| Tape shows oklahoma bomber had help { April 19 1995 } Original Source Link: (May no longer be active) http://www.canoe.ca/NewsStand/LondonFreePress/News/2004/04/20/428993.htmlhttp://www.canoe.ca/NewsStand/LondonFreePress/News/2004/04/20/428993.html
Oklahoma bomber may have had help
A mysterious video cited in an agent's log indicates the possibility of accomplices. AP 2004-04-20 02:15:39 WASHINGTON -- A Secret Service document written shortly after the 1995 Oklahoma City bombing described security video footage of the attack and witness testimony that suggested Timothy McVeigh may have had accomplices at the scene. "Security video tapes from the area show the truck detonation three minutes and six seconds after the suspects exited the truck," the Secret Service reported six days after the attack on a log of agents' activities and evidence in the Oklahoma investigation.
The government has insisted McVeigh drove the truck himself and that it never had any video of the bombing or the scene of the Alfred P. Murrah federal building in the minutes before the April 19, 1995, explosion.
Several investigators and prosecutors who worked the case said they had never seen video footage like that described in the Secret Service log.
The document, if accurate, is either significant evidence kept secret for nine years or a misconstrued recounting of investigative leads that were often passed by word of mouth during the hectic early days of the case, they said.
"I did not see it," said Danny Defenbaugh, the retired FBI agent who ran the Oklahoma City investigation. "If it shows what it says, then it would be significant."
Charles Bopp, speaking for the Secret Service, declined to discuss the video footage reference, saying it would be addressed by witnesses this week at the capital murder trial of McVeigh co-defendant Terry Nichols.
"It is anticipated Secret Service employees will testify in court concerning these matters," he said.
Other documents show the Secret Service in late 1995 gave prosecutors several computer disks of enhanced digital photographs of the Murrah building, intelligence files on several subjects in the investigation and a file detailing an internal affairs inquiry concerning an agent who reconstructed key phone evidence against McVeigh.
"These abstract sheets are sensitive documents which we have protected from disclosure in the past," said a Secret Service letter that recounted discussions in late 1995 with federal prosecutors on what evidence would be turned over to defence lawyers.
Lawyers for Nichols say they have never been given the security video, photo disks or internal investigative file referenced in the documents.
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