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04/23/93
No gunshot wounds found yet on cultists
By George Kuempel / The Dallas Morning News
WACO-Despite statements by federal authorities, none of the people whose bodies have been found so far in the ruins of the Branch Davidian compound appears to have suffered gunshot wounds, the pathologist in charge said Thursday.
"There is absolutely no evidence of that as far as we are concerned at this stage,' said Tarrant County Medical Examiner Nizam Peerwani.
He cautioned, however, that he won't know for sure about possible bullet wounds until the bodies have been X-rayed and autopsies completed. He said that it will be several days before all bodies are removed from the compound, where 86 people are presumed to have died in Monday's raging fire.
The U.S. Justice Department said in Washington on Wednesday that at least three of the dead followers of cult leader David Koresh appeared to have been shot before the fire. Officials also were quoted as saying that some children were gunshot victims.
In light of those reports, Dr. Peerwani said, he re-examined the bodies for gunshot wounds and found none.
Department of Public Safety spokesman Mike Cox said that 46 bodies had been pulled from the rubble by Thursday evening.
Dr. Peerwani said that Mr. Koresh's remains have not been found.
The statement out of Washington rankled some Texas Rangers, who
have been left with the task of overseeing the removal of the bodies and preserving evidence at the scene. Gov. Ann Richards called U.S. Attorney General Janet Reno on Wednesday to try to head off any possible conflicts between the state and federal investigators.
Bill Cryer, the governor's press secretary, said the call was made not because problems exist between agencies, but rather to make sure none occur.
The attorney general told a Senate subcommittee Thursday that she hoped federal agents could find "non-lethal means to resolve future confrontations such as the one in Waco.'
In a separate hearing before a House subcommittee, officials of the U.S. Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco and Firearms were sharply criticized for the failed Feb. 28 raid that triggered the standoff.
At a news conference Thursday, medical examiners said the bodies located so far were on top of the rubble. They said they had no idea how many they will find under the two or three layers of rubble yet to be sifted through.
Dr. Peerwani said several bodies appear to be those of children, but he said he can't be sure. At least 17 children under age 12 are believed to have been in the compound when it burned.
A co-worker, Rodney Crowe, a dentist who specializes in identifying bodies, pleaded for dentists who have worked on cult members to contact medical examiners.
"There are no faces on some of them,' Dr. Crowe said.
The blaze, which the FBI says was deliberately set from within,
erupted after agents punched holes in the building with armored vehicles and began pumping in an irritant gas in an attempt to flush the cult members out.
Officials said Thursday that millions of rounds of live ammunition, gernades, possibly rockets and other explosives have been found in the smoldering rubble.
Roughly 1 million unspent cartidges have been found in a cinderblock "bunker,' about the only part of the compound still standing.
"It's about up to your thigh when you in there,' DPS spokesman Chuck McDonald said of the ammunition cache.
Nine chared bodies have been found atop the structure, along with a number of rifles mounted on tripods, Mr. McDonald said.
The 12-feet-by-20-feet structure was inside the building, and below the lookout tower, the most prominent feature of the rambling building.
A small group of reporters taken to near the site Thursday saw investigtors removing what appeared to be a body from the structure.
It was the first time reporters have been allowed near the compound.
Seven black body bags could be seen neatly lined up beside a tent where officials said the bodies are examined before shipping.
Dr. Peerwani, dressed in combat fatigues, earlier told reporters that the bodies have been burned beyond recognition and that the bodies of some small children may have been incinerated.
"The bodies have suffered tremendous heat damage' and must be handled carefully because of their fragile contion, he said.
"They are very soft and crumbling because of the heat damage.'
Most will have to be identified by dental reords, he said.
Dr. Peerwani said some of the bodies were found clutching shoulder
weapons.
The bodies removed Thursday were wrapped in clean white seats and placed in body bags. They will be kept at the site overnight in a refrigerated truck and taken to Fort Worth on Friday for autposies.
Dr. Peerwani said an autopsy revealed that one cult member found Monday outside the rubble died of smoke inhalation and burns.
He said the victim was a white males in his 50s.
The site was still smoldering on Thursday, and Mr. McDonald said
there had been an explosion earlier Thursday.
Mr. McDonald attempted to play down reports that the Rangers are unhappy with the federal authorities who abandoned the site after the blaze.
"This is the situation we were left with. This is the hand we were dealt and we will deal with it,' he said.
Meanwhile, McLennan County Sheriff Jack Harwell said Thursday that he suspects some in the compound may have died of poisoning.
"They had the ability to inject poison and they had poison,' said the sheriff, who, as part of the negotiations, met face-to-face with cult members during the siege.
He said one woman released earlier from the compound told investigators she thought about poisoning herself on March 2. That was the first date on which Mr. Koresh promised to surrender. Authorities say they have since learned that his plan, later abandoned, was to come out and blow himself up with grenades instead.
The woman, whom the sheriff would not identify, said others had agreed to follow their leader's example. "Some of them were going to blow themselves up and some were going to commit suicide with guns,' he said. "She couldn't shoot herself, but she was going to inject herself.'
As authorities sorted through the ashes, some ATF officials expressed frustration at their limited role in the investigation of Monday's inferno. ATF bomb technicians were allowed onto the compound to search for ammunition and other explosives, but the agency's arson experts are being excluded from the investigation because of the ATF's role in the gun battle that began the siege.
"We don't think that our credibility or integrity is second to anybody's, and we know that we have the particular expertise that's necessary on that scene,' one senior ATF official said.
Officials also said they're irritated that the U.S. Attorney's office is barring the ATF from public comment. The FBI, meanwhile, has been permitted to mount an aggressive publicity campaign to get its version of events over to the public. The FBI agents who were in command in Waco during the siege have granted numerous interviews, some on national televison, to defend the agency's actions.
"It is is frustrating experience,' the senior ATF official said.
"We don't understand those rules, and they're creating discontent and concern thoughout the agency.'
Ray and Leroy Jahn, the assistant U.S. attorneys overseeing prosecution of Branch Davidian survivors, could not be reached for comment.
The Associated Press reported, based on interviews with attorneys who've spoken to six of the nine surivivors of the blaze, that Mr. Koresh spent his final hours in the compound pacing among his followers, making sure the women and children were secure and double-checking that everyone had gas masks on.
His right-hand man, Steve Schneider, huddled on the floor, hanging on every word coming through the headphones of his portable radio, The Associated Press said. The radio was his only means of contact with the outside world once he ripped out the phone in a fit of rage after FBI negotiators told him the compound was being gassed and all inside should surrender.
Once the FBI started pumping in gas, cult members strapped on their gas masks and tried to go about their routines. The women had laundry to finish. Some people went to their rooms and read their Bibles. The children remained on the second floor, by their mothers' sides, according to the report.
It was impossible to ignore what was happening. The rickety buildings rattled violently with each ram of the tank.
One man, thinking he was in an area where the gas had not penetrated, slipped off his mask to get a drink of water. Instantly, his throat began to burn, his eyes watered and his skin stung.
Although the FBI is emphatic that cult members torched their own quarters, the six survivors, in separate discussions with lawyers, gave consistent accounts at variance with the official version, according to AP. They said the FBI's tank knocked over numerous lanterns and a barrel of propane. The compound-built of used lumber, plywood and tar paper and heavily littered from the long siege, went up in flames almost instantly.
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