OKLAHOMA CITY BOMBING Police search for videotape

The tape wasn't found during the house search.
By DAVID SKOLNICK
VINDICATOR POLITICS WRITER
A former staffer of imprisoned ex-U.S. Rep. James A. Traficant Jr., and the attorney who represented Richard E. Detore, Traficant's co-defendant, made national news concerning a supposed tape of the 1995 Oklahoma City bombing.
Several press outlets published articles about a Jan. 30 search at the home of John Culbertson, a Virginia man who briefly served as the 17th Congressional District's administrator after Traficant was expelled from Congress and sentenced to eight years in a federal prison.
Police from Oklahoma and Fairfax County, Va., searched Culbertson's Centreville, Va., home looking for a videotape that supposedly shows the Oklahoma City bombing as it happened, according to the Washington Post. Culbertson told the newspaper that the tape wasn't found because he doesn't have it. Culbertson said in front of a U.S. House committee in 2000 that such a tape exists but he had never seen it.
Important for trial
The supposed tape is of interest because if it exists it would be used in the murder trial of Terry Nichols, convicted of conspiring to blow up the Oklahoma City federal building, the Washington Post reported. Nichols is to go on trial next month on 161 state counts of first-degree murder in connection with the bombing.
Culbertson told the newspaper that police took his computers, his children's computers and various other discs and files during a five-hour search.
Nichols' attorneys learned about the supposed tape from Thomas W. Mills Jr., the Dallas attorney who successfully defended Detore last year against charges that he conspired to bribe Traficant. Mills said Culbertson showed him a video on his computer in 1998 of the bombing, while Culbertson says he showed the attorney only bombing-related materials, the newspaper reported.
Culbertson met Traficant in 1996, a year after the April 19, 1995, bombing of the Alfred P. Murrah Federal Building. Culbertson shared Traficant's belief that the government had covered up what really happened in a number of incidents including the Oklahoma City bombing.
The 'real story'
Shortly after the bombing, Culbertson formed the Center for Reform, which he used to criticize the federal government for covering up the "real story" behind the Oklahoma City bombing.
He testified in July 2000, in front of a U.S. House Judiciary subcommittee regarding Traficant's Fair Justice Act. He accused the U.S. Department of Justice of a "cover-up" and of tampering with a witness. His reports on the bombing was discredited by the U.S. General Services Administration.
Two months after the testimony, Culbertson was hired by Traficant as a part-time staffer to investigate allegations of wrongdoing at the Justice Department and other federal agencies. In June 2002, two months after Traficant's conviction on 10 felony counts including racketeering and bribery, Culbertson was hired as a full-time employee.
Just before his expulsion from Congress in July 2002, Traficant appointed Culbertson as district administrator. Culbertson held that position until mid-September 2002 when he resigned at the request of the U.S. House Clerk because of disputes with U.S. House administrators.
skolnick@vindy.com