Nichols Jurors Reveal Support for Execution

A strong faction of the jury in the second Oklahoma City bombing trial favored sentencing Terry L. Nichols to death, and a majority of jurors wanted their deliberations to continue, several panel members said Thursday.

Their account differed sharply from the explanation that the panel’s forewoman provided Wednesday.

“A majority of us were leaning towards the death penalty,” said juror Thomas Baker, “and we never, ever felt that anything else in the case was an option.”

Joining two other jurors Thursday in contradicting jury forewoman Niki Deutchman, Baker added that the jury engaged in lively, often emotional debate that over time could have brought a unanimous decision either for or against a death sentence.

Although revealing that the panel took several votes behind closed doors, Baker would not divulge exactly how many jurors wanted Nichols to live or how many wanted him to die for his role as a conspirator in the 1995 bombing of the Alfred P. Murrah Federal Building.

But he and other jurors said a death sentence was a real possibility for Nichols, and some of them also challenged their forewoman’s criticism of the government’s role in the case.

Baker, for instance, defended the prosecution and the FBI, and criticized the courtroom tactics of lead defense attorney Michael E. Tigar.

“We looked at all of the evidence, and I saw his guilt,” said Baker, part of the jury of seven women and five men that had earlier convicted Nichols of conspiracy while finding him guilty of involuntary manslaughter--rather than murder--in the deaths of eight federal law enforcement officers in the blast.

“I do believe he was a major player,” Baker said of Nichols.

A second juror, Diana Vaughn, said she also argued with her peers that Nichols should die and had hoped their talks would continue. She was bothered by a letter Nichols left for convicted co-defendant Timothy J. McVeigh telling him to “go for it,” an apparent reference to the bombing.

“That was pretty incriminating,” Vaughn said.

A third juror, Chris Seib, said she also thought that the panel should have kept deliberating.

“I wanted the death penalty,” she told CNN. “I think it was the answer here.”

She said a plurality of jurors “were more or less going for the death penalty,” specifying that five jurors favored death while the remaining seven were split on whether they should give Nichols life or pass the decision on to the judge.

But a fourth juror, Holly Hanlin, backed up Deutchman’s contention that the government’s case did not justify a death sentence.

“We did the best we could with what we had,” Hanlin said.

She added that while the government’s evidence did not clearly prove that Nichols helped McVeigh make the bomb, Nichols nevertheless knew what would happen.

“If nothing else,” she said, “he could have stopped this.”

But she, like Deutchman, was not prepared to sign a death warrant for Nichols. “Me personally, no,” she said.

The new insight into the jury’s travails came as prosecutors and defense lawyers began the arduous task of preparing legal arguments to present to U.S. District Judge Richard P. Matsch before he passes judgment on the 42-year-old Nichols.

Because the jury did not reach a unanimous verdict, the judge can impose a sentence of either life in prison with no release or a shorter, fixed number of years that someday could restore Nichols to freedom.

Legal briefs are due Feb. 9, and James Manspeaker, the court clerk, said Thursday that the judge will set a sentencing date at that time. Prosecutors will seek life in prison; the defense will ask for a fixed number of years.

Complaints by some members of the Nichols jury raised new questions about the FBI’s conduct in high-profile criminal cases and prompted Atty. Gen. Janet Reno to issue a firm vote of confidence in the bureau’s investigation of the April 19, 1995, explosion.

“When you have a long and complicated case there may be different feelings from jurors who may not be aware of all the circumstances that go into an investigation,” Reno said Thursday in Washington.

“I think the FBI did an excellent job. They interviewed over 30,000 witnesses. They pursued innumerable leads. And I think they did so based on appropriate standards for how to conduct an investigation. And in this instance, when you look at what the FBI has done, I’m just very, very proud of the work,” Reno said.

Reno was responding to complaints from Deutchman, who said Wednesday that prosecutors sometimes presented “sloppy evidence” and that FBI agents were “arrogant” in the way they treated some witnesses and others. At the same time, she had high praise for Tigar.

But Baker said Thursday that he was pleased with the government’s performance.

“In any large organization, there’s going to be times you don’t mesh and things may get missed,” he said. “But as a whole, I would have to say they did a good job.”

Baker said he was not impressed with some of Tigar’s courtroom dramatics, particularly in placing his hand on Nichols’ shoulder and, in asking for an acquittal, telling the jury: “This is my brother. He’s in your hands.”

“I didn’t fall for it,” Baker said. “I saw Michael Tigar for who he is.

“But if I was in Terry Nichols’ position, I too would have wanted a lawyer who is a good actor and who plays things and plays around.”

Hanlin, however, joined with Deutchman in criticizing the government agents.

“I think there were some mistakes there,” she said. “I think the FBI knows that. They were in a frenzy to get this solved.”

Indeed, the defense did raise problems with the FBI’s investigation, the largest of its kind in American history.

Agents did not record a 9 1/2-hour interview Nichols gave them after surrendering because FBI policy prohibits recordings. So they were left with just a small number of agents’ notes that later went into the drafting of reports recording potentially incriminating statements from Nichols about himself and McVeigh.

FBI officials also damaged some key pieces of evidence, including a drill bit recovered from Nichols’ home that was believed to have been used to break into a rock quarry to steal dynamite. The tool was exposed to a substantial amount of water from an accident or plumbing problem at a lab, agents testified.

In addition, a key defense witness complained to the jury that FBI agents had badgered her and tried to get her to change her story about seeing McVeigh in the days before the blast. Her recollections contradicted the government’s contention that McVeigh at that time was in Oklahoma City with Nichols, dropping off a getaway car.

None of those issues surfaced in the McVeigh trial, where he was convicted on all 11 counts and sentenced to death. A member of his jury, Michael Leeper, reiterated Thursday that his panel had faith in the FBI’s conduct in the case.

“I was amazed at how quickly they reacted in pulling a lot together very quickly,” he said. “They did a fine job.”

One of the key disagreements among the Nichols jurors during the penalty phase centered on his intent--whether Nichols truly intended to kill anyone or simply may have unwittingly helped McVeigh obtain bomb ingredients and the storage lockers to keep the material.

On Tuesday, the forewoman sent two notes to the judge saying the panel had “reached a place of impasse” and “we are ‘hung.’ ”

But Baker and others said Thursday they did not realize that the judge would so quickly discharge the jury, as he did Wednesday morning, and take it upon himself to render a sentence. Rather, they thought he would merely encourage them to work harder in their discussions.

“We did not break down in our deliberations,” Baker said. “We were simply asking the judge for assistance.”

Matsch is governed by new federal sentencing guidelines, a complex matrix that makes it unclear what punishment he will give Nichols. Before the guidelines, he was known as a tough judge. In the 1984 racial slaying of a Jewish disc jockey in Denver, he sentenced two white supremacists to 150 years each.