Posted on 05/11/2005 7:06:44 AM PDT by GlockGrrl
Judge: FBI Must Do Better Search on Case By MATT KELLEY, Associated Press Writer Mon May 9, 7:19 PM ET
WASHINGTON - A federal judge has ordered the FBI to do a more thorough search for records about possible links between the 1995 Oklahoma City bombing and a gang of white supremacist bank robbers.
U.S. District Judge Dale Kimball rejected the FBI's argument that all it had to do was a cursory computer database check. Salt Lake City lawyer Jesse Trentadue had filed a Freedom of Information Act request for FBI documents related to any links between a purported informant, the Aryan Republican Army bank robbers and the federal building bombing that killed 168 people.
The FBI's computer check turned up nothing — not a report on an FBI interview of Trentadue or a memo Trentadue specifically asked for which the FBI released earlier.
In a decision dated Thursday, Kimball ordered the FBI to hand over those records — without deletions — to Trentadue by June 15 and do a manual search of its files for more records Trentadue is seeking. The judge also rejected the FBI's argument that releasing the files would invade the privacy of government officials.
"It's a victory for everyone in this country," Trentadue said in a telephone interview Monday. "This takes a big step forward for knowing what really happened in Oklahoma City."
Trentadue is pursuing a theory his brother Kenneth was murdered in a federal prison's isolation cell in August 1995. Local and federal investigations ruled Kenneth Trentadue's death a suicide, although bruises and other marks on the battered body raised questions among some officials.
Trentadue believes federal authorities mistook his brother, a convicted bank robber, for a member of the Aryan Republican Army bank robbery gang. Members of the racist gang robbed nearly two dozen banks, mostly in the midwest, before the FBI arrested them in 1996.
The first memo Trentadue asked for was a Jan. 4, 1996, message from then-FBI Director Louis Freeh's office to field offices including the one in Oklahoma City. The memo mentions similarities between evidence in the Aryan Republican Army bank robberies, which often used real or fake bombs, and the Oklahoma City bombing.
The publicly released copy of that memo has several names and other details blacked out. Trentadue believes the unredacted memo, which Kimball ordered to be released, would reveal the names of informants within the radical racist groups involved.
The second document Trentadue sought is the FBI's record of an interview that Trentadue says he gave an agent and two Justice Department officials on Aug. 12, 1996, which discussed the lawyer's dead brother and the bank robbery gang, including one member who resembled Kenneth.
Trentadue also asked for all FBI documents about any connection between a purported informant and eight named individuals from the Oklahoma City bombing and bank robbery cases or a white supremacist compound in Oklahoma known as Elohim City. Members of the Aryan Republican Army and Oklahoma City bomber Timothy McVeigh had visited the compound.
Trentadue's court victory is the latest in a series of recent revelations about the Oklahoma City bombing, which occurred ten years ago last month.
In early April, FBI agents acting on a tip found explosives hidden in the crawl space of the house where convicted conspirator Terry Nichols lived just before the bombing.
Nichols, who is serving multiple life sentences on state and federal charges, then wrote a letter to the grandmother of two bombing victims about those explosives. Nichols claimed a man never charged in the attack had provided the explosives to him and McVeigh.
The man, Arkansas gun collector Roger Moore, was questioned extensively by the FBI but has steadfastly maintained he had nothing to do with the bombing. Prosecutors at the trials of McVeigh and Nichols said the proceeds from an armed robbery of Moore's home in 1994 helped finance the Oklahoma City bombing.
___
Check Burger's pants....or talk to Gorelick. Always thought she was on that commission as a control...to make sure the inquiry didn't include OC.
More obfuscation and distraction by the government. It has happened since day one of the OKC investigation. There is so much more to this story. Everybody should read The Third Terrorist, by Jayna Davis. She was a reporter for the OKC NBC affiliate who has spent almost a decade researching and writing on the bombing, the suspects, and the connection the bombers had to the middle east- Iraqi intelligence under saddam, and even possibly al-queda.
The FBI is probably lying about not knowing how to search its own documents.
The book to read is "In Bad Company: America's Terrorist Underground" by criminologist Mark S. Hamm. It offers a more compelling "why" behind the OKC Bombing than any other book and these FBI docoments being sought directly back up Hamm's work.
What the FBI doesn't want you to know is that they knew about terrorist involvement in this country long before 9/11. They chose to cover it up for political reasons. They chose Clinton's political career over the security of America itself.
I think you are exactly right.... and screw Bush for continuing this shameless charade
The cover up continues because Hillie could be hurt by the cover up, not, perhaps, the blast, itself, but all that was done to hide, well, what was done.
I've also long believed that a good document base can be found in the papers in the boxes in the garage of the Dallas agent in charge who retired some years ago.
I'll have to check that book out. The third terrorist simply paints a who what where when and how from a journalist perspective, but it doesn't touch much on the WHY behind the attacks.
It's just as scary if they are not lying about it, don't you think? One way they are lying to the people who pay their salaries, the other way we the people are paying for incompetent boobs, who we count on to protect us from terrorists, gangsters and such. Either way I guess that makes us the real boobs, doesn't it?
Jesse Trentadue already has a copy of the memo the FBI is supposed to be looking for....that should make it easier to find! He wants the original because it lists the name of a Southern Poverty Law Center government informant who was present during pre-bombing planning with McVeigh. The name is redacted, but you'd have to be blind not to see it's Andreas Strassmeir. The original FBI document would prove they had knowledge of the bombing before it happened.
It's either that or breathtaking incompetence within the DOJ.
Given who was inhabiting the corridors at that time,I suspect the former. Now the survivors are covering their #$$es as they bought into it in the first place, thereby obtaining a personal stake in the coverup and crime.
Disclaimer: Opinions posted on Free Republic are those of the individual posters and do not necessarily represent the opinion of Free Republic or its management. All materials posted herein are protected by copyright law and the exemption for fair use of copyrighted works.