Fbi Director Admits Errors Freeh’s Testimony Wraps Up Ruby Ridge Hearings

If he had been a sniper that day on Ruby Ridge, FBI Director Louis J. Freeh said Thursday, he wouldn’t have fired the bullet that killed Vicki Weaver.

But Freeh defended the judgment of FBI sharp-shooter Lon Horiuchi, who took the shot that passed through a cabin door and slammed into Vicki Weaver’s head.

“Looking at it today, I would not take that shot. Nobody in the FBI would take the shot. But that’s the difference in hindsight,” Freeh told a Senate panel at the close of six weeks of hearings into the Randy Weaver case.

“In the shoes and the eyes of the man taking the shot, it was constitutional.”

In his testimony, Freeh confessed to tragic flaws in the FBI’s chain of command and admitted he had erred in promoting the man in charge of the Weaver siege.

Freeh was the first, and only, of 60-plus witnesses in the hearings to accept responsibility for mistakes in the case.

Although not in charge of the FBI during the 1992 North Idaho standoff, he said “the mistakes were grievous, and the aftermath worse.”

After the standoff, Freeh censured, then promoted his close friend Larry Potts to the bureau’s No. 2 spot. Potts was in charge of the 11-day siege of Weaver’s remote cabin.

Asked by committee chairman Sen. Arlen Specter if he would promote Potts again, Freeh replied: “I would not. That was a mistake I made, and my mistake alone.”

Freeh later demoted and suspended Potts, pending a Justice Department investigation into an alleged FBI cover-up.

Committee members praised Freeh for shouldering some blame, but were more critical of his interpretation of the bureau’s new shooting rules.

The rules announced Tuesday by the Justice and Treasury departments allow federal law officers to use deadly force “only when necessary,” when officers have “reasonable belief” that there is “imminent danger” to someone.

The bureau has been widely criticized for adopting modified shooting rules at Ruby Ridge that allowed snipers to shoot any armed adult on sight.

Freeh said the new rules would have kept snipers from firing the shot that killed Vicki Weaver as she held the cabin door open for her fleeing husband, daughter and friend.

Senators starkly disagreed, saying they feared the same mistake could occur again under the new Justice Department rules that allow deadly force when faced with “imminent” as opposed to “immediate” danger.

Specter, a former Philadelphia prosecutor, said the new rule was “more flexible” than the current constitutional standard.

“The FBI’s moving in the right direction, but they have considerable distance to go,” the Republican presidential hopeful told reporters after listening to Freeh. “These new rules of deadly force may go beyond constitutional bounds.”

Senate panelists said they are considering drafting legislation to define when deadly force can be used.

The series of 14 hearings stemmed from an Aug. 21, 1992, shootout and ensuing standoff that pitted U.S. marshals and the FBI’s elite hostage rescue team against white separatist Randy Weaver, his family and a friend, Kevin Harris.

What initially started when Weaver failed to appear in court for selling a sawed-off shotgun resulted in the deaths of Weaver’s wife, their 14-year-old son, Samuel and U.S. Deputy Marshal William Degan.

Freeh said Thursday that “Ruby Ridge has become synonymous with tragedy,” and apologized repeatedly for what he called a series of “terribly flawed law enforcement operations.”

Freeh promised to become personally involved in future crises and pledged to follow through on reforms guarding against similar failures.

But Sen. Larry Craig, whose persistence helped spur the hearings, said he remained frustrated with FBI officials and unconvinced that a similar tragedy couldn’t occur.

“This is not the first instance. Waco is not the first instance. There is a whole case of this,” the Idaho Republican said after the hearings.

Asked if, even under the new deadly force rules, he thought a like tragedy could happen again, Craig replied: “Yes, I do.”

“How (the deadly force rule) is defined and how it is played out is still very much in the air,” Craig said.

The FBI director said he hopes to improve relations with county sheriffs and other local law officers, especially in the West.

Admitting what many senators already had concluded, Freeh told the panel: “The FBI was not prepared to deal with situations like Ruby Ridge.

“The problem with Ruby Ridge is we didn’t learn any lessons for Waco,” Freeh added. “I am committed to ensuring the tragedies of Ruby Ridge never happen again.”

MEMO: This sidebar appeared with the story: NOW THE REPORT After six weeks, 14 sporadic days of hearings and 63 witnesses, the Senate Ruby Ridge inquiry finally concluded Thursday - sort of. Now the committee will begin drafting a report, due out by Thanksgiving, that could recommend administrative and legislative changes to the way the FBI operates. After that, the panel might reconvene, if more information arises from a Justice Department investigation into an alleged FBI cover-up.