Posted on 04/19/2002 3:53:14 AM PDT by OKCSubmariner
Copyright 2002 by Patrick B. Briley
A librarian from Kansas was driving south down interstate I-35 when she witnessed near Perry, OK the pullover of Timothy McVeigh in his yellow Mercury Marquee (in the north bound lane) by OK State Highway Patrol trooper Charles Hanger. The pullover occurred on the morning of April 19, 1995 less than two hours after the OKC bombing. Hanger has testified that McVeigh was not speeding but was pulled over because he had no plates on his car.
The librarian who witnessed the pullover is certain there was a second vehicle pulled over with the Mercury Marquee. And the librarian has said that the second vehicle pulled over may have been a pickup truck. The librarian has not been interviewed before by anyone but her description of the event is consistent with the known facts of location and time about the pullover.
The librarian observed Hanger’s lights flash on and then the Mercury and the second vehicle pull over. The impression given to the librarian was that Hanger had stopped both vehicles at the same time. The librarian made her observations over a long (but closing) distance and significant period of time from her lane on the opposite side of I-35 as she was traveling south.
A lot is learned from a review of testimony given by Charles Hanger found in transcripts from the McVeigh trial and in published accounts about Hanger’s testimony before the OK County Grand Jury. Some have written that Hanger was evasive, not fully forth coming and contradictory when giving answers about a second vehicle that was pulled over with McVeigh.
Hanger said he was distracted and did not know if a second vehicle pulled over. When asked about the video camera he first said he did not know if it was working properly, then he said he did not know if he had turned it on. He later admitted that he took the video home and reviewed the video. But when asked what was on the video he said he did not look at enough of it to know and had turned it over to the FBI. The FBI to this day has not been asked formally in court about what was on the video.
The FBI still maintains along with prosecutors that no John Does were known to have traveled with or helped McVeigh or Nichols. A pickup truck pulling over with McVeigh when stopped by Hanger would imply that a John Doe was traveling with and helping McVeigh especially since Hanger says there was no speeding involved.
The librarian’s account is especially important either if Hanger’s video camera did not capture the second vehicle or if Hanger or the FBI is lying about what is on the video.
The Houston Chronicle reported in May 1995 that a second vehicle, an old brown pickup truck, also pulled over in front of McVeigh at the same time. The Chronicle further reported that a video camera in Hanger’s patrol car had recorded the pickup and the plates on the vehicle. Other articles in the Dallas Morning News and the New York Times in May 1995 also referred to the pickup and stated that the plate and truck had been allegedly traced to a Steve Cobern. Cobern was a chemist who had experimented with bombs he blew up in the Arizona desert before the OKC bombing.
Steve Cobern lived in Oatman Arizona near Michael Fortier in Kingman, Arizona. McVeigh was introduced to Cobern by Roger Moore and his woman friend Mrs Anderson. Moore is the gun dealer that the FBI testified was robbed in Arkansas to finance the OKC bombing. Testimony about the robbery of Moore’s guns revealed that a very strong man resembling Cobern (he is known to have carried refrigerators around on his back) had blind folded, bound up and dragged Moore around in his house.
A note was found in the Arizona desert from McVeigh addressed to Steve Cobern. Neighbors of Cobern and Fortier interviewed by local Arizona newspapers reported that Cobern and Fortier left about two weeks before the OKC bombing and did not return until a few days to a week after the bombing.
Fortier’s next door neighbor and drug dealer, James Rosencrans also reportedly left Kingman about the same time and returned about the same time as Cobern and Fortier. Rosencrans fenced and sold at a Kingman pawn shop the guns stolen from Cobern’s friend, Roger Moore. Oddly enough Roesencrans testified twice before the Federal grand jury implicating McVeigh in the use of drugs. Rosencrans was considered reliable enough for the Federal Grand Jury even though he brandished a rifle in front of FBI agents sent to give Fortier a proffer agreement written by Clinton’s personal FBI legal advisor in the White House, Howard Shapiro. And the Federal Grand Jury was not told by the FBI or prosecutors about the four witnesses interviewed by the FBI at the Travelers Aid near the Murrah Building who have identified Rosencrans with a group of John Does driving McVeigh’s Mercury on April 18, 1995.
If the Houston Chronicle, New York Times and Dallas Morning News are correct then the librarian is not only correct but the second vehicle was likely a brown pickup truck.
Some witnesses reported seeing an old brown pickup truck at the EZ Mart in Newkirk (see Part 1) on April 18, 1995 when Nichols and a John Doe was there in Nichols blue pickup truck and with a Ryder truck. And witnesses have reported seeing an old brown pickup truck with McVeigh and a street person in OKC at a Total gas station the morning of the OKC bombing. There is a surveillance video (which the FBI confiscated) of the McVeigh visit to the Total gas station. The FBI took the street person in custody for questioning about the brown truck and his visit with McVeigh.
It is possible that the vehicle pulled over in front of McVeigh by Hanger and seen by the librarian could be the same vehicle seen in Newkirk and at the Total gas station by numerous witnesses. The information is known to the FBI and prosecutors. Was the information adequately recorded in FBI interview reports? If so were the reports withheld from the courts, defense and public or even destroyed (as recently reported by the DOG Inspector General to the Senate Judiciary Committee two weeks ago) so there would not be a basis to think there was a John Doe traveling with McVeigh in a pickup truck pulled over when Charles Hanger stopped McVeigh on I-35?
Copyright 2002 by Patrick B. Briley
I've long thought that the driver who pulled over with McVeigh was part of some sting operation. If the cars weren't speeding, there would be no logical reason for him to pull over, unless he planned to kill or disable the trooper.
Since he didn't do that it, it is likely he pulled over to make sure McVeigh didn't get away, and to serve as backup for the trooper.
It is inconceivable that a lone trooper wouldn't notice two vehicles pulling over. The only reason for the trooper to protect the driver of the second vehicle would be because they were "on the same side"...
Hanger sure has a "strange" memory.
Thanks for the post.
Why is the theme song from The Prisoner playing in my head?
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