Washington – After a decade of silence, Terry Nichols, who was convicted of conspiracy in the Oklahoma City bombing, has accused a third man of being an accomplice who provided some of the explosives used to kill 168 people at the Alfred P. Murrah Federal Building 10 years ago.
Nichols, in a letter written from his cell at the government’s Supermax prison in southern Colorado, said Arkansas gun collector Roger Moore donated so-called binary explosives, made up of two components, to bomber Timothy J. McVeigh that were used in Oklahoma City, as well as additional bomb components that recently were found in Nichols’ former home in Kansas.
The claim that a third man was involved in the plot comes as a California congressman has begun pressing for answers to lingering questions about the worst act of domestic terrorism in United States history.
Rep. Dana Rohrabacher, R- Calif., chairman of the investigative arm of the House Committee on International Relations, has been collecting new evidence in the bombing and said he would announce soon whether to open formal hearings into the April 19, 1995, tragedy. He says Nichols’ knowledge about other potential conspirators is central to his investigation, especially since the components found in March in a crawl space below Nichols’ home remained undetected for nearly a decade.
The congressman said it was important to determine whether others were involved beyond Nichols and McVeigh, two Army pals who became anti-government zealots.
Nichols has been convicted twice – in federal court and in an Oklahoma state court – and is serving two life sentences without parole. For 10 years, he has kept silent; his new revelations came in letters he sent to a woman named Kathy Sanders, who lost two grandchildren in the bombing.
Having just turned 50, Nichols said he wanted to speak out about the bombing because the 10th anniversary last month honoring the victims had passed and “I felt the record should be set straight.”
Repeated attempts to find Moore, an itinerant gun dealer who has lived in Arkansas and Florida, for comment on Nichols’ allegations were unsuccessful. The FBI in the early stages of its investigation took a hard look at Moore because of his anti-government views and close relationship with McVeigh. McVeigh often stayed at Moore’s home in Royal, Ark., and the two had exchanged letters sharing their views about the government.
In past interviews, Moore has steadfastly denied any involvement in the bombing. He maintained that before the explosion, he was robbed at gunpoint by a masked man who stole dozens of firearms and other weapons worth about $60,000 from his home in Royal.
The FBI and government prosecutors later proved that McVeigh sold the firearms to raise money to purchase bomb ingredients, and prosecutors have long asserted that it was Nichols who robbed Moore.
In past interviews with the Los Angeles Times, Moore said he took a lie detector test that convinced the FBI he was not involved in the bombing. “Everything they asked was 100 percent right,” said Moore, who was 60 years old at the time of the bombing. “They told me that.”
Sanders has befriended Nichols while conducting her own investigation into the bombing. She said the letter he wrote shows that he is eager to talk.
“He was a quiet, introverted little fellow before the Oklahoma City bombing,” she said. “He’s been sitting in his cell now for 10 years alone. He’s very timid; he’s not good in social circles. But he is starting to want to tell everything.”
McVeigh was considered the bombing mastermind. Nichols helped him assemble the bomb in Kansas but then stayed at home while McVeigh drove the rental truck to Oklahoma City.
McVeigh was executed in June 2001, and secrets may have died with him. That makes Nichols all the more interesting to Rohrabacher and Sanders.
She recently wrote a book, “After Oklahoma City,” and has met with the congressman to share some of what she has turned up in her quest to find others besides Nichols and McVeigh who might be responsible.
In other letters she has received from Nichols, which she also shared with the Times, he described his solitary life amid unending conspiracy theories such as whether a gang of Midwestern bank robbers was involved, whether there was a German or Middle East connection to the bombing, and whether a figure known as John Doe No. 2 accompanied McVeigh to the truck rental store.
