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CNN Live Saturday

McVeigh's Lawyers Study FBI Documents

Aired May 12, 2001 - 12:03   ET

THIS IS A RUSH TRANSCRIPT. THIS COPY MAY NOT BE IN ITS FINAL FORM AND MAY BE UPDATED.

THIS IS A RUSH TRANSCRIPT. THIS COPY MAY NOT BE IN ITS FINAL FORM AND MAY BE UPDATED.
DONNA KELLEY, CNN ANCHOR: As McVeigh's lawyers pore through the newly disclosed evidence, the guessing game begins: what do the documents show, what does McVeigh want, what can the lawyers achieve? For an educated guess, we turn to Jeralyn Merritt in Denver. She served as one of McVeigh's principal trial lawyers in 1996 and 1997.

Ms. Merritt, thanks for joining us. What do you think the lawyers will do now? They've got about 3,100 pages. Where do they start?

JERALYN MERRITT, FORMER MCVEIGH DEFENSE ATTORNEY: I think they are going to start by reading the documents, and then they are going to probably need to analyze them and then investigate them. They can't just take what's in the documents as being gospel, as being truth.

After they review the documents, after they're analyzed, after they're investigated, I think they will then go to Mr. McVeigh with a recommendation as to whether he should seek further relief in the courts or not. And I think the ultimate decision will be Mr. McVeigh's. I think they will follow his direction.

KELLEY: Timothy McVeigh has admitted that he did this. Can they actually get a verdict overturned?

MERRITT: Well, you know, the test is not really whether Mr. McVeigh did it or whether he didn't do it, or whether more than one person or more than 10 people did it. The issue here is really what's in these documents and would have a jury have decided differently had they been aware of the material in the documents.

KELLEY: You have talked about before -- I saw some of your notes before -- his role will be important. What do you mean by that?

MERRITT: Well, this is a death case. Death is different. And the jury heard certain evidence and based its decision on the evidence presented to it.

If there is new evidence in these documents that might have led this jury to maybe return a verdict of life instead of a verdict of death, that's something that the 10th Circuit might consider in deciding whether to allow Mr. McVeigh to pursue another appeal.

KELLEY: He said that he would rather die rather than spend his life in prison, so he scrapped the appeals, but you spoke to him about a year ago, you spoke to him in chambers frequently, can you tell us what you might think that he would do from your conversation with him?

MERRITT: Sure. Of course, I can't speak for him. But what I would think is that he gave up his appeals because he didn't want to spend the rest of his life in a six-foot-by-10-foot cell 23 hours a day. If the only relief available to him through these documents would be maybe get a life sentence instead of death, I don't think he would want it.

KELLEY: All right. Jeralyn Merritt, former McVeigh defense attorney, glad to have you join us and talk with us.

MERRITT: Thank you.

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