Seized FBI Tapes Indicate Cult Hit by ‘Hot’ Tear Gas

A week after the FBI was forced to disclose that it used incendiary devices in the deadly 1993 siege of the Branch Davidian compound near Waco, Texas, law enforcement officials said Wednesday that they had uncovered additional evidence in the form of audiotapes indicating that federal agents had fired “hot” tear gas canisters at a concrete bunker.

Angry Justice Department officials took the unusual step of ordering U.S. marshals to seize the new evidence from FBI headquarters here late Wednesday.

“People here were just outraged. This is devastating,” said one senior Justice Department official. “We’re the federal law enforcement agency. This is just not the way things are supposed to be done. . . . This is as bad as it gets.”

The discovery of audiotapes made in the final hours of the 51-day siege near Waco, Texas, raised new questions about the government’s handling of the investigation of the fire that ended the siege, killing about 80 people, and it dealt another blow to the credibility of federal law enforcement authorities, who had maintained until a week ago that no incendiary devices were used in the Waco siege.

Discovered as Justice Department and FBI officials were trying to initiate an independent investigation of the matter, the new evidence raises questions about possible violations of congressional subpoenas for federal records related to the fire, and it threatens to further strain relations among the Justice Department, the FBI and Congress.

In searching its records in recent days, the FBI found the audiotapes at one of its offices in Quantico, Va., Justice Department spokesman Myron Marlin said. The FBI transferred the material to its main headquarters in Washington. After senior Justice Department officials were notified of the discovery, they ordered marshals to take control of the evidence, Marlin said.

Although the exact contents of the new evidence were still unclear late Wednesday, one law enforcement source said that it appeared to include audiotapes of conversations suggesting that there was a “spur of the moment” decision in the early morning hours of April 19, 1993, to use the pyrotechnic canisters--against the orders of Atty. Gen. Janet Reno and top FBI officials.

FBI spokesman Tron Brekke said that, although he was not familiar with details of the new evidence, “it raises more questions--like what was this stuff and why wasn’t it brought forward in a more timely manner?”

The Davidian tragedy resurfaced as a political controversy last week when FBI officials first acknowledged that their agents had fired military tear-gas canisters at a concrete bunker several hours before fire broke out at cult leader David Koresh’s compound. Agents were attempting to block possible escape routes that the Davidians might use.

Federal officials insisted that the canisters had nothing to do with starting the fatal conflagration. They were fired at a concrete bunker about 100 yards away from the main building of the compound, several hours before the fire began. After six years of denials on the issue, mere acknowledgment that “hot” munitions were used that day has become a major embarrassment for Reno and other federal officials.

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Reno, who said she was assured that no incendiary devices would be used that day, has pledged a full investigation, and aides said she has decided to bring in an outsider to do the review, rather than leaving the sensitive task to the FBI or the Justice Department.

Both the FBI and the White House are recommending that an outside investigation be done to ensure the integrity of the review. The only question now appears to be who Reno will name to do it. An announcement from the attorney general, who is in Panama on government business, could come in the next few days.

In extensive hearings after the Davidian disaster, congressional committees subpoenaed numerous documents that shed light on handling of the episode by federal authorities. Capitol Hill lawmakers are now pledging to reopen hearings to determine whether crucial information was withheld over the last six years.

Conspiracy theorists and critics of the government’s handling of the episode have seized on the disclosures in the last week as evidence that federal agents caused the deaths of Koresh and his followers and then conspired to cover it up. Federal authorities dismiss such allegations, but they acknowledge that the surfacing of previously undisclosed evidence has damaged their credibility.

The disclosures come just six weeks before relatives of the dead are scheduled to go to court in Texas in a wrongful-death claim against the government. The siege began after four federal agents were killed in an attempted raid on the Davidian compound to confiscate illegal weapons.