From: [h--s] at [boi.hp.com] (Kevin C. Hess)
Newsgroups: alt.politics.org.batf,talk.politics.guns
Subject: Update on FBI report - December 8
Date: 8 Dec 1994 20:56:19 GMT


Seen in the Idaho Statesman, December 8, 1994


Report criticizes FBI in Weaver seige

FBI's director yet to respond to internal report

New York Times News Service and Statesman staff


Government officials who have seen the investigative report on the 
siege at Randy Weaver's North Idaho cabin said it provides powerful 
grounds to justify disciplining agents and supervisors.

But some officials have expressed doubts about whether anyone will be 
punished after the FBI director, Louis Freeh, announced on Tuesday that
he would promote Larry Potts, who had overall responsibility for the 
Idaho operation, to be his second-in-command.

Freeh has not yet said how he plans to respond to the highly critical 
internal report.

The FBI formed an employee committee to review the findings.  The 
agency has already made a number of changes in how the special team
responds to crisis in the aftermath of both the Idaho incident and the 
tear-gas assault on the Branch Davidian compound in Waco, Texas in 
April 1993.  It resulted in a disastrous fire in which more than 70
people died.

Neither the internal investigative report, completed in April, nor the
civil rights division's formal memo on October 15, declining
prosecution, have been made public, but in recent days, the Justice
Department has distributed the report to the FBI and other law-
enforcement agencies.

Officials who have seen the report said it found the siege was ill-
conceived, mismanaged, and disorganizaed.

Potts was among the FBI officials Boundary County Prosecutor Randall
Day was weighing bringing state homicide charges against in conjunction
with the standoff.  In a January interview with the Statesman, Day said
he was also considering charges against Lon Horiuchi, the FBI sniper
who killed Weaver's wife, Vicki, as she stood in the door of the cabin,
and Richard Rogers, commander of the FBI's elite Hostage Rescue Team.

Carl Stern, the Justice Department spokesman, said on Wednesday that
officials are waiting to show the still-secret report to a local 
prosecutor on Idaho, who has said he is considering whether to bring 
state charges in the case.  Day could not be reached for comment
Wednesday night.  A woman who answered his phone at his Bonners Ferry 
residence said he was asleep.

Justice Department officials have said Attorney General Janet Reno had
reportedly urged subordinates to move more quickly in making the report 
public.

Stern said copies would be furnished to the officials who are 
criticized in it.  He said the report is not likely to be made public
before next year.

Lawyers involved in the case on the side of the Weaver family and 
Harris said the Justice Department had dodged the incident by 
refusing to hold anyone accountable and covered it up by refusing to
release the report.

"We were promised a thorough investigation and a honest one and what we
got was a recomendation of prosecution for those who murdered Vicki 
Weaver and a refusal of the Justice Department to follow its own 
recomendations." said Gerry Spence, the lawyer who defended Weaver in 
the criminal trial.  "it's like the right hand pulling the trigger on 
the murder weapon and the left hand patting the murderer on the head
with blind approval."

***********************************************************************

Personal Note: Any misspelling or typographical error should be 
               recognized as an error on my part, and not that of 
               the Idaho Statesman or the New York Times.

The statements/opinions expressed here are not necessarily those of the 
Hewlett-Packard Company.  HP paid a research firm millions of dollars to
get their own opinions, and has made it clear they do not wish to share mine.

Kevin C. Hess (KB7UKR)               Hewlett-Packard Network Printer Division 
[h--s] at [hpdmd48.boi.hp.com]              (208) 396-3384   Boise, Idaho  83704

Are we at last brought to such humiliating and debasing degradation, that we
cannot be trusted with arms for our defense?  ...   If our defense be the
_real_ object of having those arms, in whose hands can they be trusted with
more propriety, or equal safety to us, as in our own hands?  - Patrick Henry