McVeigh drops all appeals of death sentence
Published 9:00 pm Thursday, June 7, 2001
Herald news services
DENVER — Convicted Oklahoma City bomber Timothy McVeigh abruptly dropped all of his legal appeals Thursday and once again said he is ready to die — a decision he made just minutes after learning that a federal appellate court had turned down his request for a stay of execution.
The 33-year-old McVeigh, who for months has maintained that he wanted to die on his terms, instructed his lawyers not to ask the U.S. Supreme Court for any more delays in his death by lethal injection scheduled for Monday morning at the new federal execution facility in Terre Haute, Ind.
His decision all but brings to an end the largest and most expensive criminal case in U.S. history, and opens the door for the federal government to once again begin executing prisoners for the first time in 38 years.
McVeigh’s attorneys had mounted a furious appeal on his behalf, hoping newly discovered FBI files might show that others helped him bomb the Alfred Murrah Federal Building. They argued that the discovery of the new documents was a "fraud upon the court," suggesting their client was denied a fair trial because all the government material was not turned over to the defense as required.
But their efforts ended with McVeigh’s decision Thursday.
McVeigh began shipping his personal belongings to his family in western New York Thursday, his attorneys said, and was preparing to telephone relatives and friends with his final farewells.
"Mr. McVeigh does not want to proceed any further in legal actions in order to try to stop his execution," said his lawyer, Rob Nigh, straining to hold back tears as he spoke in front of the elegant U.S. 10th Circuit Court of Appeals building in downtown Denver.
McVeigh could take his final drive outdoors as early as this morning, making the short trip from death row to the execution chamber. His short walk from the van into the death house will be the last time he is outdoors.
The death house is a windowless, two-story brick building surrounded by a fence topped with barbed wire.
Though he has had months to consider his request for a last meal, even those plans haven’t been finalized. Warden Harley Lappin said McVeigh has yet to make up his mind on what he’ll request. "He keeps changing it," Lappin said.
This much is certain: It can come from the prison or any restaurant in the Terre Haute area, but cannot cost more than $20.
He has long pondered his last words. According to the recently published book "American Terrorist: Timothy McVeigh & the Oklahoma City Bombing," McVeigh has chosen an excerpt from William Ernest Henley’s 19th-century poem "Invictus."
"I am the master of my fate. I am the captain of my soul."
Before the 5 a.m. PDT Monday execution, he will be kept in a 9-foot-by-14-foot cell, with a small bed built into the wall, a wall-mounted metal table and a toilet. On one wall are windows that look into a guards’ office. McVeigh will be monitored around the clock.
Personal calls from the death house will be suspended 24 hours before the execution. McVeigh will be able to speak only with his lawyers.
On June 11, McVeigh will change into prison-issue white briefs, khaki trousers, a white T-shirt, socks and slip-on shoes. He will walk across the white and gray tile floor, past the green-tile walls and the clock that will register his time of death.
He will be strapped to a T-shaped gurney and given a lethal injection.
McVeigh’s last days also will affect the rest of the prison population. Lappin said there would be a lockdown throughout the prison Sunday night.
But there is one hitch to that plan. Many of the inmates will want to watch an NBA championship playoff game between the Los Angeles Lakers and the Philadelphia 76ers that night. Lappin said the lockdown might be delayed until after the game.
Attorney Nigh, who has represented McVeigh longer than any of the dozens of lawyers who have defended him since the April 19, 1995, bombing, said Thursday McVeigh also does not want his attorneys to file a clemency appeal with President Bush.
"I think his resolve was clear. He takes this much more in stride than probably his lawyers do, most certainly," Nigh said. "He has family and friends that he must say his goodbyes to. The kind of introspection and psychological preparation he has to go through only he can know."
But while the defense was clearly shaken, the government applauded the appellate court’s ruling and said it showed that in the end, McVeigh will be appropriately punished.
"Today’s ruling by the 10th Circuit Court of Appeals is a ruling in favor of justice," Attorney General John Ashcroft said in a statement released in Washington. "… Timothy McVeigh is responsible for the brutal murder of 168 people, including 19 children, and he will now be brought to justice."
