Judge approves Nichols interview

By Nolan Clay

Published: September 22, 2007

A federal judge has given permission to a Utah attorney to question Terry Nichols about the Oklahoma City bomb plot and to videotape their interview.

U.S. District Judge Dale A. Kimball also ruled the attorney can question and videotape convicted murderer David Paul Hammer, who was on death row with bomber Tim McVeigh. The judge ruled Thursday in Utah.

The attorney, Jesse Trentadue, is seeking information to support his theory his younger brother was killed at the Oklahoma City Federal Transfer Center in August 1995 during an interrogation.

He contends authorities mistook his brother for a bombing suspect, bank robber Richard Guthrie.

He is suing the FBI for records to support his theory. Federal and local officials concluded the brother, Kenneth Trentadue, committed suicide in his cell.

The attorney also contends the federal government had advance knowledge of the 1995 bombing from informants.

Nichols, a convicted murderer, is serving life sentences at the maximum-security federal penitentiary in Colorado for the bombing. McVeigh was executed in 2001.

"The whole objective here is to get to the truth about my brother's murder,” Trentadue said. "I think it's a win for a lot of people, not just for me.”

Nichols denied involvement in the bombing for years but after his 2004 state trial he admitted to the FBI, his family, a congressman and Trentadue that he helped McVeigh.

Hammer claims McVeigh revealed the identities of accomplices while the two were imprisoned almost two years together on federal death row at the U.S. Penitentiary in Terre Haute, Ind.

McVeigh told biographers and his attorneys only Nichols helped him. McVeigh called Hammer's claim a "scam” and called Hammer "a big, fat rat.”

Nichols and Hammer already have given Trentadue written declarations. The judge ruled they can be interviewed on tape "so long as these individuals are willing to cooperate.”

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