Jose Padilla's Oklahoma
City Connection
 

Was Jose Padilla, the American citizen suspected of plotting to detonate a radioactive "dirty bomb" in the U.S., connected to the bombing of the Murrah Federal Building in April of 1995?

Christopher Brady
Posted: Thursday June 13, 2002 06:13AM ET
Glenn Beck Program Exclusive

Jose Padilla is the focus of great speculation by Americans today. How can the U.S intelligence agencies have known that Padilla was plotting to detonate one of the most sinister types of weapons of mass destruction? Is it because these agencies had received reports, as John Ashcroft claims, that Padilla and his accomplices had been meeting and gathering information on how to build these deadly devices? Or because these agencies have known of him all along, and had chosen to simply wait for his return to the United States?

Jose Padilla (LEFT) is shown here next to a sketch of John Doe No. 2 (RIGHT). John Doe No. 2 was initially suspected in the OKC bombings in 1995.

This article explores a premise that seems so unlikely, a premise that can't possibly have any basis in truth. However, further investigation reveals that this scenario, in fact, makes absolute sense, and puts all the pieces together. From the streets of Chicago to the sandy deserts of Pakistan and back to the U.S. to bring destruction to Oklahoma City, Jose "Abdullah al Muhajir" Padilla, is John Doe No. 2.

Universally Accepted History of Oklahoma City

Anybody within 20 miles of downtown Oklahoma City on the morning of April 19, 1995 remembers the frightening sound and the awful "thump." In those first few seconds after 9:02 on that morning, the only question heard was, "What was THAT?"

A massive bomb inside a rental truck had exploded, blowing half of the nine-story Murrah Federal Building into oblivion.

A stunned nation watched as horrifying images and screams and shouts of pain and confusion were broadcast on television.

Just 90 minutes after the explosion, an Oklahoma Highway Patrol officer pulled over 27-year-old Timothy McVeigh for driving without a license plate.

Shortly before he was to be released on April 21, McVeigh was recognized as a bombing suspect and was charged with the bombing.

When McVeigh's ex-Army associate, Terry Nichols, was wanted for questioning, Nichols voluntarily surrendered to police in Herington, Kansas, and was later charged in the bombing.

In June 1997, a jury convicted Timothy McVeigh of bombing the Oklahoma City Federal building, a terrorist attack that left 168 people dead.

On December 23 1997, a jury found Terry Nichols guilty of involuntary manslaughter and of conspiring with McVeigh. Nearly six months later, Nichols was sentenced by a federal judge to spend the rest of his life in prison.

On Monday, June 11, 2001 Timothy McVeigh was put to death by lethal injection at 7:14 a.m. in Terre Haute, Indiana.

Terry Nichols is currently serving out his sentence in Federal prison while maintaining his innocence.

This is the universally-accepted version of history. However, overwhelming evidence suggests that there is much more to the events in Oklahoma City than the story of a couple of anti-government ex-Army radicals acting alone.

Getting the Facts in Order

The factual fallout from the OKC bombing was riddled with confusion. Various reports were later debunked, many reports were simply ignored.

The following is in-depth look at some of the happenings that occurred during the morning of April 19, 1995.

• An FBI All Points Bulletin was issued shortly after the blast for all law enforcement to be on the lookout for a late model Chevrolet pickup "occupied by Middle Eastern subjects" seen fleeing the blast area "at a high rate of speed."
   

• At least four witnesses have attested to seeing young men of apparent Middle Eastern appearance acting in a suspicious manner in front of, or in the immediate vicinity of, the Murrah Building before and right after the explosion.
   

• On April 19, 1995, the head of Saudi Arabia's Intelligence Service called the CIA's former chief of Counterterrorism Operations to report that Saddam Hussein had hired seven Pakistani terrorists to bomb targets in the U.S., one of which was the Murrah Building.
   

• There is a superabundance of evidence of neo-Nazi operatives in Europe and the U.S. either collaborating with Arab and other Middle Eastern terrorists, or acting under the direction of the Soviet KGB and its surrogate services in Eastern Europe.
   

• Some elected officials and terrorist experts pointed out that militant leaders of the terrorist groups Hamas and Islamic Jihad had addressed a radical Islamic conference in Oklahoma City, and that the militants' statements had been recorded for a PBS documentary.

While evidence certainly substantiates the involvement of Timothy McVeigh and Terry Nichols, there is also enough evidence to show that they did not act alone.

John Doe No. 2

The calendar moves to the December 2, 1997 trial of Terry Nichols.

A mysterious suspect -- never identified and never found -- dominates the Oklahoma City bombing case today as defense lawyers attempt to shift attention away from defendant Terry L. Nichols.

The defense launched its case with a stream of witnesses who claimed that convicted bomber Timothy J. McVeigh was seen with a man who did not fit the description of Nichols around the time of the April 19, 1995 blast. Looming on courtroom evidence monitors was the now-famous FBI sketch of John Doe No. 2, the bombing suspect never located by the authorities, the bombing suspect who is, according to the FBI, no longer being sought.

The government now takes the position that John Doe No. 2 was actually an innocent Army private who happened to be at Elliott's Body Shop the day after McVeigh rented the truck.

This was the case put forth by the lawyers for Terry Nichols. The government maintains that there was no John Doe No. 2, that the very idea of a second co-conspirator was all just a big misunderstanding.

Evidence proves otherwise.

A former Elliott's employee, Vicki Beemer, testified that two days before the bombing, McVeigh had been accompanied by a second man. A nurse from Herington, Kan., told jurors that she saw a Hispanic-looking man riding with McVeigh in the passenger seat of a Ryder truck several days before the blast. Numerous others testified that they saw a man resembling the sketch of John Doe No. 2 in or near a Ryder truck in the days preceding the bombing.

The resemblance between John Doe No. 2 and Jose Padilla is uncanny. Some might say that his hair in the photo doesn't match the hair in the sketch. However this can be easily explained away by noting that John Doe No. 2 was actually wearing a hat, and that the sketch is just a best guess effort.

Many witnesses describe John Doe No.2 as: Hispanic, 5'10", 170 pounds., 25 to 26 years old, dark hair, robust, prominent lips, bushy eyebrows, with a strong, angry look upon his face. Descriptions of Jose Padilla at the time would have been similar to those of John Doe No. 2.

But the connection between Padilla and John Doe No. 2 does not end with similar physical characteristics.

Background of Jose Padilla

Jose Padilla has an extensive criminal record -- including an involvement in a gang-related murder when he was 15 years old.

Padilla was born in Brooklyn, N.Y.and moved to northwest Chicago at age 5. As a teenager, he was a member of a street gang.

He spent time in juvenile detention in 1985 for an armed robbery that left one victim dead of stab wounds.

Later, armed with a baseball bat, Padilla and a knife-wielding accomplice robbed three men. One man fled, but the two thieves chased him, and Padilla' s accomplice stabbed him in the stomach.

As a juvenile, Padilla was convicted aggravated battery, armed robbery and attempted armed robbery and was in custody in Illinois from November 1985 to May 1988.

After serving time on murder and assault charges, Padilla moved to Florida, but quickly found himself in trouble again when he was convicted of both aggravated assault with intent to commit a felony and discharging a firearm from a vehicle.

Despite his already lengthy criminal record, he was sentenced to just a year on probation.

In 1992, one year after he was released from probation, Padilla was convicted in Florida of aggravated assault with a firearm.

While serving time in the Broward County Jail, Padilla was accused of battery on a jail officer and resisting without violence in January 1992. He settled the charges with guilty pleas after spending 10 months behind bars.

It was either during or after serving those 10 months in the Broward County Jail that the man raised as a Roman Catholic converted to radical Islam with his future wife, Cherie Maria Stultz.

Following Padilla's release, he and Stultz worked at a Taco Bell restaurant in Davie, near Fort Lauderdale, close to about 20 Islamic centers or mosques.

Padilla disappeared after two years, and the couple later divorced.

By 1998, Padilla had moved to Egypt. His goal, according to officials, was to further explore Muslim teachings and traditions. He stayed about two years, aligning himself with illegal underground extremist mosques.

Putting the Pieces Together

Even though McVeigh went to his death denying any larger plot, many questions remain unanswered. Did John Doe No. 2 ever exist? If he did, who is he? If there is no John Doe No. 2, why did a second suspect initially emerge? What items or witnesses did the bureau use to create its three sketches of this alleged co-conspirator?

The evidence that the Oklahoma City bombing involved a larger conspiracy, one with Middle Eastern connections, is compelling. And the trail begins with that mysterious FBI APB.

In the week following the bombing a Oklahoma City, a reporter at television station received a tip about some suspicious activity and began an investigation of a local property management company. The reporter had been told by several former employees of the management company that they had seen a pickup truck at the office, a truck that matched the description in the APB.

The reporter discovered that the owner of the property, a Palestinian expatriate, had pled guilty in 1991 to several counts of insurance fraud and served eight months in a federal prison. Court papers indicated that the FBI had investigated him for alleged connections to the Palestine Liberation Organization.

Former employees told the investigator that six months prior to the bombing, the owner of this management company had hired a group of foreign refugees to do painting and construction work. This group had allegedly fled from Iraq to escape Saddam Hussein's regime. An employee told the reporter that he saw these "refugees" cheering the Oklahoma terror attack and vowing to die in Saddam's service.

The reporter used surveillance equipment to photograph these foreign refugees, and focused on one man who seemed to match the last FBI profile sketch and description of John Doe No. 2.

Over the next several months the reporter interviewed witnesses who said they saw McVeigh in the company of a foreign-looking man in the days and hours before the bombing.

Witnesses also said they saw several of the refugees moving large barrels around in the back of an old white truck. The barrels, they alleged, emanated a strong smell of diesel fuel, one of the key ingredients used in the Oklahoma City bomb.

Who was this man, the one who resembled John Doe No. 2?

His name was Al-Hussaini Hussain who later filed a defamation lawsuit in Oklahoma County District Court against the television station and the reporter, charging that the news station had falsely accused him of being John Doe No. 2. The lawsuit was later dropped since the station had never directly targeted him as John Doe No. 2.

However Al-Hussaini Hussain is just one of many who were mentioned as a possible John Doe No. 2. Some would suggest that Hussain was given up as a target to deflect attention from the real John Doe No. 2.

Middle Eastern Ties

After the bombing came the finger-pointing and assignation of blame. However, since the Clinton-Reno Justice Department laid down the official line that the Oklahoma bombing was a purely domestic terrorist act, an eerie silence had descended over the case..

Oliver Revell, former FBI Assistant Director in Charge of Investigation and Counterterrorism, was quoted in news accounts as saying, "I think it's most likely a Middle East terrorist. I think the modus operandi is similar. They have used this approach." According to court documents filed in the McVeigh trial, an FBI communiqué on the day of the bombing suggested the attack may have been in retaliation for the prosecution of the World Trade Center bombers. The communiqué was clear: "We are currently inclined to suspect the Islamic Jihad as the likely group."

Terrorist expert Neil C. Livingstone was quoted in The Globe on May 16, 1995 with this observation: "There is a remarkable similarity between the methods used by Islamic terrorists in the bombing of the Marine barracks in Beirut, the attack on the World Trade Center, and the bombing in Oklahoma. The truckload of explosives is almost a signature or calling card, and it is the weapon of choice among these groups." Livingstone, the author of several books on terrorism, continued: "Very typically, these terrorists have found homegrown radicals to use as dupes in the actual bombings. They have supplied the money and the technical expertise and highly skilled operatives to guide a project and then get out of town before they can be apprehended."

One investigator from 1995 said he was more than "inclined to suspect" Islamic Jihad. His investigation, he told this reporter, directly ties suspects from the Oklahoma City bombing to an Islamic Jihad cell in Florida. The Florida cell, he believes, is tied into the network of Osama bin Laden.

Padilla's whereabouts are unknown from 1994 to 1998. In all likelihood, he was still living somewhere in Florida and could have been involved with some of the Middle Eastern terrorist organizations that have possible ties to the Oklahoma City bombings.

Additionally, according to a report from the Associated Press filed on Tuesday, June 11, 2002, Padilla was a protégé of a top lieutenant of Osama bin Laden, traveling at his mentor's request to meet with other terrorists and using the Internet to research how to build a radioactive weapon.

Conclusion

So what exactly what happened in OKC on the morning of April 19, 1995? Was it really just two anti-government ex-Army radicals? Did they construct this idea by themselves? Did they carry out the whole thing by themselves? Are all the witnesses who say there were more people involved simply mistaken?

How about Padilla? How does he fit into this puzzle?

Some might not believe that Jose Padilla was John Doe No. 2. However, it is certainly plausible to counter that a man convicted of murder as a youth, a man linked with extreme Islamic mosques, could move to the Middle East, become a part of the worlds most wanted terrorist organization and attempt to carry out a plot to kill tens of thousands of Americans.

You must consider all of the facts.

Consider all of the possibilities.

Consider the improbable, the improvable, the unbelievable.

Then consider Padilla.

Copyright 2002 - Glenn Beck Program.
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