The OKC Bombing thread: Surveillance Camera Footage

[Richard Booth]

Richard, are there print sources that describe the DOJ/FBI investigation of OKC from top down, as in how the investigation was handled from DC, and who at Justice and FBI was put on it, and how they interacted with FBI field offices and local law enforcement?

I'm interested in the involvement of John O'Neill, FBI, deceased. Even the barest or most incomplete (or falsified) procedural accounts would be of help. Gee, somehow none of this has made it into the standard literature on OKC, even those works with a CT slant. THANKS

One thing worth noting: the investigation's on-scene commander, Danny Coulson, is real similar to John O'Neil insofar as he did things his own way and didn't give a damn what others thought.

He went where his nose told him to go. He was a cowboy, a former operative/sniper on the HRT (Hostage Rescue Team). He negotiated the peaceful surrender of the Covenant, Sword, and Arm of the Lord in 1983. He was there the year before when THE ORDER was taken down in the pacific northwest. Coulson was also on the undercover operations committee that had to sign off on programs like PATCON and other Major Case UC/O. So he would have been in a position to answer a great deal of questions about who the players in that investigation were.

The difference between Coulson and O'Neill in terms of being a maverick: Coulson had developed enough prestige by the time of the OKC bombing that he could not be defamed or alienated like O'Neill was. No one dared try to defame Danny Coulson. He was Special Agent in Charge of the Dallas Office and the street agents loved Danny Coulson. They respected him, not feared him. So he was a maverick on the inside. Had Coulson ran the investigation I believe all of the accomplices would have been captured.

As far as I know the investigation was controlled top-down by Louis Freeh, he put Danny Defenbaugh in charge because Defenbaugh would do whatever Freeh told him and was ineffective, he had no power to get anything done on his own. The investigation should have been put in the hands of Danny Coulson but when Freeh saw he couldn't control him it was given to someone else who was largely thought of as ineffective. I believe that if Coulson had been in charge he would not have said "John Doe #2" doesn't exist and he would have pressed for the guy's arrest even if he was an informant. The working theory among most OKC researchers is that John Doe #2 was an asset, an informant, or a cooperating witness and as a result the FBI made him disappear. So the bureau couldn't be embarrassed. Defenbaugh would do that. Coulson would not do that, he would go wherever the leads went even if it meant embarrassing the bureau. What happens if, for example, John Doe #2 was a provocateur, part of an FBI major case undercover operation that fell under Bear Bryant? (PATCON for example) Coulson would not have cared and would have probably exposed it. Defenbaugh would have covered it up.

Another agent who would have been at the top, on Freeh's phone or in Freeh's office every day was BOB RICKS. He would have been Freeh's go-to man in Oklahoma (even though Coulson was on-scene commander in OKC, Freeh would have gone to RICKS.) RICKS would have interfaced with local law enforcement in Oklahoma and Kansas. There would be some crossover there with RICKS doing that and COULSON doing that, but Freeh I am sure trusted Ricks but did not trust Coulson.

I wish there were a good org chart for this investigation, I think it would be revealing.

I would want to know if, anywhere on that chart, you would find LARRY POTTS. I suspect you would find him there.

Others I am curious about would be TOM PICKARD and BEAR BRYANT. I suspect Bear Bryant was involved as some mention is made about how Danny Defenbaugh was loyal to him, that Defenbaugh was a proxy for Bear Bryant. That was in Roger's book. As you probably know, Bryant and Pickard had it in for John O'Neill and they were bad actors, they were cutthroat, office politics types.

I think you present a very good angle for research. Someone needs to produce a top-down list of the people who ran this investigation and who their contacts at justice were. That person isn't me, I don't know enough about the structure at the FBI in 1995 to be able to produce that, nor would I know "who to talk to" to get sources on this.

I know the first person anyone wanting to find out more about the investigation would want to talk to is DANNY COULSON. He was _NOT_ a "Friend of Louis" and was very much totally a straight shooter and independent. He won't lie for anyone and he won't shut up about John Doe #2, or, for example, he said in 1999 "we had videotape of the truck pulling up a few minutes to nine." --- Danny might not realize it but he should NOT have said that. The FBI's official position is "those tapes do not exist" because, well, the tapes all show McVeigh with another person. But Danny doesn't care about Louis Freeh's talking points, or what the "official story" mandates. He would be inclined to speak the truth.

So anyone wanting to find out the stuff you're asking about would need to talk to Danny Coulson, and they'd probably also do well to identify local agents who were treated like shit who have stories to tell. Anyone who came in conflict with the Friends of Louis would probably have a story to tell. Through those stories from people inside, a framework of who the players were could emerge.

I think I'm going to ask Roger Charles if he knows whether or not JOHN O'NEILL had any involvement in the case. If anyone of my contacts would know that, it's him. But I suspect that O'NEILL would have been sidelined because this case was tightly controlled by Louis Freeh and his surrogates and proxies were the people running things at Headquarters and at the regional level he had his people installed there.

--Richard