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American Morning

McVeigh Execution: Legal Team Explores Options

Aired May 16, 2001 - 10:04   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.
DARYN KAGAN, CNN ANCHOR: Well, back to Timothy McVeigh. He remains housed on death row even as his case approaches some form of legal limbo. Today, his lawyers will map out any possible avenues for a challenge. Let's get more now from our Susan Candiotti, who is outside the penitentiary where the meeting will take place -- Susan?

SUSAN CANDIOTTI, CNN CORRESPONDENT: Good morning, Daryn.

Timothy McVeigh escaped his scheduled execution date, which was supposed to happen this day, when Attorney General John Ashcroft postponed it for 30 days until June 11th. McVeigh got a reprieve from the death chamber at the federal prison here in Terra Haute after the FBI admitted that it dropped the ball in failing to turn over more than 3,000 pages of new material never before seen by McVeigh's defense lawyers.

And just to give you an idea of how many documents were involved in this Oklahoma City bomb investigation, 20 million alone dealt with Ryder truck sightings and motel registrations. But the number that matters now is that number 3,000 pages or more. Some of that information has to do with additional John Doe 2 sightings that were never substantiated.

Now, McVeigh's lawyers arrived in town this night and will meet with McVeigh in just about an hour or so to pick apart this new material and discuss matters with their client. The lawyers will be meeting with him to update Timothy McVeigh. I talked with one of the lawyers just a little while ago. He said they expect to spend about two to three hours with Mr. McVeigh and he also said that the lawyers have barely had time to look at this new material and that if they need additional research help, investigative help, one option they have is to go back to the trial judge, Richard Matsch, to ask for assistance. They don't know, the lawyers don't know if they'll be able to complete their work before June 11th.

Now, the FBI continues to insist that there is nothing in this new documentation that would exonerate McVeigh, that provides any kind of a reasonable doubt about his guilt and after all, Mr. McVeigh has said that he acted largely alone when he carried out the Oklahoma City bombing.

Those lawyers will update us about their meeting with Mr. McVeigh when they are through in a few hours -- Back to you, Daryn. KAGAN: Susan, what about the town of Terra Haute, where you are? Of course, this was supposed to be the day that Timothy McVeigh was executed and this town had to go to considerable effort to take care of the logistics for this. Has that just been all put on hold to be reinstated at a later date when the execution does take place?

CANDIOTTI: It has been put on hold and, for example, there was supposed to be no school today, government offices were all supposed to be closed. Obviously, that's not the case now. But everyone here is bracing themselves for the next scheduled execution date, June 11th.

KAGAN: Susan Candiotti in Terra Haute, thank you so much.

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