pursued against U.S.
10 years after standoff, last-ditch appeal for new trial is planned
02/10/2003
NEW ORLEANS - It was a brutal and deadly confrontation that transfixed the nation for weeks in the spring of 1993: government agents facing off against a fanatic cult leader and his followers near Waco.
Nearly 10 years after the fire that ended the standoff and killed Branch Davidian leader David Koresh and scores of his disciples, survivors and their families are still pursuing claims against the federal government.
On Monday, they're scheduled to make a last-ditch effort before the 5th U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals in New Orleans, seeking to have the judge removed from their wrongful-death lawsuit and asking for a new trial.
In September 2000 in Waco, U.S. District Judge Walter Smith dismissed the lawsuit, backing the federal contention that agents had not used excessive force in their tear-gas assault on the sect's compound. Judge Smith found that the Branch Davidians themselves set the fire that killed nearly 80 men, women and children.
Monday's appeal arguments are being made on behalf of the estates of 14 children who died in the fire, a 15-year-old girl who was badly burned and three parents whose children died in the blaze.
The Branch Davidians, whose beliefs encompass fierce hostility toward the government, say Judge Smith's rulings in related cases, and comments on and off the bench, betray "deep-seated antagonism" and "preconceptions" against them. They say he expressed "negative characterizations" of them, including calling one Branch Davidian follower "crazy" and a murderer.
Government lawyers dismiss the bias allegations.
"To the contrary, Judge Smith displayed patience and diligence wading through enormously complicated legal and factual claims and gradually winnowing down the issues for trial," they say in their brief.
A lawyer for the Branch Davidians, James Juranek, acknowledged that the odds are against him in court. Appeals such as his are "granted less often than they are denied," he said.
On Feb. 28, 1993, federal agents stormed the Branch Davidian compound looking for automatic weapons and hand grenades. Four federal agents and three sect members were killed in the ensuing clash.
For 51 days, the government attempted to get the Branch Davidians to come out. On April 19, agents fired tear-gas rounds into the compound, and fire consumed it.
This is pretty close to what she said as I remember it. Are you telling me she didn't consider any consquence of her offensive action??
Was her attitude....Oh, they'll all just come out!!
On Sunday, Feb. 28, '93, the Nashville Tennessean did a 'hit' piece on the Branch Davidians, demonizing them as wackoes and characterizing their leader as a pervert, possibly a child-molester.
SO imagine my surprise when that evening's news carried the story of the BATF's ill-fated and embarrassingly unsuccessful attack on the B-D compound.
The Tennessean article was clear evidence of a BATF propaganda campaign to make the B-D's the bad guys, in the anticipation of BATF's heroic entry into their compound, guns blazing.
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