Embers of Doubt Remain About Cause of Waco Blaze : Tragedy: U.S. concluded Davidians started fire. But discrepancies fuel speculation about government’s role.

WASHINGTON — The blackened ruins of the Branch Davidian complex near Waco, Tex., were still smoldering on April 19, 1993, when federal authorities declared that David Koresh and his followers bore the entire responsibility for the inferno that killed 76 sect members and children--a position the Justice Department maintains today.

“The setting of the fire by individuals inside the compound is beyond question,” Atty. Gen. Janet Reno told a law enforcement group recently.

Yet a two-month investigation by The Times involving more than 75 interviews and an examination of confidential documents shows that the government’s role in--and explanation of--the deadly fire is murkier and more open to criticism than its categorical assertions suggest. Questions about the government’s account of the tragic blaze are expected to receive prominent scrutiny during congressional hearings that begin Wednesday.

On the government’s side, no credible evidence has come to light supporting the widely stated claims of conspiracy theorists that the FBI intentionally ignited the flames.

At the same time, serious discrepancies, misstatements and exaggerations exist in the government’s version of what happened in the last days of the siege and the final assault.

For example, although official statements assert that at least three federal agents observed Davidians setting fires, no agents so far have acknowledged on the record that they saw such activities. Moreover, although the FBI assured Reno that a tear gas assault would not cause a fire, agents saturated the complex with flammable chemicals that were capable of contributing to the blaze.

The FBI also failed to call for any kind of firefighting response until after the building was engulfed in flames, even though it knew that fires were a strong possibility if the compound were stormed.

“Why didn’t they take some kind of action to prevent” a fire? asked Paul C. Gray, a Houston fire official who led the arson team that investigated the blaze. “That’s a very legitimate question. It certainly is a question that needs some kind of explanation.”

Gray, who had close ties to the federal agency that launched the initial, aborted raid on the Davidians, wrote the arson report that supported the government’s assertions. The team concluded that three separate blazes were set inside the complex within minutes of each other. But arson experts interviewed by The Times called the analysis incomplete and lacking in professional standards.

Supportive of the government’s account of the tragedy as it was, the arson investigation did determine that the inferno was “enhanced” by the FBI’s decision to punch numerous gaping holes in the walls of the Davidian complex.

Top Justice Department officials, led by Reno, have refused to accept any blame for the series of events that led to the deaths of 57 adults, including two pregnant women, and 19 children. The FBI declined to respond to questions submitted in writing for this article.

While the precise origin of the fire may never be known--and promises to be debated for decades, regardless of the evidence--the congressional hearings will seek to assess how the conflagration started and search for lessons that could help prevent a similar outcome in the future.

FBI Assault

The episode now so familiar to Americans that it is referred to simply as “Waco” began on the morning of Feb. 28, 1993. Agents of the Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco and Firearms carried out a raid at the Branch Davidians’ sprawling compound. The ATF had evidence that the occupants were stockpiling arms, but, owing to careless planning, the agency lost the element of surprise and a gun battle ensued. Six Davidians and four federal agents died and 15 agents were wounded.

For 51 days, the FBI tried to negotiate the surrender of Koresh and the followers who remained inside. At last, saying they were concerned about the safety of the Davidians’ children, the FBI devised a plan to force the sect members out with tear gas.

The operation began on April 19--a Monday--at 6:02 a.m. When the Davidians responded with gunfire, the FBI escalated the attack, according to the Justice Department’s four-volume report on Waco. For six more hours, until about noon, agents in Army tanks flooded the residence with tear gas and rammed the wooden structure, eventually knocking down walls.

At 12:07 p.m., flames were spotted in a front, second-floor corner of the building. Moments later, a second fire broke out in the first-floor dining room, followed by a third in the ground-floor chapel. At the same time, a possible fourth fire began in the gymnasium at the rear of the building. Within four minutes, flames engulfed the entire complex.

In less than an hour, the rambling four-story structure burned to the ground as millions of stunned Americans watched on television.

Later that afternoon, top FBI and Justice officials announced they had clear evidence that Koresh told his followers to light the fires as part of a suicide pact. The FBI said that at least three agents had seen Davidians start the fires and that listening devices had recorded the voices of Davidians as they carried out the act.

The unidentified sect members were quoted as saying, “You got to put enough fuel in there” and “Have you poured it yet?” Several Davidians who escaped the burning building also reportedly told authorities they heard unidentified voices inside the complex directing the setting of fires.

Items of clothing and shoes recovered from five of the nine surviving Davidians contained kerosene, camp stove fuel and other ignitable liquids, leading arson investigators to conclude that people inside the compound had spread the fuels deliberately. Indeed, after viewing all of the evidence, government officials had little doubt that the Davidians alone were to blame for the blaze.

To drive home the point, President Clinton said at a news conference the following day: “Mr. Koresh’s response to the demands for his surrender by federal agents was to destroy himself and murder the children who were his captives, as well as all the other people who were there and did not survive.”

Who’s to Blame

A close examination of the evidence, however, raises questions about the government’s contention that the Davidians were solely responsible for the fires.

The official Justice Department report lists one agent--not three as initially announced--as having seen the Davidians light the fire. The FBI has neither disclosed the identities of other witnesses nor furnished accounts of their observations. Only Special Agent John W. Morrison was called during the Davidians’ murder trial last year to testify about arson activity because he was considered the government’s best eyewitness, prosecutors said.

Morrison testified that, after the front door of the Davidian complex had been knocked down, he was able to observe a Davidian “making a motion like he’s washing his hands, and then I see a fire come right from where his hands are.” He viewed the activity through high-powered binoculars from a distance of more than 300 yards.

But Morrison acknowledged in court that his view was partially obstructed and he could not actually see the hands of the person. When asked if the person could have been trying to put out a fire, Morrison replied, “I don’t know what he was doing.”

In addition, none of the fires were started near the front entrance Morrison was watching, according to the government arson report. Doubts also have been raised about incriminating statements attributed to survivors. Houston attorney Jack Zimmerman met individually with four Davidians at the McLennan County Jail, where they were isolated from one another. What he gleaned from the jailhouse interviews made Zimmerman suspicious of the government’s account.

All four survivors told him there was no suicide pact and no plan to set fires, Zimmerman said. Davidian Renos Avraam gave Zimmerman a different version than the one federal agents attributed to him. Instead of “the fire’s been lit,” Avraam said he heard someone yell, “There’s a fire started!” at the time an FBI tank hit the building.

No arson charges were filed against any of the survivors, despite the conclusion of the government task force that they set the fire. Although Justice officials could not prove who lit the match, they said they suspected the fires were started by Koresh and others who died in the complex.

Furthermore, the recordings of Davidians as they purportedly spread the fuels were made by FBI listening devices several hours before the fires began. The tapes failed to convince the Davidian trial jury that sect members were responsible.

“I came away from the trial itself with no decision as to how the fire started or who started it,” said Sarah Bain, a San Antonio schoolteacher who was on the jury that acquitted Davidians on the most serious charges.

Fire Risks

Before they attacked the Davidian residence, federal agents were aware of the possibility of fire. They had cut off electricity to the building for five weeks, leaving the Davidians to rely on propane, lighter fluid and other fuels for cooking, heating and lighting.

The flammable material in such a poorly constructed building created a firetrap.

During FBI negotiations, Koresh had made references to biblical passages that warned of the onset of fire. And the day before the raid, the Davidians hung out a sign that read, “Flames Await.”

There is little doubt the FBI planners anticipated that the compound could go up in flames. They alerted a hospital burn unit in Dallas on the day of the attack and flew over the site in an airplane equipped with an infrared camera that detects heat sources in the event of fire. The infrared tape provided the government’s arson team with the strongest evidence that three fires were set simultaneously.

Many Davidian survivors claimed that the fires started when government tanks crashed through walls and windows, knocking over lighted lanterns. Still photographs and the infrared video show tanks making contact with a front corner section of the building and the rear gymnasium area minutes before fires were detected in those locations.

The government dismissed the possibility that its breaching operation played any role in the development of the fire, in part because the flames were not detected by the infrared video camera until a couple of minutes after the tanks had left the area.

One explanation offered by some chemists and other specialists who have studied the spread of the fire suggests that the inferno was stoked by the massive amount of tear gas pumped into the building. The Justice Department rejected this theory on the grounds that the tear gas canisters and spray used at Waco were non-pyrotechnic and difficult to ignite.

Army tanks operated by FBI agents fired between 300 and 450 projectiles, called ferret rounds, filled with tear gas solution into the Davidian complex. The chemical, known as CS, is referred to as “super tear gas” and considered so potent that Army manuals recommend it only be used outdoors as a riot control agent. Safety tests by the manufacturer assumed that only several rounds would be needed at one time to force occupants from a confined area.

“We never considered . . . that they might shoot 15 or 20 in one small room, let alone 300 in one morning,” said Rex Applegate, an expert on riot control agents who invented the ferret round. Applegate, a director of the National Rifle Assn., said the CS gas could not have ignited without a flame source. That is, the gas would not catch fire spontaneously, but it would burn if ignited. And if extremely high concentrations existed inside the building, they could have helped fuel the inferno.

Before getting approval to introduce CS gas into the complex, the FBI assured Reno that the chemical would not cause a fire. CS will ignite at temperatures exceeding 1,200 degrees Fahrenheit, according to officials at the U.S. Army Chemical and Biological Defense Command. These Army experts said the flammability level is greatly affected by other chemicals mixed with it.

The carrying agent for CS at Waco was methylene chloride. Dow Chemical Corp., the maker of methylene chloride, cautions firefighters that the agent “forms flammable vapor-air mixtures.” A health and safety guide published by the World Health Organization warns: “Do not use methylene chloride in the vicinity of a fire.”

Part of the difficulty in determining whether methylene chloride contributed to the fire is the lack of information about the volume and concentration levels of chemicals used by the FBI. So far, federal authorities have not disclosed this information.

George F. Uhlig, a retired Air Force lieutenant colonel and professor of chemistry at Eastern Utah Junior College, is expected to testify at the hearings that high winds and heavy doses of CS made fire conditions “excellent.”

James Quintiere, a University of Maryland fire scientist who was hired by the government to research the issue, said he doubts the gassing operation had any impact on the fire. But Quintiere said the flammability of the chemicals used at Waco require further study before they can be eliminated as a contributor.

Arson Investigation

On the day following the fire, Clinton said the government would undertake a “vigorous and thorough investigation” to explain the events at Waco.

Normally, the investigation of a major fire of suspicious origin would be assigned to the ATF’s National Response Team. Because the Waco encounter began with the ATF raid, the Administration went outside the federal government and used an “independent” team assembled by the Texas Rangers, according to the Justice report.

But the Texas police agency was never consulted, according to Capt. David Byrnes, the Rangers task force commander at Waco. “Nobody in the Rangers participated in selecting” the arson team, Byrnes said. “I can say that without any qualification.”

Instead, the head of the Waco arson task force was selected by Donnie A. Carter, the special agent in charge of the ATF office in Houston. Carter said he was confident that Gray, assistant chief investigator for the Houston Fire Department’s arson bureau, would conduct a “fair and honest” investigation.

Gray was no stranger to the ATF. For most of the 1980s, he worked out of the agency’s Houston office on a joint task force and carried a business card identifying him as an ATF agent. He taught ATF personnel at instructional courses, and his wife is employed as an ATF secretary in Houston. Gray and his wife attended the funeral of Steve Willis, one of the four ATF agents slain in the initial raid.

Along with investigators from fire departments in Los Angeles, San Francisco and Allegheny County, Pa., Gray concluded that three separate fires had been intentionally set inside the compound. The team supported the Justice Department’s contentions that the fire was neither caused by a tank rupturing a flammable container nor spread by chemicals used in the tear gas operation.

However, the arson team assessed a different form of tear gas--called CN--than the chemical used at Waco by the FBI. While the flammability of the two chemicals is not significantly different, CN is considered less lethal than CS and is no longer used by most law enforcement agencies. Gray admitted in an interview that the arson report erred in analyzing the wrong tear gas.

The Times sent the report to four arson experts representing local law enforcement and private industry. All of the experts had contributed to writing the “Guide for Fire and Explosion Investigations” by the National Fire Protection Assn. After scrutinizing the Waco report, each of the four experts concluded independently that it was poorly researched and failed to follow widely accepted principles of arson investigation.

These experts noted that the 10-page report by the arson team did not approach the kind of thorough investigation expected in major arson cases. The report, they found, contained no hard data to support its findings, no photos or sketches of the structure, no independent interviews of witnesses and no effort to calculate the concentration levels of chemicals injected into the building.

“This report doesn’t establish anything,” said Daniel L. Churchward, a forensic engineer and former firefighter who runs a Ft. Wayne, Ind., firm that investigates major fires.

Tactics Questioned

One section of the arson report, titled “Contributory Factors,” raises questions about whether two tactical decisions by the government could have advanced the spread of the fire: the punching of holes in the skin of the building and the barring of firefighting equipment at the scene until after the fire started.

The initial plan approved by Reno called for the FBI to insert tear gas gradually over a 48-hour period before beginning to batter the structure with tanks. But about 11 a.m.--five hours into the operation--FBI tanks began punching holes in the front of the building and demolishing the rear gymnasium area. This changing of the plan has never been explained.

Some evidence suggests the tank activity could have closed off a potential escape route for Davidians. A path to a buried bus that would have provided a safe underground bunker was blocked by falling materials, Gray said in an interview.

“There was debris covering that exit, but we weren’t sure that the debris was shoved in before the fire happened or after it was over,” he said.

The absence of fire emergency crews at the scene, critics say, illustrates the government’s negligence in planning the final assault. The Justice Department report reveals that the FBI rejected a proposal to move firefighters into the area, saying they feared Davidians would shoot at them.

The FBI refused an offer from Flamechek International, a Santa Paula, Calif., company, to use Czech armored, remote-control tanks that would allow firefighters to extinguish flames while being protected from gunfire, said Jan Bezucha, the firm’s marketing director.

And, just as the government outfitted Army combat vehicles with special equipment to spray tear gas, the same modifications could have been made for cannons to shoot water, experts say.

“I can’t explain why there weren’t any other precautions taken,” Gray said.

(BEGIN TEXT OF INFOBOX / INFOGRAPHIC)

The Waco Fires

More than two years after the Waco tragedy, the origin of the fires remain controversial. The government found that Davidians deliberately set three separate fires. An independent fire scientist found a fourth fire. Davidian survivors claim FBI tanks overturned lighted lanterns. Here, according to the government’s account and private analysis of FBI videotapes, is the sequence of events:

FIRE ONE: 12:06:18 Last tank ram; 12:07:41 fire detected on second floor, south west corner.

FIRE TWO: 12:08:18 Fire detected first floor dining room.

FIRE THREE: 12:09:45 Fire detected in first floor chapel.

FIRE FOUR: 12:08:31 Possible heat plume detected near gym. 12:09:07 Tank departs after demolsing gym. 12:10:22 Fire detected in gym. 12:11 Fire is rapidly engulfing entire building. 12:13 FBI calls local Fire Department.

12:04 FBI claims Davidians started fire in front hallway. Arson investigators found no fire began here.

Sources: Waco Tribune-Herald, Justice Department report on Waco.

Researched by D’JAMILA SALEM / Los Angeles Times