Denver Judge to Take Over Oklahoma City Bombing Case

The judge who tried the white supremacists charged in the slaying of radio talk show host Alan Berg was appointed Monday to handle the Oklahoma City bombing case, replacing a judge whose chambers were damaged in the blast.

U.S. District Judge Richard P. Matsch, a 65-year-old ex-prosecutor appointed to the Denver bench by then-President Richard Nixon, was assigned the case by the U.S. 10th Circuit Court of Appeals.

The appellate court Friday ordered U.S. District Judge Wayne Alley to step down, saying that although he had conducted himself professionally, “a reasonable person could not help but harbor doubts” about his impartiality. His chambers and courtroom across the street from the blast were damaged and one of his staff members was injured.

Alley officially removed himself from the case Monday.

Matsch will decide whether to move the trial, scheduled to begin May 17.

A graduate of the University of Michigan Law School and a former bankruptcy judge and assistant U.S. attorney, Matsch has presided over a number of major cases.

A profile in the 1995 Almanac of the Federal Judiciary quoted trial attorneys who cautioned: “If you make a stupid argument in front of him, he will take your head off.”

Matsch oversaw the federal prosecution of four members of the white supremacist, anti-Semitic group called The Order. They were charged in the 1984 slaying of Berg, a controversial, Nazi-baiting broadcaster who was machine-gunned outside his Denver apartment. Two were convicted and two acquitted.

Despite tight security during that three-month trial, Matsch, a familiar figure in his black western hat, conservative suit, long overcoat and black western boots, had no bodyguards.

Matsch also presided for two decades over the desegregation lawsuit that brought busing to Denver’s public schools. He lifted that order in September.

The bomb case defendants, Timothy J. McVeigh and Terry L. Nichols, who have been linked to right-wing militias, face the death penalty if convicted of murder and conspiracy charges in the blast, which killed 169 people.