Who Gave The Orders? Top Officials Deny Knowledge Of Shooting Rules At Ruby Ridge

Senior FBI officials in Washington should have known about the shoot-on-sight rules federal agents adopted at Ruby Ridge, a Senate panel was told Friday.

But Barbara Berman, who headed a Justice Department task force that spent a year investigating the Randy Weaver case, said her team couldn’t determine who exactly approved the controversial shooting rules.

“Inexplicably, no one at headquarters admits to knowing what the rules were or having read them,” Berman testified.

Berman’s 50-member task force included 28 FBI agents but was conducted under the auspices of the Justice Department’s Office of Professional Responsibility.

The task force, appointed in 1993 by Attorney General Janet Reno, investigated allegations of wrong-doing and misconduct by federal agents and prosecutors.

The allegations came from Weaver’s attorney, Gerry Spence, after Weaver was acquitted in 1993 in Boise of federal murder and firearms charges.

The modified rules of engagement said FBI snipers “could and should” shoot armed adults at the Weaver cabin. That runs counter to the agency’s standard policy that permits deadly force only when a life is in immediate danger.

The modified rules “contributed to the sniper’s decision” to shoot, Berman testified.

FBI sniper Lon Horiuchi fired two shots on the second day of the 11-day siege at Weaver’s cabin. The standoff began Aug. 21, 1992, when a deputy U.S. Marshal and Weaver’s 14-year-old son were killed in a gunbattle.

Weaver was wanted on federal firearms charges at the time and was holed up with his family at the remote North Idaho cabin.

The task force concluded that Horiuchi’s first shot, which wounded Weaver, didn’t violate the agency’s standard deadly force policy.

It said the second shot, fired just seconds later, was illegal. Weaver and family friend Kevin Harris were carrying guns and running back inside the cabin when the sniper fired the second shot.

The bullet went through the cabin door, killing Weaver’s wife, Vicki, and wounding Harris.

Berman said the shoot-on-sight rules were “imprecise and resulted in wide-spread misunderstanding” among agents at the scene.

Former FBI Director William Sessions, also testifying Friday, said the chief of the FBI criminal division in Washington should have known about the shooting rules.

That post at the time was held by Larry Potts, who denies approving the rules.

Eugene Glenn, the FBI commander at Ruby Ridge, testified earlier that Potts and FBI supervisor Danny Coulson both approved the rules.

Coulson told senators on Thursday that if he got the written rules, he didn’t read them.

Berman reminded the subcommittee that Potts agreed with Glenn on the sixth day of the siege that the rules of engagement should return to the standard deadly force policy.

Sen. Arlen Specter, R-Pa., who heads the Senate Judiciary Subcommittee of Terrorism, Technology and Government Information, asked Berman why the costly task force report hadn’t been accepted or released by the attorney general.

The FBI and Michael Shaheen, who heads the Justice Department’s Office of Professional Responsibility, disagree with some of the findings. They contend that Horiuchi was legally justified in firing both shots.

“What good does it do to have all this effort … and then have it summarily dismissed?” asked Sen. Fred Thompson, R-Tenn.

Berman said she doesn’t know why the report wasn’t accepted or made public. An unofficial version of the report was obtained by Legal Times and later posted on the Internet.

“My task force sticks by our report,” said Berman, now an assistant U.S. attorney in Milwaukee.

Reno has said the Justice Department will not make the report public until Boundary County Prosecutor Randall Day decides whether to file state charges.

Sen. Dianne Feinstein, D-Calif., expressed anger that no senior FBI or Justice Department officials admit involvement in the shooting rules.

“There isn’t one person from Washington who will say, ‘Yes, I approved that. Yes, I will stand here and take responsibility for it,”’ she said.

“What Washington seems to be saying is, ‘We had no part in it.”’

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