The Blazing Waco Conflagration: A National Disgrace – Part 1
In 1993 out-of-control federal corruption eventually paved a trail all the way to Waco, Texas that ended in a blazing inferno at the 77 acre complex that housed Mt. Carmel, a simple residence for the Branch Davidians. The Davidians were an offshoot sect of Seventh-Day Adventism whose designated leader was David Koresh.
Subsequent to a criminal trial, two Cabinet-level inquires, and three sets of congressional hearings, the full scope of government treachery in connection with the Waco conflagration remains shrouded in splinters of lies and deceiving half-truths.
After sitting through weeks of testimony in the Branch Davidians trial, Sarah Bain the jury spokeswoman bitterly expressed, “We spoke in the jury room about the fact that the wrong people were on trial, that it should have been the ones who planned the raid and orchestrated it and insisted on carrying out the plan who should have been on trial.”
Best-selling author James Bovard wrote how, “[F]ew
Americans are aware of Biden’s role, first in helping cover-up
the debacle and later, after ample damning evidence had
surfaced, exonerating federal law enforcement and instead
blaming Americans who distrusted Washington.”
https://www.theamericanconservative.com/biden-re-ignites-the-waco-fire/
On February 28, 1993, more than 70 BATF agents equipped with three military helicopters assailed the Branch Davidians in a shootout that resulted in the deaths of four ATF agents and six Davidians. Afterwards the Branch Davidians were nationally demonized as a dangerous radical cult.
The ATF raid was a total debacle. Soon FBI agents were called to Waco. After FBI involvement a 51 day siege would end in a fiery conflagration that consumed the lives of 63 Branch Davidian adults and 17 children.
More than a year after the ATF raid, on January 10, 1994 the criminal trial of 11 Branch Davidian survivors began. Prosecutors with the Department of Justice claimed that the Davidians ambushed and murdered ATF agents who were attempting to execute lawful warrants.
Lawyers for the Branch Davidians argued that their clients
feared for their lives and acted in self-defense.
On February 26, 1994 the jury returned its verdict. All eleven
Branch Davidians were acquitted of every conspiracy charge.
Seven of the 11 were convicted of lesser charges, and 4 were
acquitted of all charges. According to The Wall Street Journal, “The jury verdict was correctly characterized by The New York Times as a ‘stunning defeat’ for the federal government; a Los Angeles Times headline declared, ‘Outcome Indicates Jurors Placed Most Blame on the Government.’”
https://jimbovard.com/Bovard_Wall_Street_Journal_1995_Waco_Must_Get_Hearing.htm
After the verdicts were in Attorney General Janet Reno issued a statement that tried to twist the jury’s verdicts into a vindication for the government. The Cato Institute sums up Reno’s irrational reaction: “Because the jury did not reject every single allegation made by the prosecutors, Reno claims the jury was sending ‘a message that we were justified in our actions.’”
https://www.cato.org/sites/cato.org/files/pubs/pdf/pa395.pdf
Page 5
In response to Reno’s absurd claim of vindication The New
York Times published an editorial stating in part:
“Just about the only person who does not view the verdict as a
rebuke to the massive and unnecessary police action is
Attorney General Janet Reno.”
https://www.cato.org/sites/cato.org/files/pubs/pdf/pa395.pdf
Page 15
The Cato Institute informs how, “The jury forewoman, Sarah
Bain, wept outside the courtroom. After the trial, but before the
sentencing hearing, Bain sent Judge Smith a letter that said,
‘Even five years is too severe a penalty.’ Bain attended the
sentencing hearing in the hope that her presence in the
courtroom would remind Judge Smith of her request for
leniency.”
https://www.cato.org/sites/cato.org/files/pubs/pdf/pa395.pdf
Page 5
Try to imagine the depth of Bain’s despair after Judge Smith
imposed 40 year prison sentences! Six long years later the Supreme Court overturned Smith’s irrationally harsh sentences.
Filmmaker Mike McNulty working with Dan Gifford and William Gazecki produced the 1997 film “Waco: The Rules of Engagement,” (WTRE) that won an Emmy and was an Oscar finalist for best documentary. Gifford was a former reporter for CNN, the McNeil Lehrer News Hour and ABC News.
Meanwhile former federal attorney Dave Hardy fought like a tiger using the sweeping powers of the Freedom of Information Act to gain access to the Texas Rangers’ warehouse where a whopping 12 tons of evidence was kept. In 1999 – six long years after the deadly incident – Hardy finally entered the warehouse facility. In retrospect it seems odd that despite all the congressional hearings and a major criminal trial not one person gained access to the site where literally tons of evidence was stored.
Armed with compelling new information that went far beyond the surface froth fed to the public McNulty teamed up with
filmmaker Rick Van Vleet and in 1999 produced yet another Waco documentary, Waco – A new Revelation narrated by FBI
whistleblower Dr. Frederick Whitehurst.
McNulty’s, Gifford’s and Gazecki’s documentary, WTRE, had a
profound effect on Dr. Alan Stone, a Harvard professor of law and psychiatry who was a member of the Justice Department’s 1993 behavior science panel evaluating government action at Waco. In his 1993 report to the Justice Department Stone was critical of the government but after viewing WTRE he decided that perhaps he was not nearly critical enough and in November 1997 wrote a scathing article in the Boston Review denouncing the government drawing on a fresh cache of new evidence.
A July 1995 joint hearing before Congress did little to ask hard
questions of wayward FBI and ATF agents.
According to The Nation magazine four years later, in July
1999, Dr. Stone sat for 14 hours before another congressional
hearing before testifying himself. His impression? “The
hearing process, instead of being a careful inquiry … was
political theater of the absurd.” Professor Stone also wrote, “I had the sinking feeling that Waco would end the way it had begun: with government officials grandstanding before the American people but demonstrating only their ineptitude.”
https://www.thenation.com/article/archive/burned-waco/
The government’s narrative was sullied almost at once after it was revealed that when Koresh was informed of ATF’s investigation, he invited ATF agents to come over and search the premises but even more incredulous is that nine days before the raid two ATF undercover agents did visit Mount Carmel and while there participated in a target practice session with Koresh!
Attorney Dave Hardy explains, “On February 19, nine days
before the disastrous raid, the ATF agents went over and
asked David Koresh to go shooting. He agreed. In fact, he
provided the ammunition. And the agents handed him
their guns.”
http://web.archive.org/web/20200521154438/http://
www.hardylaw.net/DK_Shooting.html
Were the Davidians assaulted with helicopter gunfire during
the February 28, 1993 ATF raid?
The matter of helicopter gunfire was addressed in the Cato report:
“The criminal defense attorneys who went into the residence
during the [51-day] siege saw bullet holes in the ceiling of
Mt. Carmel with splinters of wood punched inward. The
Davidians explained that those were some of the shots fired
from the helicopters.
https://www.cato.org/sites/cato.org/files/pubs/pdf/pa395.pdf
Page 11
During congressional testimony the accusation of helicopter
gunfire was strenuously denied and replaced with another
explanation that makes the ATF appear in an even worse light.
“It has been suggested that the bullet holes in the roof of
the Branch Davidian residence may have come from ATF
agents on the roof who were firing into the structure as
the firefight continued. Jack Zimmerman, the attorney for
Branch Davidian Steve Schneider during the standoff,
conceded that this was a possible explanation for the
presence of the bullet holes during his testimony before the
subcommittees.
“Given that there were several ATF agents who were on the
roof of the residence during the firefight with the Davidians,
this explanation seems plausible.”
https://www.govinfo.gov/content/pkg/CRPT-104hrpt749/html/CRPT-104hrpt749.htm \122\
The explanation may be plausible but the notion that ATF
agents, standing on the roof, indiscriminately firing into a building occupied by women and children with no way of knowing who might be shot and even killed runs contrary to accepted norms of professional behavior of American lawmen. Even more disappointing is that apparently no effort was made to identify these rogue agents so that they could be criminally charged.
Nonetheless the perfidy of ATF agents pales in comparison to the deadly actions of the FBI. See The Blazing Waco Conflagration: A National Disgrace – Part 2
National Security Commentator Mark Adams