America on Fire: The Untold History of Police Violence and Black Rebellion Since the 1960s

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On August 5, 1989, Howell released the "New Light" audiotape, in which he said that God told him to procreate with the women in the group to establish a " House of David" of his "special people." This involved separating married couples in the group, who had to agree that only he could have sexual relations with the wives, while the men should observe celibacy. [32] [34] Howell also said that God had told him to start building an "Army for God" to prepare for the end of days and a salvation for his followers. [34] The ATF used an affidavit filed by Special Agent David Aguilera to obtain the search and arrest warrant that led to the Waco siege. The official filing date of this affidavit was February 25, 1993. [47] Allegedly, the initial investigation began in June 1992 when a postal worker informed a sheriff of McLennan County that he believed he had been delivering explosives to the ammo and gun store owned and operated by the Branch Davidians. This store, named the "Mag-Bag", had been identified by the said postal worker as suspicious in deliveries. The postal worker continued deliveries to the Mt. Carmel Center and reported seeing occupied observation posts; in the affidavit, it states he believed there were armed personnel at these observation posts.

The Waco siege has been the subject of numerous documentary films and books. The first film was a made-for television docudrama film, In the Line of Duty: Ambush in Waco, which was made during the siege, before the April 19 assault on the church, and presented the initial firefight of February 28, 1993 as an ambush. The film's writer, Phil Penningroth, has since disowned his screenplay as pro-ATF "propaganda". [150] Books [ edit ] Sant, Peter van (April 14, 2018). " "I've kept my story secret for the last 25 years -- I didn't want to take this to my grave" ". CBS News . Retrieved January 29, 2023.On May 7, 1962, the Centralia Council met to discuss the approaching Memorial Day and how the town would go about cleaning up the Centralia landfill, which was introduced earlier that year. The 300-foot-wide, 75-foot-long (91m ×23m) pit was made up of a 50-foot-deep (15m) strip mine that had been cleared by Edward Whitney [ clarification needed] in 1935, and came very close to the northeast corner of Odd Fellows Cemetery. There were eight illegal dumps spread about Centralia, and the council's intention in creating the landfill was to stop the illegal dumping, as new state regulations had forced the town to close an earlier dump west of St. Ignatius Cemetery. Trustees at the cemetery were opposed to the landfill's proximity to the cemetery but recognized the illegal dumping elsewhere as a serious problem and envisioned that the new pit would resolve it. [7] On a shelf dedicated to American issues at downtown Berlin’s largest bookstore, the following titles were recently on prominent display: a b "FBI chief hails new Waco report". CNN.com. CNN. Archived from the original on January 31, 2020 . Retrieved January 30, 2020.

a b FBI. "Report to the Deputy Attorney General on the Events at Waco, Texas/Child Abuse". Archived from the original on August 17, 2009 . Retrieved January 8, 2009. A number of competing hypotheses have arisen about the source of the Centralia mine fire. Some of them claim that the mine fire started before May 27, 1962. David DeKok says that the borough's deliberate burning of trash on May 27 to clean up the landfill in the former strip mine ignited a coal seam via an unsealed opening in the trash pit, which allowed the fire to enter the labyrinth of abandoned coal mines beneath Centralia. [7] David DeKok, Unseen Danger: A Tragedy of People, Government, and the Centralia Mine Fire (University of Pennsylvania Press, 1986) [8] Plan and execution [ edit ] On the night of October 8, 1871, women snatched their children from their beds, men formed ad hoc fire brigades, and the terrified residents of Peshtigo, Wisconsin fled what would become the deadliest wildfire in American history. So why did the Peshtigo wildfire fade from national memory?s:Activities of Federal Law Enforcement Agencies Toward the Branch Davidians/Section 2|Activities of Federal Law Enforcement Agencies Toward the Branch Davidians: II. The ATF Investigation. The new ATF Director, John Magaw, criticized several aspects of the ATF raid. Magaw made the Treasury "Blue Book" report on Waco required reading for new agents. A 1995 Government Accountability Office report on the use of force by federal law enforcement agencies observed that "On the basis of Treasury's report on the Waco operation and views of tactical operations experts and ATF's own personnel, ATF decided in October 1995 that dynamic entry would only be planned after all other options have been considered and began to adjust its training accordingly." [96] In 2001, another Michael McNulty documentary, The F.L.I.R. Project, researched the aerial thermal images recorded by the FBI, and using identical FLIR equipment recreated the same results as were recorded by federal agencies April 19, 1993. Subsequent government-funded studies [159] contend that the infra-red evidence does not support the view that the FBI improperly used incendiary devices or fired on Branch Davidians. Infra-red experts continue to disagree and filmmaker Amy Sommer stands by the original conclusions presented in Waco: The Rules of Engagement. America learned the exact wrong lessons from the burning embers of Watts, Newark and Detroit, setting the stage for a shift from the War on Poverty to a War on Crime funded by the 1968 Safe Streets Act, which put the federal government in the business of crime control and encouraged local police departments to identify potential criminals before they committed crimes — in short, to try to manage problems caused by systemic racism beyond residents’ control.

A Netflix documentary series called Waco: American Apocalypse, was released in March 2023. The series encompasses three episodes and features real and never before released footage and interviews with surviving cult members along with others involved. [160]

Search Warrant W93-15M for the "residence of Vernon Wayne Howell, and others", signed by U.S. Judge or Magistrate Dennis G. Green, dated 25 February 1993 8:43pm at Waco, Texas

Quigley, Joan (2007). "Chapter Notes to The Day the Earth Caved In" (DOC). p.8. Archived from the original on 2014-02-27 . Retrieved 2012-03-13. The American novelist John Updike has been directly inspired by the Waco events for the fourth and last part of his book In the Beauty of the Lilies (1996) which described how a troubled child could integrate such a sect and the inner dynamics that led to a collective massacre. [152] Documentaries [ edit ] The press coverage of the Waco siege was criticized by some [ who?] for its sensationalism and for providing a platform for David Koresh and his followers. Some journalists were accused of glamorizing Koresh and his beliefs, leading to concerns that the media attention may have unintentionally fueled the cult leader's messianic complex and prolonged the standoff. The legal proceedings that followed were complex and involved charges ranging from firearms violations to conspiracy to commit murder. Several surviving Branch Davidians faced trial, and some were convicted and sentenced to lengthy prison terms. [ citation needed]However, the trials themselves were also criticized by some [ who?] who believed that the defendants that were fueled by the media did not receive a fair trial or that the government failed to fully investigate its own actions during the siege. [ citation needed] [107] Waco and its influence on the people [ edit ]Richard Scruggs; Steven Zipperstein; Robert Lyon (October 8, 1993). Report to the Deputy Attorney General on the Events at Waco, Texas (Report). The United States Department of Justice. p.Chapter VII, Section A . Retrieved January 29, 2023. The FBI did not exaggerate the child abuse issue when it presented the tear gas option to the Attorney General. The FBI did not try to "sell" the tear gas plan to the Attorney General as a way to save the children. While one of the FBI representatives made one misstatement indicating that Koresh was continuing to beat children during the standoff, that misstatement did not materially influence the Attorney General's decision. Indeed, the FBI included virtually no mention of child abuse in its initial briefing book for the Attorney General. In the final briefing book, prepared on the weekend before April 19, the FBI included the historical evidence of child abuse and in no way indicated that it had any evidence of continuing abuse.