Date: Mon, 14 Feb 1994 20:31:45 -0600 (CST) From: "William W. Hughes" <[w--g--s] at [lonestar.utsa.edu]> Subject: Branch Davidian Trial Update - Wednesday, 2 Feb 94 Branch Davidian Trial Update - Wednesday, 2 Feb 94 [transcribed] Page 1A JURY HEARS ABOUT RAID, SUICIDE PLAN [Photo caption - "British Vice Consul David Hook escorts Victorine Hollingsworth into the courthouse Tuesday. She said two defendants claimed they 'got one' during the Feb. 28 gunbattle." Photo description - Hollingsworth, walking with a cane, is holding the arm of Cook. Both are dressed very conservatively.] By Diana R. Fuentes Express-News Staff Writer A Branch Davidian who was at the sect's home during the failed raid Feb. 28 testified Tuesday she heard two of the defendants claim they had "got one" during the gunbattle with federal agents. Victorine Hollingsworth, 59, also testified a mass suicide was planned and that the other three black Branch Davidian women wanted her to join them so they could "go home to Mother together" by means of a grenade. "Mother," Hollingsworth believes, is a female deity. Hollingsworth, a British citizen who uses a cane, told the jury there was no conspiracy to murder law enforcement officers and that the group didn't know about the impending raid. Eleven people are on trial in federal court, charged with conspiring to and aiding and abetting the murder of four federal agents who died Feb. 28, when the U.S. Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco and Firearms tried to raid the Branch Davidian compound to serve arrest and search warrants. Hollingsworth identified Brad Branch and Livingstone Fagan -- whom she said she loved and considered a son -- as the ones she heard say they "got one," which prosecutors believe refers to shooting an agent. She identified Clive Doyle and Kevin Whitecliff, saying they were armed and standing guard duty in the church during the ensuing siege. Hollingsworth testified that she heard Koresh and Fagan talk- ing after the gunbattle, emphasizing that the only reason she told authorities about the conversation was because she was angry with Koresh. "He (Koresh) said, 'I heard that you and Steve got one,' and Mr. Livingstone Fagan's response was, 'He nearly got me, but I got him first.' Mr. Koresh said, 'Where did you get him?' and Mr. Fagan says, 'I got him in the stomach... and I saw them dragging him off,'" Hollingsworth testified. The witness testified that she and the other women were re- turning to their rooms the morning of Feb. 28 when they heard gunfire, which prompted then to lie down in a second-story hallway. Minutes later, she said, Branch came into the area with a gun, telling them to "stay down." Asked whether he said anything, Hollingsworth first said he was yelling: "There were women and children here." Then she added, "I hear Mr. Branch say, 'He nearly got me' and 'I got one,' something like that... but I really couldn't tell what he means." Hollingsworth said Feb. 28 was a "very frightening, scary morning," but that she felt less afraid when Koresh began negotiat- ing with the authorities. Several days into the siege, she testified, Koresh said he had made a deal that if the FBI sent him a stretcher he would surrender with his followers. "At first, it did look like the truth, but it wasn't," she said of Koresh's deal, going on to say what really was supposed to happen. "People were planning to commit... a mass suicide." Koresh would be dead, she said. She saw one of his lieutenants with a grenade -- she didn't know what it was at the time -- strapped to his waist, and he was supposed to go out with Koresh's body. "When David (went) out, it would have been the end... because David was teaching us it was the end of the world," she said, adding that when Koresh went out, he expected a "shootout" and that his followers would "blow the place up." Hollingsworth said Doris Fagan, wife of defendant Livingstone Fagan, asked her to join the black women where they were standing. Another sect member brought them "a green thing," which she said she found out later was a hand grenade. "Annette (Richards) said, 'Vicky, this will be a quick death,'" Hollingsworth testified. "I said to her I want to be put to sleep. "I didn't mean the injection. I believe I have a heavenly Mother and a heavenly Father, and I was praying to them, asking them if they would put me to sleep. "I know if I commit suicide, I wouldn't have a place in God's kingdom." Everyone was praying loudly as Koresh was getting ready to leave by stretcher, she said, but he suddenly called it all off. He later said he had a vision from God the God had more work for him to do, she said. Hollingsworth testified that she stopped believing in Koresh when she was in the hospital -- she was taken there for a heart condition after she left the compound March 21 -- and saw Living- stone Fagan in shackles and chains on TV news shows. "It came to my mind how our mother Queen Victoria abolished slavery," she said. "I became very, very bitter and very angry with Mr. David Koresh for the things that he brought us. "When Mr. Koresh sent me out (of Mount Carmel) when I was ill, I asked him if I could take my suitcase with my clothes. Mr. Koresh says to me that I'm going to have new clothes. After a few days, I realize the new clothes that Mr. Koresh meant was jail clothes. "I didn't believe anymore that Mr. David Koresh was a prophet. I believe he was a false prophet. "He brainwashed us all," she said, adding that he was so strong that "Livingstone Fagan agreed to give Mr. Koresh his wife -- his wife and even his children. "There were times that I would see Mr. Fagan sit down and he would cry." Hollingsworth said "no" each time when she was asked whether she hated or disliked police officers, whether she planned or conspired to kill officers and whether she trained with weapons. Asked whether the group knew the agents were coming, she replied: "We didn't know anything like that until it happened." ========================= ADMINISTRIVIA ========================= Delay - My monitor blew up last week; all vertical control circuits fried. I have no access to other equipment, so I had to wait until I could get my system repaired. It's fixed now -- hasn't looked this good in years. This Update is the first of about eight or ten that will be posted in succession over the next couple of days. KNOWN DISTRIBUTIONS USENET: talk.politics.guns, alt.politics.org.batf, alt.conspiracy, alt.politics.usa.misc & alt.politics.libertarian - author USENET: info.firearms.politics/mailing list Firearms Politics ([firearms politics] at [ns1.rutgers.edu]) - author Other networks - BIX: tojerry/inquest - Paul L. Schauble ([p l s] at [shell.portal.com]) FIDONET: DEBATE - Terry Goodman ([terry goodman] at [support.com] / Terry Goodman 1:102/837) FIDONET: CONTROVERSY - Terry Goodman FIDONET: LEGAL (non-backbone) - Lester Garrett (1:125/101) FIDONET: SMOKER (non-backbone) - Bill Bauer (1:147/32) Prodigy: Politics-Other, Subject; A.T.F. Waco - Jim Bell SmartNet: POLIPHIL - Lester Garrett (FIDO 1:125/101) The Patrick Henry League - a gun rights BBS network: - Paul L. Schauble Please feel free to forward these updates to any other groups, conferences and networks that you feel may be interested. KNOWN ARCHIVES The Powder Keg BBS, 707-427-1310, 14.4, 24H7D, directory WACO (SurvNet/PRNet 176:100/24, sysop Peter Nesbitt) The Soapbox BBS. 919-387-1152, 14.4, 24H7D, file area BATF (FIDO 1:151/142, sysop Stacy Powers [[p--we--s] at [rock.concert.net]]) Full access on first call, supports FREQ, FREQ FILES to get a list of all available files Anonymous ftp teetot.acusd.edu in directory /pub/Beelzebub/Politics/The_Tax_Cops/Waco/Trial service provided by Jerry Stratton ([j--r--y] at [teetot.acusd.edu]) If anybody else is archiving these updates, and/or making them available for ftp, gopher, or other access, please let me know and I will include that information in further Administrivia sections. =-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-= This summary of the Branch Davidian trial is based on or tran- scribed from articles published in the San Antonio Express-News. The original articles, and any sections quoted herein are copy- righted by the Express-News. The remainder of the summary is copy- right 1994 by William W. Hughes. Copying of these summaries, either by hardcopy or electronic means, is authorized and encouraged, as long as this notice remains attached and intact. "I do not work for or represent the San Antonio Express-News" =-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-= [w--g--s] at [lonestar.utsa.edu] (William Hughes) | In memory of 85 un-charged, UTSA doesn't agree with me. They're wrong. | un-convicted victims of the U.S. St. Dismas' Infirmary for the Incurably | government in Waco, Texas - Informed [_Synners_, Pat Cadigan] | including over 20 children.