Philip Dru interviews V.Z. Lawton, a survivor of the 1995 Oklahoma City bombing and a member of the Oklahoma City Bombing Investigation Committee, about his experience, and more about that case.
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Scott Horton 0:03
Alright everyone, you’re listening to the weekend interview show. I’m your host, Phillip Dru Administrator and I’m joined by a survivor of the Oklahoma City bombing. And a member of the Oklahoma City bombing Investigation Committee. V.Z. Lawton. Welcome.
V.Z. Lawton 0:21
Thank you. I’m glad to be here.
Scott Horton 0:23
Eight years ago today.
V.Z. Lawton 0:25
Yeah. About eight years ago today I was at the Santa Fe hospital getting my eyes flushed out.
Scott Horton 0:32
You were inside the building when the bombing took place?
V.Z. Lawton 0:36
Yeah, I was sitting there at my desk signing some papers. Oddly enough, change of beneficiary documents on life insurance policies for… from this lady’s ex-husband her children work with me there and I felt the building start shaking lights went out and debris started falling on my desk, and something hit me in the back of the head and knocked me out before the truck bomb went off. I never heard the truck bomb.
Scott Horton 1:04
Well, now, that’s a pretty interesting thing to say I guess, maybe, maybe we should back up just a little bit. Timothy McVeigh was put to death almost two years ago now. And I think probably a lot of people, you know, with what you just said about you’re knocked out before the truck bomb ever went off? Well, I thought there were only was a truck bomb. And if McVeigh’s dead, what is there to investigate?
V.Z. Lawton 1:29
Well, there were… there were other explosive devices in that building. The building was coming down before the truck bomb went off. And I’m not the only one that experienced that sensation. A lot of them that experienced it didn’t get knocked out, they felt the building start shaking first and then they heard the truck bomb go off. So it wasn’t just me that had that experience. And of course though the government says that McVeigh was the only one that was involved. But we have witness after witness that saw him with another person, Middle Easterners.
Scott Horton 2:12
How many… how many people saw him with John Doe number two or three or
V.Z. Lawton 2:17
Oh, Rodney Johnson was driving by he had slam on the… on his brakes on his pickup truck to keep from running over the John Doe Tim McVeigh when they were leaving the truck. That’s one guy. Gary Less at the… worked at the journal record building north of the Murrah Building saw the yellow Mercury leave with McVeigh in it and John Doe two in there with him. And the John Doe two, that got out of the truck walking across the street went over and got into a brown Chevy pickup with two other John Doe twos.
Scott Horton 2:54
So we’re up to John Doe four and five now, right?
V.Z. Lawton 2:56
Yeah, right. And then Germaine Johnston when she was walking as she got out of the buildings, she thought we were going to be going back in and she walked south from across street from the YMCA there straight south down that alley and McVeigh stopped her and asked her said were you in the building that blew up. She said, Yeah, why? And he said, well, we’re very many people killed? She said, Yeah, a lot of people were, were killed. And I asked her, I said, Well, when you were talking to McVeigh was there anybody else there with him? And she said, yeah, there was another guy there with him and I said, did you get a good look at him and she said ahh I really didn’t and said I just knew they was together. So there’s another witness who saw them. David Snyder saw them down on South Oklahoma there going through a Bricktown. Mike Moroz saw the tents in Hudson.
Scott Horton 3:48
Mike Moroz now he’s the guy at the tire shop who gave them directions to the building right?
V.Z. Lawton 3:52
Johnny’s tires right at Canton Hudson. And so, you know, they’re just witness after witness that saw them. And here’s something that we didn’t get into our book that we wish we had that we just didn’t have it in time to do it. There’s a lady that worked for the Traverse Eight dealer here. She was the manager at the Traverse Eight as a matter of fact, and which was a block and a half west of the Murrah building. And on the 18th of April, three o’clock in the afternoon, she has McVeigh coming into her office with three other guys. And they’re trying to get money and they wouldn’t give them any money so they created some kind of a rhubarb there… three of it. Three other employees come up to the front, which makes it four of them that saw McVeigh in that office that afternoon at three o’clock when he’s according to the Government, he’s up there at Geary State fishing lake in Kansas… the bomb.
Scott Horton 4:06
You know Aldous Huxley once said that “you shall know the truth and the truth shall make you mad.” I wonder, you know if there’s all these John Doe three four fives and sixes running around here with Timothy McVeigh. Do we know who these people are? Have you guys been able to find out who they are and what connection they have to McVeigh and what was their role in this?
V.Z. Lawton 5:29
Well yeah, we’ve got some suspicions. Jayna Davis who was the reporter for the NBC affiliate here in Oklahoma City Channel Four. She ran the information down and she said that this Hussein Al-Husseini she thinks was the John Doe two in the truck with McVeigh when he pulled up in front of the building,
Scott Horton 5:54
Hussein Al Husseini now that name sounds familiar for some reason.
V.Z. Lawton 5:57
Okay he’s the guy that took off and went over and they stopped him in London and sent him back. He had some stuff in his satchel that was a little suspicious looking that he explained away evidently. Later on, he filed a lawsuit against Channel Four, and Jayna Davis and Brad Edwards who’s another reporter. And it tied her up shut her up for about three or four years, but he didn’t really have a case so it finally… the judge just dismissed it. And she still says he was the one that was involved.
Scott Horton 6:36
He was the guy driving the brown pickup truck right?
V.Z. Lawton 6:38
No, no he was the one that was in the truck with McVeigh got out of the truck and walked over and got in the brown Chevy pickup.
Scott Horton 6:46
Oh I see
V.Z. Lawton 6:48
I mean that’s the way I understand it.
Scott Horton 6:50
Right.
V.Z. Lawton 6:51
I could be wrong but
Scott Horton 6:52
What about what about allegations about the white supremacist? I know that right after the bombing happened, the media focused heavily on the militia movement and that kind of thing.
V.Z. Lawton 7:05
Yeah, that probably came from Clinton. He didn’t like Rush Limbaugh or any the stuff that he was coming out with and didn’t like the militias. And they tried to make it appear that the militias were involved and they couldn’t find that the militias had done a single thing wrong. That it took the heat off of the Middle Easterners.
Scott Horton 7:26
Right. So so I have to admit you sir I’ve read quite a bit about this, but I haven’t been able to get a copy of y’alls final report yet.
V.Z. Lawton 7:37
Oh you havent?
Scott Horton 7:37
So, no I actually haven’t been able to find a copy for less than 100 bucks anywhere
V.Z. Lawton 7:43
Of our book?
Scott Horton 7:44
Yes the final report of the…of y’alls Investigation Commission, right.
V.Z. Lawton 7:48
Oh you can probably get it for I think it’s $34.95.
Scott Horton 7:52
That’s not too bad. Well, so. So in that book, do you guys go into the Elohim city and the Neo Nazis out there in eastern Oklahoma? My understanding from reading Ambrose Evans Pritchard from The Daily Telegraph was that the Neo Nazis out there had a lot to do with Timothy McVeigh and perhaps the plot here.
V.Z. Lawton 8:12
They they have one piece of evidence that put him I think within eight miles of that compound. It was a ticket that he got a speeding ticket from the Highway Patrol. I don’t have any knowledge that anybody ever seen him at the compound. We have the young lady from Tulsa that penetrated the she went in as a confidential informant for the ATF. Carol how, and she she had never said anything about seeing McVeigh in there. She was dating because Dennis. He was edited while I think the white area and resistance movement and there was a lot of talk about the LLM City was the name of the compound over there and eastern Oklahoma is almost on the Arkansas line. That I don’t know that we’ve got a direct connection.
Scott Horton 9:17
In Pritchards book, The Secret Life of Bill Clinton the first section deals with Oklahoma City and in there he writes about a reporter named JD cash do you know him?
V.Z. Lawton 9:27
JD cash wrote for them. Kern county news over in Idalbel
Scott Horton 9:33
okay and in Pritchards book he says that JT cash basically fooled this guy Dennis may Han into believing that he was also a white supremacist and bought him a fifth of whiskey and they drove around and that Dennis man or man admitted to him that Yeah, we had made the bomb and and don’t if you see Mark Thomas or Michael Brzeski tell them to keep their heads down because they’re up to it and this too and and So my understanding was that this guy Dennis may have had more or less confessed to JT cash. Is that not correct?
V.Z. Lawton 10:07
Wow. That’s really what he says. I don’t know that is correct or not. There’s a lot of a lot of stories that come out of there that we haven’t really been able to confirm.
Scott Horton 10:18
And FBI didn’t investigate Elohim city maybe we’d have a little bit better information. Oh,
V.Z. Lawton 10:23
wow. They had they had a reverend Milan was one of their informers.
Scott Horton 10:32
The Reverend You mean the man in charge at Elohim City?
V.Z. Lawton 10:35
Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. Same ever. ATF was getting ready to go in there and do they were going to do the same thing there. They’ve done down at Waco. And the, this handler, Carol, how was Nike FHA manual assembly, and she wanted her her job was to do a flyover of the area and August draw, look, laugh or whatever you whatever they were gonna do. And you got the Highway Patrol flying to take a flyer over there. She saw how it’s coming, what they’re getting ready to do. He said, Well, you better talk to the FBI on this before you go in there because they got one of their own people in there. So that, that stopped him from going in there, at least. So the story goes. They, they got the ATF, head of ATF in Tulsa, where the agent Finley operated out up to get with the FBI, here in Oklahoma City. And it turns out that they did have somebody in there, so they canceled their invasion of LLM city.
Scott Horton 11:39
That’s interesting. So what you’re saying they have an FBI both were investigating the same place at the same time. And the ATF backed off on that the FBI is request basically.
V.Z. Lawton 11:49
Right. Like that’s exactly what that is.
Scott Horton 11:52
So then I guess my question about this, would you say his name was Reverend?
V.Z. Lawton 11:56
Millar M I L L A R. He was a Canadian.
Scott Horton 12:00
Okay. And so do we know whether he was a kind of a confidential informant? Like Carol, how was or whether he was actually an agent? Like, oh, not just an informant, but getting paid for a specific task?
V.Z. Lawton 12:15
I don’t think we really know we just we know what was said there in the airplane that day, and it was strong enough to ATF back office going in. I don’t think FDR ever come out and said what kind of connection they had with Reverend Milan. In fact, I they may have denied it. That was the story that we we were getting
Scott Horton 12:41
Many of the people in the audience. If anybody’s ever seen the show cops, you’ve almost everybody in America, I’m sure has seen the footage of the two key hoe brothers. They’re driving a big blue and white suburban and they get in a shootout with some state troopers I think up in New Jersey or something and they play the clip on Cops are real stories of the highway patrol or whatever all the time. But I remember watching on Court TV, they talked about how during the trial, this is the Kehoe brothers Chevie and Shane Kehoe, couple of white supremacist who are I guess, eventually convicted for that shootout with the cops and also for some involvement with some bank robberies around the West. And apparently it came out at the trial that Chevie Kehoe on the morning of the Oklahoma City bombing came into this motel it was the the motel owner testified that he came into the motel at about six o’clock in the morning and said something big is gonna happen, turn it to CNN, and that when the news of the bombing came over, that he was all joy and elation. And apparently, this guy the Kehoe brothers both were tied to the same group of Neo Nazis out there at Elohim City.
V.Z. Lawton 13:51
There’s there’s probably some connection between them. Having tried to make it look like to Summit. Ryan Nicholas probably got some financial support, help from him. Whether they did or not, I don’t know. We we we’ve never been able to time together. Where there was a really strong confirmation that there was a connection to Kehoe. They may have both been fighting for the same thing or site. They said they were pursuing the same thing but or they were doing it together, not we we can’t confirm that.
Scott Horton 14:24
Okay. I’d like to ask you something. Remember about during the turning against McVeigh’s trial, or maybe it was Terry Nichols trial. I think it was McVeigh’s trial, it came out that there was some discrepancy about the Ryder truck and that you know, some people supposedly saw it at Gary state lake, but they didn’t see the yellow mercury or Terry Nichols truck or anything anywhere near it. There are other people who said that they saw it at the hotel, but that it changed that it was a different truck that you know, one woman I remember testified that she saw it the day before McVeigh supposedly rented it And then it was brand spanking new model a truck and that then another witness said no is a faded old yellow one and and that apparently like there was some discrepancy as to whether maybe there were two writer trucks one of them the decoy and one of them the actual truck with a bomb, or maybe that the two one was shot, one group was shadowing another and do you know anything about that?
V.Z. Lawton 15:22
Well, I think there’s a real strong possibility that there were two trucks in Oklahoma City that day. In both, they both may have been loaded with explosives. We’ve got we’ve had some information that indicated that they might have intended to put another truck up in front of the federal building to the south of the Moreno Valley, which was where all the coursework, and that evidently, it didn’t get there because nothing happened there. That, that that is a very good possibility. The truck that David Snyder saw set down in Bricktown. may have been a different truck and Mike morose saw 10th and Hudson, as though they’re, you’re talking about a couple miles apart there and a lot of old downtown area to get through.
Scott Horton 16:15
And and they both saw that almost the same time or
V.Z. Lawton 16:18
yeah, pretty, pretty close to the same time. That’s right. I see. It makes you it makes you wonder.
Scott Horton 16:25
Yeah, it definitely makes me wonder, I don’t know, I got a whole list here, things to ask you about. But I guess I kind of want to stop and ask you about the media. And how is it that people are hearing this story from you for the first time today? And how can we haven’t known about all this mess for eight years?
V.Z. Lawton 16:43
Well, right after the bombing, had a friend of mine that I played golf with worked for that channel forward. They called me and asked me if I come down to an interview with him said I couldn’t find anybody that was five out of the building to interview. So I went down. And after that, I thought to just local folks, that it went all over the world and did interviews with stations for Cologne Germany to Honolulu. And to begin with, I was just following the government line, whatever they said, You know, I didn’t it didn’t happen that way. But that asked Mr. We know how come I didn’t hear that bomb truck bombs go off. Sometimes the pressure comes in and hits you you’re supposed to them before the noise gets there, which doesn’t make sense. I mean, if it had done my ears that way to done all the rest of those people’s ears, sonny boy,
Scott Horton 17:36
he said that he felt all the shaking before you ever heard anything. Right?
V.Z. Lawton 17:40
Wow. Yeah. And what what that is, if he will you get our report. There’s a report in our report that retired brigadier general Benton Kay Parton wrote that tells how the building really came down.
Scott Horton 17:54
I have it right here. I have his letter to Senator Trent Lott anyway.
V.Z. Lawton 18:00
Yeah. Okay. Well, that’s that’s essentially the same thing that that I experienced was exactly what he said happening. And to back up what he’s saying is happened. You know, you have to go to the University of Oklahoma geology school seismograph and it’ll show us seven to nine second difference in time between the first blip and the second blip. And that’s probably about the length of time of course there’s a little bit less than the seven seconds if that’s when the truck bomb went off because I was knocked out before we went off to didn’t hear it you know, there’s all kinds of confirmation for ourselves from other people. Jack Ovid down on the fifth floor is head of the Department of Agriculture. He said he felt to don’t start shaking and having to work in California for a number of years. They were always told to get under their desk. He was under his desk when the truck bomb went off.
Scott Horton 18:53
I have that audio clip and in fact, you’re gonna get that when we’re done I don’t have to set up to where you could hear it if I played it but the audience will hear that clip of him walking bloody down the street explain
V.Z. Lawton 19:05
right.
Scott Horton 19:05
right under the desk
News Reporter 19:08
if you weren’t under that desk
Jack 19:11
Well my floor was okay. In the ceiling and come down but there was still concrete above just a corner of the office that was left that we were in everybody else that we worked with is gone.
News Reporter 19:23
The corner of your office was Okay? and the rest of the floor was completely flattened
Jack 19:30
go over the edge of looking at the sky and as far down as you can look and just a hole.
News Reporter 19:36
And which floor were you on?
V.Z. Lawton 19:40
5th
News Reporter 19:40
the one corner of the 5th floor wasn’t completely flattened
[indistinguishable]
Everybody just crawled out of the desks?
It was like slow motion we crawled under before the glass and everything is just seemed to roll in on us. I thought it was an earthquake when it started a kind of a shake, and then everything started going like this and I dove under the desk and then all the glass came in and the ceilings came down. Totally got cut worse had I not been under the desk I just got little scrapes and scratches.
V.Z. Lawton 20:22
Jack’s a friend of mine he’s a nice fella. Then we’ll start with the department of agriculture for number of years.
Scott Horton 20:29
The multiple bombs thing I guess we should stick with that for a minute here. Now general pardon says that there were four bombs planted inside the building attached to the columns, is that correct?
V.Z. Lawton 20:39
That’s that’s what I would say. Because the four columns that came down, the closest one to the bomb was 15 and a half feet away if you read the FEMA report. And gentlemen, according to channel partons, and he was head of explosive Research Development for the Air Force. brilliant man. He says that the formula that you use to determine the blast pressure at different distances from the center of the blast, was calculated like this, it drops off at a negative cubed amount. So for each foot that you get away from the center, that blast is dropped off and negative cubed amount 15 and a half feet, he calculated it out it was dropped down to 375 pounds per square inch pressure while you’re adding pressure at sea levels 14.7 I think so 300-375 pounds, there’s a lot of pressure, that when you’re going up against a 4000 pound test concrete column is 24 inches by 36 inches, with 20 inch and three eight steel reinforcing bars. And it is a that it doesn’t mean anything it can’t bring a concrete column down. Right? Well,
Scott Horton 21:51
and you’re just talking about the very closest column to where the truck was parked. Right,
V.Z. Lawton 21:54
exactly.
Scott Horton 21:56
How many columns fail that the building total?
V.Z. Lawton 21:58
Well, there, there was form that came down and that was the closest one. The next closest one would have been about 30 to 40 feet away. And then that one column was all 67 feet away. And if any takes a the sheet rock off the other columns closer to the yet it brings that column down supposedly, wow. You can’t do that it dropped down to something like 70 pounds per square inch pressured by the time it got out there last
Scott Horton 22:29
that would have to be a really neato magical explosion to get stronger as it travels through the air, I
V.Z. Lawton 22:35
guess. Yeah. I guess so. It’s like a magic bullet in the Kennedy assassination.
Scott Horton 22:41
Oh, no, that’s not bring up Arlen Specter now.
V.Z. Lawton 22:45
Oh. Magic things happen.
Scott Horton 22:50
I’ll tell you what, yeah, I mean, the idea of an explosion traveling past one column and leaving it on touch even leaving the sheetrock on and then knocking down the column past it. That’s got a strain, some congility somewhere.
V.Z. Lawton 23:04
The column that went down was further away from the truck than the column rig- that I was right next to that’s included in my column is, of course, my column had gone down. Now, we wouldn’t be talking today. But
Scott Horton 23:16
well, so do we think that McVeigh and his buddies put the bombs in there who do we who had access to federal building deployment bombs on columns?
V.Z. Lawton 23:24
Anybody, we had no security, that belly was probably the Middle Eastern terrorist group out of Las Vegas that was involved in that. And we, the government never investigated them. They had a confidential informant that was working within the group. And that’s part of the evidence that we’re using in the lawsuit that we filed and guess the Republic of our actors. 24 others that are involved in that lawsuit, Carey Gaghan was a he was a confidential, confidential informant for federal law enforcement in Denver. He’d been run and read for this middle eastern terrorist group out of Las Vegas, started firing and explosives mixed in with these drugs. Went in there and said hey boys what’s going on. I said, I’m running drugs, not explosives. They said, wow, we’re getting ready to blow up a federal building will play a quarter million dollar sale. And he said, Oh, let me think about that. And he jumped on a plane flew right into Denver and went in and told federal agencies there what, what was going on? He said, You know, you guys may get me through drugs, but you’re not gonna give me a phone at federal buildings. I’m out of this. They Oh, no, no, we want you to say and so we can monitor. He said, Give me a letter of immunity. He got a letter immunity. I’ve got copies of all of these documents. And he documented everything that he did. And that was on September the 14th in 94, that he got his letter of immunity. On March 27 and 95. He took a letter into the US marshal’s office in Denver, Tina Rao, who was his contact as a confidential informant. In that letter, he told him said, I got information, there’s gonna be a federal building blown up in Denver City hereby, within 30 days, call me at this number. He said, I spoke to that number two days, nobody ever told me the facts. Matter of fact, he said they never treated me like they’re supposed to handle a confidential informant. They’re supposed to polygraph them, they’re supposed to follow him, check them, you know, make sure they’re doing what they supposed to do. They never did that with him. Then again on the well, on the third of April, he got called to a meeting by this middle eastern group, their group and said there six other guys in the room besides him take occasion stay with he knows the Middle Eastern guys that he worked for. He said I didn’t understand Arabic. So I didn’t know what they were talking about. If this table, if they had a set of plans on the table, and they called me up, they’re fine. And I got to look at it this set of plans for the Merville. So I better go back in that talk to let the federal law enforcement Denver know what I found out. So he flies back into Denver. As friend his tanter letter down, he sprayed psyche founder this time because he’s afraid the Middle Easterners might be watching. He sent another letter down there, he said, we’ve got new information that there’s gonna be a federal building bonus in Denver City nearby within two weeks. So if you don’t call me this time, you won’t hear from me again. He’s little irritated with him. And he said, left phone number I say call me Call me at this number. He said I stayed there two days that couldn’t stay longer. So they never call me. And everybody said, Well, you know, this guy’s not very credible. But he said he’s done. He’s gonna be blown up within 30 days. He said on the 27th of March, he said on the third on the sixth of April, it was gonna be blown up within two weeks. Sounds pretty credible to me. Sounds credible sound right?
Scott Horton 26:56
Are we talking about I mean, this this cover up just so that the government can save face because they can’t admit how many clues they had that they didn’t follow up? I mean, this is an incredible cover up the information that you’re bringing out the fact that this has never been on 60 minutes, you know, I’ve never seen it Bradley interview this carry James Gagan guy. I mean, are they just saving face? Or do they want this to happen or what’s going on here?
V.Z. Lawton 27:22
That’s the that’s the reason I’m still presented, I want the truth. You give me the truth, I play golf seven days a week instead of four until I get the truth, I’m gonna be pursuing it. And we want something about we will accomplish our goal yet that our name is out there, the Oklahoma bombing investigating committee, and people that have real information that they’ve taken to the FBI that they’ve totally disregarded, are coming to us with that information now. And we at least were given people that do have some information in place to bring it where we might have a chance of getting the truth out about what happened. I think that’s a plus for our committee. And we’re we don’t have a lot of funds to work with that. We got a lot. We got four people in this committee that are determined to get to the truth, and we will use our time and for few resources we do have to pursue it.
Scott Horton 28:23
Well, I’m sure glad you are. I know you know, there’s a lot of people around the country, I’m sure who have the interest but not the time, the money or the inclination to, you know, go and be their own investigators and the fact that y’all set up this committee to be kind of the clearinghouse for all this information. I know it’s a great help to a lot of people. They are getting other books or newspapers, anybody else that has done a good job with this that you can recommend to people to check out.
V.Z. Lawton 28:51
Craig Roberts is in his book, The Medusa files he he currently has a section on the the Oklahoma City bombing. Colonel Bo Grice has got a new book coming out. It’s not I’ve got a draft copy of it here. I had to go over some of the stuff my corrections, he wanted me to look at it and make sure that what he had in there was correct. And I don’t know exactly when he’s going to get it published. But it shouldn’t be too much longer. He’s got his best, like 25 or 46 chapters on defer is as likely the Randy Weaver thing when he went out and wrote him down. And just one chapter I was gonna say on Oklahoma City bombing, but he he covers it pretty well. Stephen Jones book, others unknown, I think is the name of it. So you know, to begin with, I didn’t like too much about Steven Johnson. He’s, he’s given us quite a bit of help on our lawsuit against Iraq, giving us information that we didn’t have.
Scott Horton 29:53
Now that McVeigh is dead, is he free to go ahead and tell you everything he knows about McVeigh I know in his book I know he couldn’t write about McVeigh at all the sort of the minus McVeigh in that book but tell you everything now, right?
V.Z. Lawton 30:07
The first book was that way but now he’s when when McCray fired him and hired two new attorneys that put him in a little different light. We just did a radio or a TV show. It’s gonna come out over PBS. At time now,
Scott Horton 30:23
PBS. Yeah. Is that for frontline or
V.Z. Lawton 30:27
is Jerry McHugh Souter. Dennis McHouston stood up in Dallas is the producer. And he has some awesome backers, financial backers. Other Oh, we call them how these tax free foundations that are supporting them. And Josh and I went down and we’ve paired with with Stephen Jones and Danny Carlson was the FBI agent that was in charge of the investigation here. They’re doing two to one hour segments that are going to be coming out anytime on on public broadcasting system.
Scott Horton 31:09
Excellent. And what was his name again?
V.Z. Lawton 31:12
Well, Dennis McHouston, get used to this the producer, they’re in Dallas.
Scott Horton 31:17
And I’m gonna see if I can’t get a hold of him.
V.Z. Lawton 31:20
He’s a good guy. I think a lot of Dennis, he’s, he’s trying to get the truth out. And he studies presented both sides of this reason he had the FBI agent there. There was also another FBI agent there that the FBI fired, that I’ve heard about him, and I think he’s a pretty damn good guy. I think he lives right there, outside of Austin. And I talked to him for a while I asked him, I said, Well, why did they fire you? I mean, I’ve heard the story. But I’d love to hear what your what Yes. And if I remember, he said that he he he was out posted to another town here in Oklahoma that did investigations over in the eastern part of the state. And part of his investigation uncovered a Middle East connection to the bombing. It is 302 that he sent back into the office. He had all that information. And they sent it back. They’ve said destroy it and forget it you ever heard about it?
Scott Horton 32:16
Is this the agent that Dan Rather interviewed right before McManus execution, that when there were three or four agents on PBS, I remember that I remember those guys. And they were saying that this is when for the audience who might not remember right before McMahon’s execution, the FBI admitted that they had boxes and boxes full of information that they never gave to the defense. And so they postponed his execution for a little while. And then these FBI agents came forward on 60 minutes and said, hey, you know, I know for a fact that the stuff that I turned in, still hasn’t been given to the defense.
V.Z. Lawton 32:50
Yeah. Yeah, that’s that’s the ones Dan Vogel Rico hater. I can’t remember the other two, but the just just before probably what the reason that happened was Jane Graham and I filed a lawsuit in Terre Haute, Indiana, to stay McVeigh’s education. She was on the ninth floor of the building that they have survived. And she’s she’s strong lady. Her daddy was vice president under Jimmy Hoffa. She, she doesn’t she doesn’t run scared of anybody? No, I guess. And anyway, we filed that lawsuit. Well, about a few days after we filed the lawsuit, then this information comes out. Oh, yeah, we got 4000 pieces of evidence here that we just forgot about given to. And so then Mr. Ashcroft comes in and gives an administrative state which supersedes our request for a stay. And then but his stay is running out on the 16th of June. And we have to have new requests for our study back in there. At least 10 days before the execution. Our attorney in Dallas who had filed it electronically before didn’t have a problem getting through the files at 12 days ahead of time, but somehow they just didn’t get it on time. Oh, and that shame? Yeah. Imagine that they, they they wanted McVeigh dad as fast as they could get him there.
Scott Horton 34:21
Yeah. And you know, it’s something, you know, the first execution by the federal government since What 1970 Something 71 – 72, something like that. And it was based on a Russian style show trial, where 4000 pieces of evidence are omitted, where they bring in a British explosives expert to testify about the bomb because every single FBI agent from the crime lab is fired for being criminal and a forger of evidence. Careful how the ATF informant is not allowed to testify. I mean, we’re talking about a total joke of a trial That was thought that sentence sent us a man to death. For the first time the federal government had executed somebody in or legally anyway, in 30 years.
V.Z. Lawton 35:12
Yeah, it should have been in Oklahoma. They violated his constitutional rights when they moved it. When they killed him, it was destruction of evidence, and that’s obstruction of justice. That was that was the basis for our lawsuit. And, of course, he’s gone. Now. We got Terry Nichols up here in our county jail there wanting to try him for the other 160 deaths. McVeigh was strapped for the deaths of the eight federal agencts. right. Now they want to try Nicolas. He got a last sentence up there for conspiracy to participate in Oklahoma City Bombing, which vote from the jury was 10 to two for acquittal to begin with. If two people failed out, I actually
Scott Horton 35:55
have the clipping here where the jury for woman says that there were of the two guys who voted guilty that they made them cry. That was the quote from the from one of the guys who voted to to convict in the first place was they all wanted to acqquit, but we told them, we made him cry, and they ended up agreeing. And so then they convicted him but only have involuntary manslaughter, right?
V.Z. Lawton 36:23
Yeah, this this mission, Nikki was the foreperson of the jury. Very bright lady. very articulate. I can remember the afternoon that that occurred. There. There was two or three other people on the jury that was supposed to go with her to meet the press. They all bailed out, because she was terrified herself. And I’ll tell you why she did a superb job. She’s a very bright lady.
Scott Horton 36:50
I mean, it seems to me and you know, this is just my own personal point of view. It seems to me that Terry Nichols is probably guilty of first degree premeditated murder and the whole bit, but that the government couldn’t afford to give him a real trial and really display all the evidence against him without leading to a bunch of other stuff.
V.Z. Lawton 37:12
It would lead to the Middle East connection because he we found out since then, that he was for probably more heavily involved than McVeigh. And all those trips he was making over to the Philippines Cebu City. You know, it married a little mattify to the mail order brides. That he was going over there when she was over here. And he was meeting with Ramsey Yossef and Edwin de Angeles, who was the Middle Eastern terrorist leader there and Cebu City.
Scott Horton 37:45
And now Ramzi Yousef, he’s the guys sitting in prison for the first World Trade Center bombing right now.
V.Z. Lawton 37:50
Correct. Exactly, exactly. That he didn’t go in there until after the bombing. And we’ve got some other things I can’t talk about it on. I don’t want to go public with it yet because we get we got some guys to get hurt that we get. We get involved in our lawsuit. There in Washington, I’m going to try to get this information out. And it’s, it’s going to tie it’s gonna say the Middle Easterners in to the Oklahoma City building bombing very tightly.
Scott Horton 38:24
Wow. Yeah. I remember in Stephen Jones book, I think he he talked about how they actually had people in the Philippines who are willing to travel to the United States to testify under oath that Terry Nichols was there with Ramzi Yousef in bomb making school or whatever, they’re
V.Z. Lawton 38:39
They call him the farmer
Scott Horton 38:41
And that art was a judge made that joke. Wouldn’t let this witness come here to testify.
V.Z. Lawton 38:48
Judge mice would not allow Steven Johnson proceeded at evidence that connected who was connected to Middle East. There’s something wrong with that kind of a border coming from a federal judge. Say it sounds like the department is more like a department of injustice instead of the Department of Justice.
Scott Horton 39:08
That sounded more and more like that all the time. Well, I guess I just want to end with I want to get your comment on this quote. I have a quote here from Judge Burkett, who oversaw the county grand jury investigation that Glen Wilburn and then got started. And when they were done rubber stamping the FBI his version of what happened there, Judge Bearcat said quote, hey, more than a million records, or more than a billion records were reviewed 35,000 personal interviews worldwide, and basically refer to this giant pile of evidence that the FBI had investigated and if the FBI doesn’t believe in these silly conspiracy theories involving Middle Easterners or white supremacists or anybody else, after going through all of that volume of information, then why should Do?
V.Z. Lawton 40:01
Well, nothing like that the answer to that goes back to the agent that we talked about was investigating things in eastern part of Oklahoma that had run out to the Middle East connections to the to the bombing, sending the information in to the officer in Oklahoma City has been sent back to him saying just destroy it and forget it. You know, don’t make a difference. You’ve done a billion invested, investigated a billion pieces of evidence. If you are going to use it. You can’t get to the truth. The truth show getting hung out.
Scott Horton 40:35
So we’re talking about a difference between quantity and quality.
V.Z. Lawton 40:39
Exactly, exactly. It’s like the FBI lab. They’re so bad. They can’t even get membership in the National Forensic Lab Association. I don’t remember the name of it, but that’s what it is. And oh, yeah, all you got to do is read the, the IGs report on the FBI lab. And as a matter of fact, this Monday back at this little bit, this TV thing that’s coming out on PBS with the denitrification. One of the first things that we said, My story was what I told here a minute ago, you know, the felt ability shake, and you know, there were other Sposi devices in the belly. Well, Danny Collison couldn’t wait to get up and refute what I said. He said, Well, he said, Dave Williams, from the FBI lab, one of the best investigators that they have, but he and I went all through that belly, we could find no evidence of any other explosive devices. And I wanted to jump up and and refuse them. But we were supposed to have a question and answer session in which we didn’t have so I couldn’t refute it on the station. But in between the first air and the second, we they fed us little food. I’m sitting there, and he comes over and sits down by me and starts talking about that. You know, you mentioned Dave Williams in there, when you were saying that. There are many other explosives in there. Are you talking about the Super Dave that they call him? The one that they had to fire? Get him out of the lab? Because his work was sloppy commingled evidence. And he said, What do you know about that? I said, have you read this? Have you read the FBI zone report the IGs report on FBI lab? You know, if you haven’t, then you you don’t know what I’m talking about. y’all go reading about that. I’m sure I’ll seek him over. Then he said, I think the problem is we know more about this bombing than you do. Yeah, clearly. At least.
Scott Horton 42:30
That’s my job is to remain ignorant so that he doesn’t have to do his job.
V.Z. Lawton 42:35
Yeah. I think that’s a good possibility. He’s nice guy locked. In a copy of his book, he’s got a book out. I’ll read it. I’d like to see what he says.
Scott Horton 42:46
I mean, this guy, Dave Williams. He’s such a great forensic examiner. We we all have to question how come he wasn’t good enough for the prosecution? Or the Nichols trial?
V.Z. Lawton 42:57
Exactly. Exactly. Yeah, doctor, Dr. Whitehurst. His book called cleaning evidence, there’s a good book for you to read. It’s by Kelly and Hearn, I believe it is or word. And the name of it is training evidence or good luck. Most of it is on the FBI lab. In fact, all those just about on the FBI lab,
Scott Horton 43:20
and now now Frederick Wright Whitehurst, he was the guy who was the head of the crime lab, and then who got fired for complaining about the manufacturing of evidence in the First World Trade Center bombing Waco and Oklahoma City, correct?
V.Z. Lawton 43:31
Well, he couldn’t not call the city because if they just sat him down here, then they could use his testimony that they knew that he wouldn’t lie. You know, he told me that he tried to say his laughs when he walked across the stage and got his diploma from the FBI Academy. But he said also signed an oath that took an oath. And I can’t violate mouth. And there was a lot of that going on in the lab. And that’s, that’s the reason he got fired rough horse. He goes from fancy medicine, good whistleblower attorneys, and they go get a winner settlement out of the FBI. I think it’s 1.6 million. And while they were while they were pursuing him, and trying to make you think he is crazy, send him to psychiatrists, and all this stuff. He went got a law degree at Georgetown University. He already got a PhD from Duke. Yeah, he’s brilliant guy, super Pfeiffer super patriot. He’s one of the fastest. He has time in his offices that for awards, he got bronze stars for valor in Vietnam. You’re talking about Dr. White hairs? Yes, right after Frederick laughs and this
Scott Horton 44:47
is the guy who, once he became a whistleblower was fired. And then when he sued the federal government settled with him for $300,000. Which
V.Z. Lawton 44:55
1.6 million
Scott Horton 44:57
Oh, was it that much?
V.Z. Lawton 44:58
Yep.
Scott Horton 44:59
Which is absalutely unheard of for suing the federal government. The federal government might give you a few 1000. If anything,
V.Z. Lawton 45:05
well, give Randy waivers girl 3.2 million.
Scott Horton 45:09
Yeah, well, they definitely had that comment. And yeah,
V.Z. Lawton 45:13
I’m more Oh, Randy. I feel sorry for you.
Scott Horton 45:16
Yeah, me too. And you know, in fact, that’s a story for a whole different time. I just interviewed Alibaug. Last week on here, the guy that wrote ambush at Ruby Ridge.
V.Z. Lawton 45:24
Oh, really? I’ve read the oh,
Scott Horton 45:26
That’s an excellent book by Alan Bach. I recommend at the top of the list, unfortunately, Mr. Lon we’ve run up against the time wall here, got an interview with Dick Revis, the author of the ashes of Waco coming up in about 10 minutes.
V.Z. Lawton 45:41
Twice. I gotta go. So it worked out just right. All right.
Scott Horton 45:44
Well, ladies and gentlemen, you’ve been listening to an interview with Mr. V. Z. Lawton, of the Oklahoma City bombing Investigation Committee, and who is himself a survivor of the Oklahoma City bombing? Is there a website that people can look at? Yeah, but it is. Okay. OKCbombing.org? Okay. All right. Thank you so much for joining us on radio chaos today, sir.
Okay, celebrate. Appreciate it.
This is the weekend interview show. And I’m your host, Phil dru administrator.
Unknown Speaker 46:22
Questions about what happened? That day, I know you have been so concerned about this execution, because you spent two years of your life looking into whether or not there was a conspiracy. That was larger than just a Terry Nichols and a couple of others. Do you feel any differently? Now having seen this, or having gone through the execution?
News Reporter 46:50
Not you know, this is just a bump in the road. Just a bump in the road to me, I feel absolutely no different. You’re absolutely we’re other people involved in.
Unknown Speaker 47:02
And I’ve been working with MTA films the last two years. And we’re going to be releasing a documentary entitled apply for justice story. And I think the American people are going to be surprised.
Scott Horton 47:17
Rarely, there’s a conspiracy of some six to eight people with perhaps another half dozen partner helping that is to say they didn’t precisely know
News Reporter 47:26
what the objective was for agents for warned about a bomb in Oklahoma City. Did they know the morale building was? The APS says no, absolutely not. But tonight in the soil, Fiona, the news channel, you’re about to hear otherwise, from people who are at the morale building that morning. We asked some simple questions. We can’t get any answer. So it makes it much more curious. You know, where’s the news channel did ask for a private meeting with ATF officials to discuss the credibility of these witness reports. But the ATF refused, saying they had no more to say on the subject.
Unknown Speaker 48:03
What he told her that he thought that they had received a tip that morning of yet another witness a rescue worker says after she talked with an agent of the bombing scene. She also suspected the ATF was warned an agent stayed away from their office that morning.
Unknown Speaker 48:18
His office was in the building. And he said yes. Ask if there were any ATF agents that were still in the building? And he said No, we weren’t here.
Unknown Speaker 48:33
Witness number one approached an ATF agent nearby. He claims he asked the agent what had happened. And witness number one says this is what the agent told him
Unknown Speaker 48:41
who started getting a little bit nervous to try taking somebody on the freeway rodeo couldn’t get anybody and I’ll tell him I wanted an answer. Right, man. He said they were in the briefing. And agents have been there. They’ve been tipped by the pagers not coming to work that day, plain as day out of his mouth. They were kept. Why wouldn’t anybody else? There was a lot of people, good people died down there. And if I knew I should let everybody my scene McVeigh was with another person. In the water.
Unknown Speaker 49:20
Even more, I have no doubt that there was definitely a second person no matter what. There was two people. John Doe number $2 million. There’s no doubt
Unknown Speaker 49:32
all witnesses puts out a photo lineup, that we can all share the information of this man with the FBI. We’ve had some of that material long before our report went on the air. We act with Dan Vogel with John Doe number two so part of the investigation. The answer yet the FBI still trying to locate and identify John Doe number two. The man in our reports is Iraq. Today the FBI says they are not the selenium was rolled out, that could change tomorrow
Unknown Speaker 50:09
or failed our chili. also focus on surveillance cameras or pasta bombing. And maybe the man behind the problem. And your channel has the information tonight to be the smoking, that we have candid questions and aware of face to face meeting with the investigation. We learned that video collected from downtown businesses the morning of April 9, Sunday. What exactly how, however, numerous confirmed cases, and that they reveal more than one bother. So what evidence are they asking for the last video?
Unknown Speaker 50:50
Of what we’ve all been after we’ve been asking that question before the surveillance cameras aimed at the federal building could have captured all those involved on tape. And for those who care more than one farmer. The FBI also confirmed the video is part of a criminal investigation. And now for the first time we get in on the record response from the head of the Dallas office. We learned that videotapes could be unveiled as part of the prophecies and critical was on the video, but we’re having to recreate some of what may have impacted by downtown surveillance cameras will be added to the witness. We’re looking at the funnel moving to the water profit setting to disable the profit profits within positive moments before closing. Tonight it’s time to go resell them memories of how they believe the trade off and they forget all these accounts. There are common and unsettling similarities. The witnesses say they saw several accomplices including the John Doe. John Doe partisan, but will not comment any further
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