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McCurtain Daily Gazette (Idabel, Oklahoma)

1 July 1997

THE REV. ROBERT MILLAR IDENTIFIED AS FBI INFORMANT

By J.D. Cash

Tulsa-- Near pandemonium broke out in a federal courtroom here Monday when a senior agent of the Federal Bureau of Investigation shocked observers by telling the court that the spiritual leader of Elohim City, the Rev. Robert Millar, was a confidential informant for the FBI.

The McCurtain Daily Gazette has long been reporting that Elohim City is a religious and paramilitary compound in east-central Oklahoma that is frequented by some of the most dangerous members of the neo-Nazi iunderground in the United States and Canada.

Although residents of the cult have continued to deny it publicly, the Gazette has reported that its sources believe one of those shadowy figures was Timothy McVeigh.

Stories published in this newspaper have also exposed Elohim City as the center of a wide-ranging conspiracy to overthrow the federal government by members of a group called the Aryan Republican Army.

Several of those members have since been arrested on charges related to a string of bank robberies across the midwestern United States.

The incredible revelation that the leader of Elohim City himself was part of a government intelligence operation came during a pre-trial hearing associated with the upcoming trial of another confidential informant and frequenter of the compound, Carol E. Howe.

Howe, a former Tulsa beauty queen, debutante and one-time paid undercover informant for the Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco and Firearms, is scheduled to stand trial later this month for conspiracy charges associated with making bomb threats and possession of bomb-making components.

Howe was indicted shortly after the Gazette reported that she intended to be a key witness in the trial of Timothy McVeigh.

U.S. District Judge Richard Matsch, who presided over the McVeigh trial, refused to let Howe testify in Denver-- ruling that her information that Elohim City was the center of the bombing conspiracy "might confuse the jury."

Under questioning Monday by Howe attorney Clark Brewster of Tulsa, Special Agent Peter Rickel stunned everyone when he reluctantly admitted that the man Elohim City cult members call "Grandpa" is really a cooperating source for the FBI.

Millar's status as a confidential informant began in the fall of 1994. The FBI admitted in court that Millar was a paid confidential informant, although the amount of his paycheck was not revealed.

When Rickel disclosed this startling information, a senior FBI agent and several U.S. attorneys bolted from the courtroom in an agitated state.

Millar's encampment was heretofore considered by experts in domestic terrorism to be the "Switzerland" of the neo-Nazi movement in the United States.

Elohim City, a 1,000-acre area of rolling timberland, is the residence of some 80 followers. But more importantly, it has played host to some of this nation's most notable subversives.

Thus Millar's position as a mole for the FBI could explain why the compound has never been raided.

Despite its use as a hideout for gunrunners, drug dealers, bank robbers and suspected members of the conspiracy that bombed the Alfred P. Murrah Federal Building in Oklahoma City, Elohim City has enjoyed a reputation as a place fugitives can live without fear of arrest.

In the weeks before the Oklahoma City bombing, BATF agent Angela Findley had planned to raid the compound and arrest its security advisor, Andreas carl Strassmeir.

Strassmeir, an illegal alien who migrated to Elohim City from Germany, was supected by Findley of converting semi-automatic weapons to machine guns as well as plotting with other Elohim City residents and visitors to bomb federal installations.

Carol Howe reported to Findley during the time she worked for the BATF.

Howe told Findley that Strassmeir was the ringleader in the plot to bomb the Oklahoma City federal building and that Millar was preaching twice a day to his flock that the group had to act by April 19, 1995, or they would end up like the Branch Davidians in Waco.

The arrest of Strassmeir was scrubbed after senior members of the BATF, the FBI and the U.S. Attorney's office met in February, 1995 and discussed Findley's plan.

Sources have told the Gazette that Strassmeir was also an important source of intelligence for the U.S. government.

In January, 1996, shortly after it was discovered that it was Strassmeir that Timothy McVeigh had called for in the days before the bombing, the German national fled to his native Berlin with the aid of German intelligence officers.

With Millar now exposed, the loss of Elohim City as a virtual nest of spies for the U.S. intelligence community is almost assured.

But such a loss could have consequences far beyond the obvious.

If Millar was reporting a wider conspiracy to bomb the Oklahoma City federal building, and those reports were not subsequently turned over to Timothy McVeigh's defense team, then the withholding of such critical information by the FBI could get McVeigh a new trial.

Those reports, as well as Howe's, will likely be sought by the defense teams for both McVeigh and Terry Nichols and may also be subpoenaed by the grand jury convened in Oklahoma City to investigate the bombing.

Also those reports could prove important in several civil suits that are pending against the government for its alleged failure to notify the occupants of the Murrah building that there was a heightened risk of danger on April 19, 1995. And Congress is also looking into the government's intelligence role in the bombing.

Calls to the compound to get Millar's comments about the situation were not returned.

END OF STORY