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04/20/93
DEADLY InfERNO: FBI says cult torched compound; 26 believed dead
By Lee Hancock / The Dallas Morning News
WACO-The Branch Davidian compound became a hell on Earth Monday as David Koresh ordered his followers to set fire to their home, federal officials said. An estimated 86 sect members, including 17 children, were believed to have died in the blaze.
As federal agents and a stricken public watched helplessly, the wooden structure was consumed by a wind-driven wall of orange flames.
The fire began shortly after noon, about six hours after federal agents started bashing holes in sections of the compound and filling it with non-flammable tear gas.
Nine cult members escaped the conflagration, said federal officials. No bodies had been recovered Monday night.
FBI officials said they "have not been able to confirm' that Mr. Koresh, the self-styled messiah who led the sect, was among the dead, but added that they did not expect to find additional survivors.
"We can only assume that there was a massive loss of life,' said FBI Agent Bob Ricks. "It was truly an inferno of flames.
"We did not introduce fire into this compound. David Koresh, we believe, gave the order to commit suicide, and they all followed willingly his order.'
Among religious groups, only the mass suicide in 1978 by People's Temple members in Jones-town, Guyana-in which more than 900 people died-claimed more lives than Monday's tragedy. In 1985, 11 members of the cult MOVE died after Philadelphia authorities dropped explosives on their headquarters.
"This is what we hoped would never happen,' said Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco and Firearms spokesman Jack Killorin in Washington. "We dared on February 28th to try to take the compound in the way that we did because of this, because of this end.'
The siege began after four ATF agents were killed and 16 were wounded during a 45-minute firefight that erupted when they tried to serve a search warrant on the compound and a federal arrest warrant on Mr. Koresh. The federal government said it had information that the cult leader had illegal automatic weapons and possibly explosives.
The ensuing seven weeks were a roller coaster of hopes raised and then dashed by Mr. Koresh. Several times the cult leader thumbed his nose at authorities by promising to surrender, then mocking those promises.
Agent Ricks revealed Monday that one surrender offer, on March 2, almost culminated in a public suicide by Mr. Koresh. But he said the cult leader "chickened out' on a plan to blow himself up with grenades. Mr. Koresh later said God had instructed him to wait for a message before surrendering.
At a Monday afternoon briefing, Agent Ricks released the names of nine survivors from among the 95 men, women and children believed to have been inside the compound. The youngest survivor was 16.
Four people who escaped the compound were hospitalized with burns and broken bones; three were flown to Parkland Memorial Hospital in Dallas. The five other survivors were being held in the McLennan County Jail, ATF officials said.
Fire's been lit'
The blaze, which erupted about 12:05 p.m. and engulfed the compound within minutes, shocked officials at the scene.
"I can't tell you the shock and the horror that all of us felt when
we saw those flames coming out,' Agent Ricks said. "We thought, "Oh my
God, they are killing themselves.' '
He emphasized that the tear gas that agents sprayed into the building was not flammable and was delivered by compressed air hoses rather than explosive devices.
One person who escaped the compound told investigators that he had overheard cult members making plans to splash lantern fuel throughout the complex, Agent Ricks said.
He said another survivor reported hearing someone inside yell: "The fire's been lit. The fire's been lit.'
He said one FBI agent reported seeing a black-uniformed cult member wearing a gas mask and kneeling with his hands cupped near a second-story window. The agent said flames erupted from the area around the individual's hands, Agents Ricks said.
Agent Ricks said the fire appeared to be set in three locations, including Mr. Koresh's quarters on the second floor. The flames touched off at least three explosions throughout the compound, he said.
The largest blast appeared to come from the tower room where officials believe the sect kept its cache of weapons.
"I had hoped to report that today's careful and humane efforts by the FBI and ATF agents to bring the Branch Davidians out of their compound had resulted in a peaceful resolution of the standoff,' FBI Director William Sessions said in a statement read by Agent Ricks.
"Instead, we are faced with destruction and death. However, I have no question that our plan was correct and was conducted with professionalism,' he said.
In Washington, Attorney General Janet Reno took responsibility for the decision to step up pressure on the embattled cult with aggressive tactics.
"I made the decision. I'm accountable; the buck stops with me,' Ms.
Reno said Monday afternoon at a Justice Department news conference.
The White House issued a statement late Monday afternoon in which President Clinton defended the FBI's actions. "I told the attorney general to do what she thought was right, and I stand by that decision,' he said.
Ms. Reno said she knew there was a risk that Mr. Koresh would order a mass suicide rather than surrender.
"Obviously, if I thought the chances were great of a mass suicide, I would not have approved the plan,' she said. "Everything that we were told, every indication-reactions to the pressure up to that point- was that that would not occur.'
Agent Ricks also said Mr. Koresh had repeatedly assured the FBI and the cult leader's attorney that he did not intend to end his life.
Tear gas warning
Monday's gas attacks began around 6 a.m., about 10 minutes after negotiators warned cult members by telephone that they would be gassed if they did not immediately surrender.
Agent Ricks said cult member Steve Schneider responded to the warning by hanging up the phone and throwing it out of the building.
Cult members fired on the armored vehicles, Agent Ricks said, but no government personnel were seriously injured in the assault, adding that federal agents did not return fire.
After the gas attacks began, he said, one individual waved what appeared to be a white flag at federal agents, but there were no attempts at surrender before the fire broke out.
Even as the complex became engulfed in flames, "a man on the roof was spotted and signaled that he did not want to be rescued,' Agent Ricks said.
"A woman in flames was seen coming out of the compound and tried to run back into the building. An FBI agent exited his armored vehicle, ran toward the building and physically rescued the female despite her attempts to fight him off,' he said.
The cult's compound included a tunnel system, an underground bunker and firing range.
Agent Ricks said Monday that much of the tunnel system was believed to have been inundated by recent rains and that other underground areas were unusable because they were filled with the group's excrement and other refuse.
Agent Ricks said the gas attack was the FBI's next "logical step' in ratcheting up pressure on the group, and he stressed that FBI agents were not entering the compound or trying to destroy it.
"We are using the ultimate amount of restraint,' he said.
Tarrant County medical examiners will perform autopsies to identify
the bodies of cult members and determine how they died. However, authorities said it probably would be at least Tuesday morning before the embers cooled sufficiently to let them begin retrieving bodies.
More than 200 ATF agents were in the Waco area Monday night, charged with securing the 77-acre compound site, Mr. Killorin said.
Between 4 and 5 p.m., Texas Rangers performed a cursory sweep of the ruined compound after ATF explosives specialists probed the area for booby traps, he said. They were expected to begin processing the crime scene Tuesday morning after ATF specialists make a detailed sweep for explosives, an ATF official said.
The Rangers did see some bodies in the compound's wreckage, the official said.
What led to raid
The ATF said the Feb. 28 raid followed an eight-month investigation of the Branch Davidians that produced evidence that the group had amassed more than $280,000 in assault rifles, explosives and other firearms, including two .50-caliber sniper rifles.
Some independent tactical experts have questioned the planning and execution of the raid. A handful of agents have complained anonymously that their superiors ordered them into the compound even after they knew the cult had been tipped off by a phone call.
ATF officials have staunchly defended the raid but have acknowledged that they lost the element of surprise crucial to their raid plan.
"It all gets back to: Who the hell told those folks we were coming?' Mr. Killorin said Monday. "All we know is we needed one minute of surprise, and we didn't get it.'
Twenty-one children and 16 adults left the compound during the first days of the standoff. Nearly all those adults remain in custody, and five have been charged with federal offenses, including conspiracy to murder federal officers.
About three weeks ago, Mr. Koresh had again raised hopes for a surrender when he began talking with Dick De-Guerin, a lawyer retained by the cult leader's mother. Mr. De-Guerin and Jack Zimmermann, a Houston lawyer retained to represent Mr. Schneider, eventually met several times with cult members inside the compound. They emerged with promises that the group intended to surrender after the Branch Davidians' Passover holiday, which ended last week.
However, Agent Ricks said the FBI had information that Mr. Koresh considered the meetings with the attorneys "a fiasco.'
Monday's fire came as no surprise to one person who had analyzed Mr. Koresh's apocalyptic teachings in detail.
"It was always ordained that David and his followers must die,' said Frank Leahy.
Mr. Leahy is a private investigator in Waco who has access to taped conversations recorded over the past year in which Mr. Koresh details his religious beliefs.
Mr. Leahy's analysis, which he provided to the FBI earlier this month, led him to conclude that the cult leader anticipated a fiery end. The Bible is sprinkled with prophecies of flaming wrath for God's enemies. Mr. Koresh made the same threat last week in a letter to officials.
Mr. Leahy also predicted that the standoff would end after the seventh week, in accordance with prophecy. He said Mr. Koresh would be expecting an angel to appear at that point to direct his actions.
Mr. Leahy said FBI agents told him Sunday night they were preparing to attack the compound.
He said one agent told him, "We're going to be the angel.'
Staff writers Victoria Loe and Anne Marie Kilday contributed to
this report.
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