Davidians Angered By Accusations Busy With Memorial Service, They Decry Oklahoma Bombing

Branch Davidians, commemorating the second anniversary of a raging fire than killed more than 80 of their sect members here, appeared stunned and saddened at the news of Wednesday’s deadly explosion in Oklahoma City.

Suggestions that surviving Branch Davidians or their supporters might have been involved in the Oklahoma City bombing to claim revenge brought cries of anger, murmurs of disbelief and counter charges.

“That’s idiocy,” raged a nearly speechless David Thibodeau, one of only nine Branch Davidians who survived the fire two years earlier.

“Look, I’m sorry. I feel bad about it (the Oklahoma City explosion). Six kids died, I heard. But 87 people died here, children, too. What about them?

“A government building goes up, and they want to blame us. It’s ridiculous. It’s ridiculous,” he snapped.

Two years ago, the Branch Davidian’s leader and prophet, David Koresh, died from a gunshot wound to the head. Most of the others died from fire-related injuries, although several also suffered gunshot wounds.

Russell Smith, Dallas County commander of the Texas Constitutional Militia, scoffed at rumors that members of his group or of any other progun, anti-government group might be linked to the Oklahoma City bombing.

“We don’t kill children,” Smith said, in a pointed reference to his and others’ belief that federal agents caused the fire that led to the April 19, 1993, deaths of their fellow sect members, including 27 children.

“If they’re looking for someone to investigate, they ought to investigate the government,” Smith said.

“Isn’t it terrible?” asked Branch Davidian Margaret Lawson, who left the complex early in the 51-day siege by federal agents that led to the tragic fire.

“Who could have thought of doing something so awful, so horrible?” Lawson said.

Pam Hawkins of Waco, head of the Mount Carmel Independent Investigation Advocates, said she suspects the federal government may have engineered the deadly bombing on the anniversary of the Branch Davidian tragedy to cast blame the sect’s way.

“They (government officials) have been trying to discredit the Branch Davidians’ legitimate claims against the government. Maybe that’s what this (bombing) is about,” Hawkins said.