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American Morning

Will McVeigh Lawyers Seek Further Delay of Execution?

Aired May 14, 2001 - 09:05   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.
LEON HARRIS, CNN CORRESPONDENT: Now to the legal limbo surrounding convicted Oklahoma City bomber Timothy McVeigh. His lawyers say that McVeigh has not ruled out seeking a further delay of his execution. It was postponed because of newly discovered FBI documents. CNN national correspondent Martin Savidge is in Oklahoma City. He joins us now with the latest this morning -- Marty?

MARTIN SAVIDGE, CNN CORRESPONDENT: Good morning to you, Leon.

U.S. Attorney General John Ashcroft made his first public appearance last night since he extended the deadline of the death penalty for Timothy McVeigh on Friday. He appeared at a candlelight vigil at the National Law Enforcement Memorial in Washington, D.C. and he said absolutely nothing regarding the case of Timothy McVeigh. But he was speaking out about McVeigh yesterday through the newspaper here, "The Oklahoman," essentially saying that that extension of the deadline was a one time event and he is not going to do it again, even if the attorneys for the defense team of McVeigh come to him and ask for more time to review those FBI documents. He's essentially drawing a legal line in the sand.

Another person who is speaking out is Robert Nigh, who's an attorney for Timothy McVeigh. He basically says at this point all options are open and they continue to look at all the possible avenues for their client.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

ROBERT NIGH, MCVEIGH ATTORNEY: Absolutely those are possibilities and quickly in this case I would suggest to you that anything is possible. A week ago, nobody would have expected that anything was going to happen other than Mr. McVeigh's execution on May 16th. This revelation at literally the 12th hour makes it clear that anything can happen.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

SAVIDGE: Essentially, there are three options here. Number one, the attorneys could go to the court system and basically ask for more time to review the documents, maybe even conduct some new interviews as a result of those documents. Number two, they could say that there's enough new evidence here that they could go and try for a new trial. Two and a half would be essentially they could do a combination of the both, that is, they would ask for more time and then essentially ask for a new trial. And the third option is that they would do absolutely nothing. Of course, that would probably be at the express request of their client, Timothy McVeigh.

As for the people of Oklahoma City, all of this is a new ordeal for them to have to deal with. There were a number of victims' family members that were here at the memorial site yesterday and Tom Kight was one of them. He lost a daughter in the explosion. We talked at the memorial about a number of things and then eventually raised the issue of Timothy McVeigh. And he had an understandable and yet interesting response. Here it is.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

TOM KIGHT, FATHER OF BOMBING VICTIM: This is Frankie's ground. I've done a lot of interviews on McVeigh, but I will not -- this is sacred ground. This is these kids and these other 167. So it's sacred ground for me and I just don't talk about Tim McVeigh on this turf.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

SAVIDGE: It's clear that the family members are tired about talking of Timothy McVeigh not only on the grounds of the memorial but anywhere. The problem for them is there is likely to be a lot more talk about Timothy McVeigh over the coming weeks -- Leon?

HARRIS: All right, thanks much, Martin Savidge, reporting live this morning from Oklahoma City.

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