Poem praises McVeigh
Buffalo FBI not worried about authors, threat within text
Denise Marmo
Niagara Gazette
LOCKPORT - They"re few, but they are out there.
Several letters sent recently to the Union-Sun & Journal including a flyer received Friday from a group called the "Erulian Brotherhood" - show that Oklahoma City bomber Timothy McVeigh has support from some people for both his anti-government sentiments and his violent action.
McVeigh, convicted of killing 168 people when he destroyed the Alfred P. Murrah Federal Building on April 19, 1995, awaits a June 11 execution at the federal prison in Terre Haute, Ind. Prior to the bombing, Pendleton native McVeigh and his sister, Jennifer, used the US&J"s opinion page to promote their views and criticize the government for its actions, including the 1993 siege of the Branch Davidian compound in Waco, Texas.
The photocopied Erulian Brotherhood flyer, with a postmark from Pocatello, Idaho, contains an ode titled, "Hail Tim McVeigh!" and is illustrated with a drawing of a fully masked man holding an automatic assault weapon. A tag line, "They may kill the Revolutionary but not the Revolution," runs across the bottom of the document.
Paul Moskal, a special agent based in the FBI"s Buffalo office, said the group likely poses little threat. After seeing a copy of the flyer, Moskal said the FBI "wouldn"t have a professional interest" in it.
"For the most part, unless someone makes an overt threat against a particular individual or building or an institution of some sort, people of this country have the right to express themselves, whether it"s a popularly held belief or not," Moskal said. "The only time the FBI would become involved is if somebody is threatened, or a threat to property or people. It doesn"t seem to be the case here."
Moskal said he didn"t want to "broadbrush" people in a geographic area, but he wasn"t surprised that the flyer came from Idaho. He said the Rocky Mountain state has a stronghold of groups that embrace anti-government philosophy.
"In Western New York, in the East generally, the militia movement is not a strong one," he said. "The further west you go, the greater number of people (there are) who espouse that philosophy."
The only other time the Erulian Brotherhood surfaced was at the time of McVeigh"s conviction in U.S. District Court in Denver in June 1997.
According to the Southern Poverty Law Center, the Erulian Brotherhood handed out "Hail McVeigh" flyers in several locations at that time, then disappeared. The center, based in Montgomery, Ala., works to track and combat hate groups and maintains a computer database on militia activity.
Spokesman Mark Potok said the people behind the Erulian Brotherhood have never been identified. The name, he said, is a reference to a god of Norse mythology popular among white supremacists.
"The `hail McVeigh" set on the radical right set is not very large," said Potok, a former USA Today reporter who covered the McVeigh trial and is now the editor of the center"s publication, "Intelligence Review." "There"s just a ",small number, on the very hard, far right."
Only two other militia groups, one based in California and another in Pennsylvania, have proclaimed McVeigh a; hero, according to the center"s records. Most groups in what Potok called a dwindling militia movement have distanced themselves tom the bomber.
"The movement from which McVeigh came is essentially fading away," Potok said.
In 1996, militia activity peaked with 858 known groups, Potok said. That growth was in part due to McVeigh, Potok said, because militia groups blamed the blast on the government, claiming the tragedy was a ploy to push the American public to accept strong laws curtailing freedom.
"It grew spectacularly right after the bombing," Potok said. "Oklahoma City became another Waco."
By 2000, there were only 194 militia groups active, according to the center"s database. Potok attributed the decline to the absence of a United Nations or new world order takeover of the United States, as many groups predicted, and the lack of a global apocalypse following the Y2K computer crisis.
"They got tired of waiting for the revolution that never dame," Potok said. "Many, many people in the movement felt betrayed."
Potok said he doesn"t expect violence from the Erulian Brotherhood or any other militia group tied to the McVeigh execution.
Closer to home, two proMcVeigh letters were sent by fax to the newspaper from Ed Sanfilippo of Chenango Forks, a Binghamton suburb. The first refers to Waco, saying, ".`The hand of the government at Waco was heavy," and that the government "used tanks against its own people."
"No one in government was
held accountable," the letter states. "Justice could not be gotten through the legal system in America where lawyers, judges and juries have forgotten what fairness is.
"There was and is only one viable option left in America to right the wrongs of government and Timothy McVeigh was the only one man enough to attempt it," the letter continues. "If his killing of the innocent is repugnant, then what can be said of all the American pilots who killed over 3 million civilians, in the last 60 years and received medals for it?"
When contacted by phone, Sanfilippo said he doesn"t believe McVeigh should be executed for his actions, but agreed that he should be punished. Sanfilippo said McVeigh"s actions mirror the U.S. military policy.
"We"ve been dealing it out to everybody - the Japanese, Germans, North Koreans, Iraqis, Sudanese," he said. "But when it happens here, suddenly it becomes evil."
Sanfilippo did criticize McVeigh"s "crude" use of bombs and the death of innocent people.
"But somebody should pay the price for decisions made in the past," he said. "There"s no denying that this is the way of the world.
"He struck out where he could."
McVeigh hailed
This is the text from a flyer received by
the Lockport Union Sun & Journal on Friday.
Once-there was a land, of riches untold,
Hail Tim McVeigh!The rulers of which, became corrupt and cold,
Hail Tim McVeigh!Prisons and death, to all who resist,
Hail Tim McVeigh!Ruby Ridge and Waco, can"t go on like this,
Hail Tim McVeigh!Out of many millions, one Giant came forth,
Hail Tim McVeigh!He punished the villains, just like he was taught,
Hail Tim McVeigh!They demanded his blood, and life so dear,
Hail Tim McVeigh!Whet we must finish, is abundantly dear,
Hail Tim McVeigh!
ERULIAN BROTHERHOOD
They may kill the Revolutionary but not the Revolution
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