Legal Commentary

Waco

By David Kopel

With President Clinton wagging his finger at the Tea Party movement and claiming that the movement is inciting violence, it is worthwhile to remember the role the Clinton administration in perpetrating and covering up numerous violent and other crimes at Waco. The subject is treated at length in my book, co-authored with Paul Blackman, No More Wacos: What?s Wrong with Federal Law Enforcement and How to Fix It. This page provides a summary of the book, a free copy of the first chapter, two law review articles (on the warrant, and on police militarization), several shorter articles, and videos of speeches regarding Waco.

Just to be clear to the trolls who comment without reading: The book describes the Branch Davidian false prophet Vernon Wayne Howell (a/k/a David Koresh) as a predatory sociopath and a criminal. And of course nothing in the book attempts to justify that other sociopath Timothy McVeigh. Nor does the book claim that federal agents deliberately started the fatal fire, although it does point out that before the fire began, at least some of the victims had already been killed by the CS chemical warfare bombardment and tank attack.

Full post as published by The Volokh Conspiracy on April 20, 2010 (boomark / email).