Attorney OKC
bombing tapes appear edited
Breaking News
September 22, 2009
http://news.yahoo.com/s/ap/us_oklahoma_bombing_video
OKLAHOMA CITY –
Long-secret security tapes showing the chaos immediately after the 1995 bombing
of the Oklahoma City federal building are blank in the minutes before the blast
and appear to have been edited, an attorney who obtained the recordings said
Sunday.
"The real
story is what's missing," said Jesse Trentadue,
a Salt Lake City attorney who obtained the recordings through the federal
Freedom of Information Act as part of an unofficial inquiry he is conducting
into the April 19, 1995, bombing that killed 168 people and injured hundreds
more.
Trentadue gave copies of the tapes to The Oklahoman newspaper, which posted them
online and provided copies to The Associated Press.
The tapes turned
over by the FBI came from security cameras various companies had mounted
outside office buildings near the Alfred P. Murrah
Federal Building. They are blank at points before 9:02 a.m., when a truck bomb
carrying a 4,000 pound fertilizer-and-fuel-oil bomb detonated in front of the
building, Trentadue said.
"Four cameras in four different locations going blank at basically the
same time on the morning of April 19, 1995. There ain't
no such thing as a coincidence," Trentadue said.
He said
government officials claim the security cameras did not record the minutes
before the bombing because "they had run out of tape" or "the
tape was being replaced."
"The
interesting thing is they spring back on after 9:02," he said. "The
absence of footage from these crucial time intervals is evidence that there is
something there that the FBI doesn't want anybody to see."
A spokesman for
the FBI in Oklahoma City, Gary Johnson, declined to comment and referred
inquiries about the tapes to FBI officials in Washington, who were not
immediately available for comment Sunday.
The soundless
recordings show people rushing from nearby buildings after the bomb went off.
Some show people fleeing through corridors cluttered with debris. None show the
actual explosion that ripped through the federal building.
FBI agents did
not report finding any security tapes from the federal building itself.
The FBI in the
past refused to release the security camera recordings,
leading Trentadue and others to contend the
government was hiding evidence that others were involved in the attack.
"It's taken
a lawsuit and years to get the tapes," Trentadue
said.
He received the
latest batch of tapes over the summer in response to an April request for video
from security cameras in 11 different locations. Nothing on the tapes was
unexpected.
"The more
important thing they show is what they don't show," Trentadue
said. "These cameras would have shown the various roads and approaches to
the Murrah Building."
Trentadue began looking into the bombing after his brother, Kenneth Trentadue, died at the Oklahoma City Federal Transfer
Center in August 1995. Kenneth Trentadue was a
convicted bank robber who was held at the federal prison after being picked up
as a parole violator at his home in San Diego in June 1995.
He was never a
bombing suspect, but Jesse Trentadue alleges guards
mistook his brother for one and beat him to death during an interrogation. The
official cause of Kenneth Trentadue's death is listed
as suicide, but his body had 41 wounds and bruises that Jesse Trentadue believes could have come only from a beating.
A judge in 2001
awarded Kenneth Trentadue's family $1.1 million for
extreme emotional distress in the government's handling of his death.
Jesse Trentadue said he has received about 30 security tapes,
including some images that were used as evidence at bomber Timothy McVeigh's
trial. McVeigh was convicted on federal murder and conspiracy charges and
executed in 2001. Coconspirator Terry Nichols is serving life in prison on
federal and state bombing convictions.
Trentadue said he is seeking more tapes along with a variety of bombing-related
documents from the FBI and the CIA. An FOIA request by Trentadue
for 26 CIA documents was rejected in June. A letter from the National
Geospatial-Intelligence Agency, which reviewed the documents, said their
release "could cause grave damage to our national security."
Trentadue said he gave the latest set of tapes to The Oklahoman because of their
historical value. The newspaper has agreed to provide copies to the Oklahoma
City National Memorial & Museum.
All logos and trademarks in
this site are property of their respective owner. FAIR USE NOTICE: This site contains copyrighted material the
use of which has not always been specifically authorized by the copyright
owner. We are making such material available in our efforts to advance
understanding of environmental, political, human rights, economic, democracy,
scientific, and social justice issues, etc. We believe this constitutes a 'fair
use' of any such copyrighted material as provided for in section 107 of the US
Copyright Law. In accordance with Title 17 U.S.C. Section 107, the material on
this site is distributed without profit to those who have expressed a prior
interest in receiving the included information for research and educational
purposes. For more information go to: www.law.cornell.edu/uscode/17/107.shtml