Bombing Trial Repercussions Begin Appeals Phase Is Next, And Mcveigh Cohort Nichols Gets Ready For His Trial

Timothy McVeigh’s legal battles now move across the street and a state away, while his alleged accomplice Terry Nichols prepares for his own trial.

The federal death penalty statute does not contain an automatic appeal, so McVeigh is expected to file a notice of intent to appeal within a month at the 10th U.S. Circuit of Appeals, across the street from the courthouse where a jury sentenced him to death on Friday for the Oklahoma City bombing.

The appeals could challenge a wide range of issues, from the constitutionality of the federal death penalty law to various rulings from the judge restricting the sort of evidence McVeigh’s lawyers could introduce.

Those appeals could drag on for years.

“We have some decent legal issues to present, but overall the judge tried the case pretty fairly, and I think the court will look at it from an overall perspective and it’ll be a fairly tough row to hoe for us,” said one of McVeigh’s lawyers, Richard Burr, a death penalty expert.

McVeigh also is planning to ask for a new trial in U.S. District Court - the request is due July 7 - and, within two years, is expected to stand trial on 160 murder counts in the state of Oklahoma, where the district attorney in Oklahoma City wants to make doubly sure that McVeigh is executed.

Meanwhile, co-defendant Nichols is preparing for trial on murder and conspiracy charges in the bombing, with the date likely to be set after Labor Day.

Among McVeigh’s possible grounds for appeal are U.S. District Judge Richard Matsch’s refusal to allow the defense to expound its theory that foreign terrorists may have been behind the bombing; his refusal to let the defense introduce all of a scathing Justice Department report on the FBI crime lab; and his refusal to allow testimony from Carol Howe, a former government informant who said she overheard a white supremacist and a German discuss blowing up federal buildings in the months before the attack.

Burr said the defense may also challenge the way Matsch curtailed efforts to make an issue of the Waco tragedy.

“We felt, as we argued, that there really is some measure of responsibility that lays at the government’s door, for its failure to account and assume responsibility for what it did at Waco,” Burr said.

Harvard Law professor Alan Dershowitz said that McVeigh may have another avenue for appeal: His lawyers did not adequately represent him.

“This was an awful, awful defense,” Dershowitz said.

The evidence against Nichols, 41, differs from that used in McVeigh’s trial.

Prosecutors will build their case around statements that Nichols made to authorities.

He told them he was in Oklahoma City with McVeigh three days before the bombing; that he lent McVeigh his pickup the day before the attack; and that he cleaned out a storage locker at McVeigh’s request the day after.

Authorities also have evidence seized from Nichols’ home in Herington, Kan., including two key bombing components - detonator cord and ammonium nitrate fertilizer. They also confiscated a phone card allegedly used to make dozens of calls as part of the bombing plot.

In addition, they have a note that Nichols wrote to McVeigh when Nichols went to the Philippines in 1994. Nichols told McVeigh that in the event he did not return, McVeigh should “Go for it.”

However, prosecutors will not be able to rely on the testimony of Lori and Michael Fortier as much as they did in McVeigh’s trial. At McVeigh’s trial, the Fortiers testified that McVeigh detailed his plans to blow up the federal building in Oklahoma City.