Questions for Congress About "Waco"

Questions for Congress About "Waco"
Scott Ostrander: scotto@cica.indiana.edu
http://www.firearmsandliberty.com/waco.questions.html

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Box 65518 * Washington, D.C. * 20035 * 202/986-1847

Between March and June, 1993 the United States House and Senate held several hearings regarding Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco and Firearms (BATF) and Federal Bureau of Investigation (FBI) actions against members of the Branch Davidian religious group in Waco, Texas. These actions led to the deaths of 82 Davidians, 56 of them women and children, and of four BATF agents.

While Congress asked some important questions regarding these deadly raids, too many remain unasked and unanswered. Since those hearings new information revealed at the trial of 11 Davidians and through the research of a number of investigators, including in the ongoing civil lawsuits, has raised many more questions that cut to the very heart of our Constitutional government.

Millions of Americans are beginning to discover the truth about what really happened February 28, 1993: BATF agents in National Guard helicopters zoomed in on the Branch Davidians' church and home, Mount Carmel Center, with guns blazing, killing unarmed Davidians. Ground agents mortally wounded David Koresh's unarmed father-in-law who stood at the front door with Koresh as he begged BATF agents to stop the attack on a building filled with 82 women and children. BATF agents--and FBI agents who took over from them--knew that more than a dozen agents would face prosecution if America learned the truth.

We believe leading BATF and FBI agents in Waco conspired, either explicitly or silently, to lie to and harass the Davidians to keep them inside Mount Carmel so agents would have an excuse to destroy the building, its incriminating evidence, and the defiant witnesses calling for justice. A study of the April 19, 1993 gas and tank attacks suggests they were a successful systematic effort to render Mount Carmel an inescapable fire trap.

Congressional committees conducted three in depth hearings, the April 22, 1993 House Ways and Means Subcommittee on Oversight hearing, the April 28, 1993 House Judiciary Committee hearing (whose transcripts still have not been released), and the June 9, 1993 House Appropriations Committee hearing. Below is list of questions which these committees never asked or which BATF, FBI, Treasury and Justice Department agents and officials never really answered. (Neither were these questions adequately answered in the official Treasury or Justice Department reports.)

Except at trial, in no investigation have these agents and officials been questioned under oath. Nor has immunity ever been granted to any agents or officials. Even under oath, many agents gave inconsistent, altered and self- serving testimony.

Millions of Americans are troubled by the obvious continuing coverup of BATF/FBI crimes against the Davidians and the failure of Congress to find the truth. They similarly are concerned about the failure of the Justice Department to prosecute or the FBI to fire agents and officials responsible for the death of Vicki Weaver in Idaho. Tens of thousands of Americans have gone so far as to form armed militias and vow to march on federal agents should they ever again put Americans under siege. Congress must re-open hearings or see to the appointment of an independent counsel to get to reassure the American people that federal law enforcement never again will raid and massacre Americans.

The supporting information mentioned in these questions is documented in Carol Moore's The Massacre of the Branch Davidians to be published soon by Gun Owners of America. Please contact us for sources of additional information.

1/26/95 Version

1. Did BATF hide irregularities in its investigation of the Branch Davidians from Congress?

** When a representative asked about cooperation with local law enforcement, BATF officials did not reveal that they avoided cooperating with the McLennan County Sheriff and prosecutors' office because of one individual's allegations of "leaks" in the Sheriff's Department to Koresh.

** Congress was not told that both U.S. Assistant Attorney Bill Johnston and District Judge Walter J. Smith (who presided at trial) may have been prejudiced against Koresh because of civil suits linked to alleged drug dealing out of Mount Carmel under George Roden before David Koresh took over. Others may have feared that Koresh would reveal evidence of local law enforcement involvement in that activity. The Treasury report asserts Johnston insisted that BATF use a paramilitary entry as opposed to more peaceful means. This became a big issue at trial.

** Why didn't BATF officials tell Congress that David Koresh had a legal gun business and that through his gun dealer, Henry McMahon, Koresh had invited BATF agents to inspect his guns on July 30, 1992? Why didn't they reveal that a few days later Koresh faxed the dealer documentation for his weapons purchases which was forwarded to BATF?

** Why didn't BATF officials tell Congress that Koresh complained to the Sheriff's office about obvious surveillance weeks before the raid? (Why must Americans fear this kind of attack despite their efforts to cooperate?)

** Why wasn't Congress informed of the mass of prejudiced, stale, inaccurate, false, misleading, irrelevant and inflammatory information contained in the February 25, 1993 affidavit in support of search and arrest warrants? Will Congress investigate BATF and other federal agencies habit of providing such faulty affidavits to judges and the judiciary's role in rubber stamping them?

2. Did BATF and FBI lie about or even fabricate Davidians' allegedly illegal weapons?

** There have been frequent allegations that BATF converts legal semiautomatic weapons to illegal ones in order to score convictions. BATF/FBI needed to find such weapons to excuse the deaths of 82 Davidians and four BATF agents.

** That is why many suspect BATF and the FBI falsely claim that after the fire they found 48 automatic weapons, four live grenades and twenty metal tubes they labeled "silencers." These agencies have proved to no one outside of law enforcement that Davidian guns were illegally converted. Nor have they proved the grenades were live or the metal tubes were silencers.

** When a Davidian gun expert tried to look at the weapons, he only was allowed to do so through thick plastic, which would make it difficult to see if the changes had been made or if they had been done before or after the fire.

** While several agents alleged they heard automatic gun fire coming out of Mount Carmel, prosecutors could not provide such evidence in video tape or in vehicles shot at by Davidians. If Davidians had used such weapons, they would have done much more damage to vehicles and killed many more agents.

** Prosecutors put on the stand a Davidian woman with little weapons experience to testify a deceased Davidian told her some weapons were automatic. (A Davidian man with little experience told a grand jury that because some guns had three switch positions he assumed they were automatic. He was told a grenade in his possession was live but did not know if this was true.)

** Prosecutors did not prosecute or call to the stand a Davidian mechanical engineer who both the woman at trial and BATF agents in affidavits had identified as being possibly involved in converting weapons. This suggests the engineer had no credible evidence Davidians converted weapons.

3. Did anti-cult individuals and organizations lie to law enforcement about the Branch Davidians?

** Will Congress investigate whether financially motivated anti-cult "deprogrammers" like Rick Ross provided false or exaggerated information to law enforcement about the Branch Davidians? Ross hinted of his knowledge of BATF's upcoming raid to try to scare Davidian Steve Schneider's family into paying Ross to deprogram Schneider. Schneider and his family died on April 19th.

4. Did BATF hide the reason for a paramilitary raid from Congress?

** During one hearing a representative questioned a low ranking BATF public affairs official about BATF's "publicity" motivations for a paramilitary raid. Her superior, who also appeared and probably knew the answer, did not volunteer an answer.

** Congress did not ask other more disturbing questions like: What was the role of the federal prosecutor in promoting such a raid? Are violent paramilitary raids the preferred BATF modus operandi against citizens? Did anti- cult individuals give BATF false information about the likelihood of Koresh complying with a search warrant and of Davidians committing mass suicide? Was BATF punishing David Koresh and the Davidians for showing a BATF undercover agent a Gun Owners of America video tape which exposes BATF abuses of citizens' rights?

5. Did BATF break the posse comitatus law?
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====================

"THE CLINTON CONNECTION"

Justice Department investigation should target UT campus
http://net.cs.utexas.edu/users/boyer/fp/texan-970317.html

Clayton Vernon TEXAN COLUMNIST

According to The New York Times, former UT System Regents Chairman Bernard
Rappoport hired Webster Hubbell for a joint venture with the Riady family in
Indonesia during the brief time before Hubbell's federal imprisonment. This
shocker should end naive beliefs that the cozy and profitable relationships
between the individuals who ran this system and Indonesian interests was
above-board.

Whitewater prosecutor Kenneth Starr is investigating these and other
enormous payments, totaling $400,000, to determine if they were "hush
money" related in any way to Hubbell's decision to not cooperate with
federal investigators. Appearances of impropriety include frequent visits
to Hubbell in prison by the Clintons' close personal friends, to remind him
the Clintons still "cared."

The Lippo Group, an Indonesian conglomerate run by the Riadys, helped
introduce since-disgraced fund-raiser John Huang to the Clinton
administration, which later endorsed Rappoport's $2 billion Chinese
real-estate project. Rappoport's public service to Texas served his private
interests well. Clinton has claimed ignorance of these "indefensible"
payments from his good friends and his best friend.

We can no longer deny the coinciding of Rappoport's sudden interest in
hiring Hubbell as his lawyer, and the large consulting compensation paid to
UT System Chancellor William Cunningham by Jim Bob Moffett and
Freeport-McMoRan -- a large and controversial corporate presence in
Indonesia.

We now expect the Justice Department's investigation to shift south, to
the Democratic Leadership Council. This group was co-founded by Sen. John
Breaux of Louisiana, who helped Moffett intimidate our faculty last year.
This cozy relationship suggests our system administration lacks integrity.

This sad possibility is supported by other events. Last year, we lost a
"whistle-blower" lawsuit in which a plaintiff alleged the University
deliberately undercollected royalties from oil and gas producers with
ties to administrators.

Now there are allegations of administrators being forced to contribute
to the DNC. [APFN: Cause of Ron Browns death)

Students, faculty and staff are completely unaware of the alleged sleazy
machinations. Perhaps our traditional reliance on the Democratic Party's
support of higher education has left us vulnerable to its recent
indiscretions.

Perhaps UT President Robert Berdahl had some of these consideration
in mind when he accepted the chancellorship at Cal-Berkeley. Berdahl
is a man of principle, he may have felt totally out of place within
the highest levels of the UT System.

Vernon is a graduate student in economics.

[APFN]
American Income Life Insurance Company -- Bernard Rappoport
Health Insurance for over 2 million union workers
[1993 Hillary Clinton spent over $5 million pushing
health insurance. Hubble, Hillary's partner
in Whitewater] Rappoport, pays $400,000 fee for Hubble's
Service(s)!!!
AIIC HOME PAGE:
http://www.ailins.com/main/default.htm

Hillary Rodham Clinton to visit Waco
http://www.apfn.org/apfn/hillary_visit.htm

Why Waco?
http://www.apfn.org/apfn/wacopg.htm

Texas Ranger Report on Waco
http://www.txdps.state.tx.us/director_staff/public_information/branch_davidian/index.htm

UNNERSTALL FAX
http://www.apfn.org/apfn/unnerstall_fax.htm

FBI didn't plan to fight Waco fire
http://www.apfn.org/apfn/wacofire.htm

From: Gary Hunt at the Outpost of Freedom in Waco, Texas
Date: MARCH 24, 1993
http://www.illusions.com/opf/opf0324a.htm

Waco Whitewash
http://www.radio4all.org/pfp/wacowhit.htm

PARDON THE SEVEN WACO PRISONERS
http://www.apfn.org/apfn/pardon.htm

FBI Special Agent (SA) R. Wayne Smith Waco Report
http://www.apfn.org/apfn/fbiwaco_doc.htm

There is NO Statutes of Limitations on the Crimes of Genocide!
http://www.apfn.org/apfn/genocide.htm

In the end, JUSTICE WILL BE SERVED!
HTTP://WWW.FREEYELLOW.COM/MEMBERS5/APFN/

IT IS THE LAW:
"Silence can only be equated with fraud when there is a
legal or moral duty to speak, or when an inquiry left
unanswered would be intentionally misleading... We cannot
condone this shocking conduct... If this is the case we hope
our message is clear. This sort of decption will not be
tolerated and if this is routine it should be corrected
immediately"
U.S. v. Twell 550 F2d 297, 299-300