THE JOHN DOE TIMES
Volume IV, No. 11
3 March 1997
IN THIS ISSUE:
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The John Doe Times is an on-line, electronic newsletter published by the 1st Alabama Cavalry Regiment (Constitutional Militia) and friends. Our motto: Sic Semper Rodentia!
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KINGMAN, Ariz. (AP) -- Oklahoma City bombing suspect Timothy McVeigh may be the man Kingman police have been searching 2 1/2 years for in the 1994 burglary of the National Guard Armory.
McVeigh reportedly told his lawyers that he and Michael Fortier, a former friend from Kingman and Army associate who's now a key witness against him, broke into the armory sometime in June or July of 1994, according to Friday's editions of The Dallas M orning News.
"He said they jumped the fence to try to take welding tools," the newspaper reported. "Failing that, he said, they stole an ax, a shovel and some other items."
Sgt. Ray Sipe of the Kingman Police Department confirmed the Kingman armory was burglarized between July 10 and Aug. 10 that year. The burglary was reported on Aug. 24, Sipe said.
According to a police report released Saturday, an axe, shovel, pick and a first-aid kit were stolen from the armory. No arrest had been made and police said they have not yet connected McVeigh to the burglary.
Fortier has pleaded guilty to helping transport the weapons and failing to warn the government of the bomb plot. He has begun a 23-year prison sentence. McVeigh's trial is scheduled to begin March 31.
The Dallas Morning News' report quoted confidential notes of jailhouse interviews, which also say that McVeigh told his defense team he alone drove the truck in the April 19, 1995 bombing of the Alfred P. Murrah Federal Building that killed 168 people and injured more than 500.
In another Kingman connection, the newspaper also said that Fortier helped dispose of guns stolen in Arkansas to help finance the bombing.
McVeigh reportedly described how he and Fortier picked up the guns from Council Grove, Kan., where codefendant Terry Nichols had stored them. He said Fortier took the weapons to sell in Kingman, where both men once lived and worked.
McVeigh also reportedly said they bankrolled the bombing in part with the November 1994 robbery of Arkansas gun dealer Roger Moore.
Moore had said he believed that McVeigh may have been involved in the robbery. Moore also had said he knew McVeigh and that McVeigh was familiar with the gun collection. The FBI in 1995 had confiscated guns believed to be connected to robbery from a Kingman pawn shop.
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SPOKANE PEE-PEES GO ON TRIAL; WHICH ONE IS THE PET NAZI?
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JDT Commentary: Long-time readers of the JDT will remember Mssrs. Barbee, Berry & Merrell. Barbee and Berry were mentioned in a confidential ATF report dated October, 1995, as having been given a pass on federal prosecution after having been caught in a Kelso, Washington Motel Six with a silencer, incendiary devices, etc., (even though one of them was a convicted felon). One of these birds is probably a pet Nazi. Will the trial demonstrate which?
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By Bill Stimson
SPOKANE, Wash., March 2 (Reuter) - Three white supremacists accused of carrying out a pair of pipe bombings and bank robberies go on trial Monday in a case that could be complicated by the defendants' refusal to recognise the court.
Charles Barbee, 44, Robert Berry, 42, and Jay Merrell, 50, all of the Sandpoint, Idaho, area, are charged with robbing the same Spokane bank branch twice last year, once April 1 and then again July 12.
They also are charged with bombing a newspaper office before the first robbery and a Planned Parenthood office before the second.
The bombings, which caused no injuries, were presumed to be diversionary tactics, although FBI officials said the bomb at the Planned Parenthood office was powerful enough to kill if anyone had been in the building.
At preliminary hearings, the three men have sometimes refused to stand for the ceremonial entrance of the judge, to answer questions about their legal representation or to have their photographs taken by law enforcement officials.
At one hearing Merrell shouted at U.S. District Judge Frem Nielsen, ``You're in violation of the commandments of Yahweh!''
Yahweh is an ancient Hebrew term for God frequently used by white supremacists.
Refusing to answer Nielsen's questions about whether he accepted appointed legal counsel, Merrell pointed to the United States seal on the wall of the courtroom and said, ``These are pagan images.''
Nielsen authorised federal officials to use ``reasonable force'' to take the defendants' photographs.
Prosecutors are expected to argue during the trial that the three men were motivated to carry out the attacks by their belief in a white supremacist religion known as Christian identity.
Barbee, Berry and Merrell were arrested Oct. 8 near Yakima, Wash., by a swarm of federal agents who had been following them as they drove from Portland, Ore.
The three men allegedly had approached a Portland bank with the intention of robbing it but found the doors locked because authorities had been one step ahead.
Federal agents said they found fragmentation grenades, loaded guns and bomb-making ingredients in the men's vehicle. The suspects have been held without bail in Spokane.
Prosecutors are expected to present evidence found at the men's homes, including masks and ski goggles like those used by the bank robbers and ingredients like those used in the bombings.
Adding interest to the case is the fact that FBI officials are investigating whether the men may have been involved in the bombing of Atlanta's Centennial Park during last year's Olympics.
That July 27 bombing killed two people and injured 111.
17:57 03-02-97
