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By Edward Walsh and Roberto Suro
Washington Post Staff Writers, Thursday, September 2, 1999; Page A1
The U.S. Marshals Service, acting on orders from the Justice Department, yesterday seized from FBI headquarters new evidence about events preceding the fatal fire that ended the 51-day siege of the Branch Davidian compound near Waco, Tex., in 1993.
The extraordinary development, which underscored the degree to which the Waco case has fostered tension and mistrust between the Justice Department and the FBI, occurred as officials said Attorney General Janet Reno had decided that someone from outside the department and the FBI should lead a new investigation into the use of potentially incendiary tear gas cartridges by federal agents during the final assault on the compound.
Justice Department spokesman Myron Marlin said FBI officials informed senior Justice Department officials yesterday that they had come across "additional material" on the Waco siege at the headquarters of the FBI's Hostage Rescue Team in Quantico. The evidence was transferred to FBI headquarters in Washington, and yesterday Justice Department officials immediately ordered the Marshals Service to take possession of it, Marlin said.
An FBI official said that on a videotape, a Hostage Rescue Team member is heard seeking and being granted permission by a superior to fire potentially flammable military tear gas more than four hours before the Branch Davidian compound burst into flames, killing 76 people.
The videotape shot from a surveillance aircraft about 7:30 a.m. on the day of the assault contained audio of radio traffic among Hostage Rescue Team members in which they discussed the firing of nonincendiary tear gas cartridges at the roof of an underground shelter that was several dozen yards away from the compound, the official said.
But those cartridges had no effect, and a team member asks a superior for permission to use military tear gas cartridges that are incendiary, the FBI official said. He said that on the tape the superior can be heard "spontaneously" granting permission to do so.
A Justice Department official said the Hostage Rescue Team is thought to have discovered the tape on Saturday. An FBI official said that the material was transferred to FBI headquarters Tuesday or yesterday and that in reviewing it FBI officials realized that they had "something new" and immediately notified the Justice Department.
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