News Digest
Witness called selfish liar;
Fortier admits she
could’ve warned of the
Oklahoma City
■ bombing — but didn’t.
DENVER (AP) — The woman
who testified Timothy McVeigh con
fided his plans to blow up the Okla
homa City federal building was por
trayed Wednesday as a drug-using liar
who changed her story to save her own
skin and make a buck.
In a persistent cross-examination
of Lori Fortier, McVeigh attorney
Stephen Jones sought not only to dis
credit one of the government’s star
witnesses but to suggest she shared
blame in the deadliest terrorist attack
on U.S. soil.
“If your testimony is accurate, all
you had to do to prevent the deaths of
168 people was pick up a telephone?”
Jones asked.
“Yes,” Fortier responded.
“And you did not do that, did you?”
“No,” she whispered.
On Tuesday, she testified that six
months before the bombing, McVeigh
divulged plans to blow up the build
ing to avenge the deadly government
siege at Waco, Texas. She said he even
used soup cans to diagram how he
would stack barrels of explosives in
the back of a truck for maximum de
struction.
In his cross-examination, Jones
suggested McVeigh was nothing more
than a “Walter Mitty” — someone
who merely fantasizes about grand
deeds.
The 24-year-old wife of one of
McVeigh’s Axmy buddies acknowl
edged in a soft voice that after the
bombing she lied to friends,,family
and the FBI by saying she didn’t think
McVeigh was involved.
Through his leading questions,
Jones suggested that Fortier and her
husband, Michael Fortier, changed
their stories after they learned co-de
fendant Terry Nichols was arrested
and they feared they could be next.
And only after she was promised
immunity from prosecution did she
start saying McVeigh divulged de
tailed plans for the bombing. Michael
Fortier pleaded guilty to lesser charges
in exchange for his testimony and
could get up to 23 years in prison.
“Mrs. Fortier, would you agree
with me that you either made false
statements to the Federal Bureau of
Investigation... or you’re making false
statements to this jury of strangers?”
Jones asked.
The question was quickly disal
lowed.
At Jones’ request, Fortier read
aloud a news release she and her hus
band issued shortly after McVeigh’s
arrest, in which Fortier says that
McVeigh was “crucified” by the me
dia and that there’s “no way that he
was responsible for this crime.”
“You were not distancing yourself
from Mr. MoVeigh, were you?” Jones
asked.
“No,” Fortier said.
McVeigh, who could get the death
penalty if convicted of murder and
conspiracy in the April 19, 1995,
bombihg, stared intently at Fortier,
leaning back in his chair with his
hands folded ip front of him.
Much of the attack on Fortier fo
cused on her acknowledged drug use.
She said she smoked pot and used
methamphetamines, or speed, since
she was a teen-ager, with her drug use
accelerating in the weeks before the
bombing.
She admitted taking speed in the
days prior to some of the most impor
tant dates of her testimony, including
the days she says McVeigh revealed
his bombing plans in the living room
of the Fortiers’ Kingman, Ariz.,
trailer.
Kenyatta Bush murder trial begins
OMAHA (AP) — A man accused
of helping kill a high school student
and later lulling himself was described
as two different people during open
ing statements Wednesday in the trial
of his friend, Jeremy Sheets.
Prosecutors described Adam
Barnett as a man who confessed to his
involvement in the 1992 killing of
Kenyatta Bush in order to clear his
conscience. Defense attorney J. WilF
iam Gallup said Barnett was a dis
turbed young man who got caught in
a lie and did not know how to get out
of it.
“He’d rather be called a killer than
a liar,” Gallup said of Barnett.
Taped statements made by Barnett
to police are expected to be presented
as key evidence in the trial.
Barnett, who was supposed to tes
tify against Sheets, committed suicide
in the Washington County Jail in Blair
Nov. 13.
Sheets, 22, is charged with first
degree murder and use of a knife to
commit a felony in Bush’s death. The
17-year-old honor student was ab
ducted Sept. 23, 1992, from outside
North High School, raped and killed.
Deputy Douglas County Attorney
Leigh Ann Retelsdorf said she would
present evidence that Sheets and
Barnett jumped out of their car and
grabbed Bush near the school.
Researchers create mighty mice
NEW YORK (AP) — With a
single genetic switch, scientists have
created a strain of supermice two to
three times more muscular than usual,
with big, broad shoulders and massive
hips.
The genetically altered giants can’t
outpace speeding locomotives, or leap
much of anything in a single bound.
But their creators believe the mice
could spur a revolution in the treat
ment of muscular dystrophy and simi
lar diseases, and perhaps even trans
form the livestock industry, where big
ger muscles would mean more meat.
The supermice were made by Se
Jin Lee, Alexandra McPherron and
Ann Lawler, molecular biologists at
the Johns Hopkins University School
of Medicine in Baltimore. The re
searchers created the mice by delet
ing a single gene that appears to limit
muscle growth.
“They do look a little strange,”
McPherron said. She and her col
leagues describe the mice in
Thursday’s issue of Nature, a British
scientific journal.
Though they seem stronger than
their peers, the supermice are gentle
giants. “When I poke them they don’t
run away as fast as a normal mouse,”
McPherron said Tuesday. “They don’t
seem to be bothered by it.”
Aside from their musculature, the
mice are physically identical to their
scrawnier kin.
The Hopkins scientists created the
burly beasts by knocking out the gene
for a growth factor they discovered.
Growth factors are proteins that either
stimulate or suppress the growth and
division of certain cell types, such as
bone or nerve — or muscle.
It turns out the growth factor the
Hopkins researchers found, myostatin,
o
B: \\ mmm
Matt Haney/DN
inhibits muscle growth. The research
ers found that out as soon as they saw
the mice they had bred without the
gene.
The result — totally buff. And
promising.
Drugs could be developed that
block the action of myostatin, for ex
ample. Those drugs might counteract
some of the muscle wasting that oc
curs in diseases such as muscular dys
trophy and cachexia, a muscular de
terioration that accompanies AIDS
and some forms of cancer.
There’s also the possibility that
farmers could breed overdeveloped
poultry and cattle, because the re
searchers have found a corresponding
gene in chickens and cows. Not only
would those animals produce really
impressive cuts of meat, but it would
be lean meat because eliminating
myostatin affects only muscle. It does
not increase fat production.
“We could end up with chickens
with two to three times the amount of
meat,” Lee said.
It’s a long road to reaping the ben
efits of myostatin, however. And a
long shot, too.
The researchers still haven’t
shown that human§ and other animals
also have the mouse myostatin.
Deal to end Ifexas separatist standoff falls apart
FORT DAVIS, Texas — The leader of the holed-up Texas seces
sionists broke off negotiations just when it seemed a surrender was in
sight, a state official said Wednesday as the standoff in the mountains
reached its fourth day.
Meanwhile, seven men carrying Republic of Texas membership cards
and a variety of weapons were arrested as they apparently headed to
Fort Davis to join the armed standoff. And a sheriff said he thought
more members of the secessionist group were on their way.
An agreement with the Republic of Texas to end the siege had been
drafted Tuesday night, but no final deal was signed. As of midday
Wednesday, nothing had been heard from Richard McLaren, leader of
the secessionist group.
Netanyahu calls for accelerated peace talks
JERUSALEM—Amid reports of more government plans for con
struction on land claimed by the Palestinians, Prime Minister Ben
jamin Netanyahu offered again Wednesday to speed up Israeli-Pales
tinian peace talks.
Netanyahu wants to replace the step-by-step process outlined in 1993
Oslo accords with a one-time summit to address all outstanding issues,
including the tinderbox issue of Jerusalem. Palestinians want part of
the city as a capital, but Israel does not want to give up any of it.
Herman wins confirmation as labor secretary
WASHINGTON — After four months of political roadblocks and
questions about her professional conduct, Alexis Herman won Senate
confirmation to be labor secretary Wednesday.
Republicans removed a hold on the nomination after President
Clinton agreed to drop plans to issue an executive order telling federal
agencies to consider awarding construction contracts to unionized com
panies.
Iran says German, Danish ambassadors not welcome
TEHRAN, Iran — Iran said Wednesday that German and Danish
ambassadors were not welcome back in Tehran and ruled out a quick
return of its envoys to Europe in retaliation for European Union sanc
tions.
Iran’s supreme leader, Ayatollah Ali Khamenei, said Europeans had
no moral standing to criticize his country’s policies. s
“Over the past hundred years, these Europeans were responsible for
two world wars that were fiill of destruction,” he said. “And these same
gentlemen who passed judgment against us, their countries were the
colonizers of tens of countries.”
The crisis between Iran and Western European countries was sparked
by a German court decision April 10 concluding that Iran’s leaders
had ordered the killings of four exiled Iranian dissidents in Berlin. All
15 EU nations except Greece withdrew ambassadors from Tehran in
protest.
Republicans trying once again to ban flag burning
WASHINGTON — That old ‘Don’t tread on me’ feeling is back
on Capitol Hill, where Republicans are hoping the 105th Congress will
pass a flag-burning amendment after years of failures.
“This issue strikes at the very heart of what is wrong in America
today,” amendment supporter Rep. John Shimkus, R-Ill., told the House
Judiciary Committee panel on the Constitution. “As a nation, we are
losing the ability to declare what is good and what is bad.... If a gov
ernment cannot declare what is right and wrong, how can it expect its
citizenry to do the same?”
Chelsea Clinton picks Stanford University
WASHINGTON — Ending months of speculation and rumor,
Chelsea Clinton chose Stanford University as her next home, putting
3,000 miles between her and the iron gates on Pennsylvania Avenue.
“Planes run out there and phones work out there. E-mail works out
there, so we’ll be all right,” President Clinton sighed.
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