http://cnn.netscape.cnn.com/news/sto...20040526SMO109
MCALESTER, Okla. (Reuters) - Oklahoma City bombing conspirator Terry Nichols was found guilty on Wednesday of all 161 counts of murder for his part in the April 19, 1995, bombing of the Alfred P. Murrah Federal building.
The jury in the Oklahoma state district court must now decide whether Nichols, 49, will receive the death penalty or life in prison. He is already is serving a life sentence for a conviction in federal court in the deaths of eight federal officials in the blast.
The verdict was delivered about five hours after the six men and six women on the jury began deliberations in the two month-long trial. Prosecutors said Nichols was more responsible for the blast than the actual bomber, Timothy McVeigh, who was executed in 2001 for driving a truck containing a fertilizer and fuel bomb to the front door of the building and detonating it.
The defense team argued Nichols, was a patsy for McVeigh and a wider conspiracy behind the bombing that killed 168 people. Closing arguments ended late Tuesday and Judge Steven Taylor turned the case over to the jury. About 250 witnesses testified.
A total of 168 people died in the bombing. The 161 first-degree murder counts against Nichols represent 160 people killed in the blast who were not federal agents and the fetus of a pregnant woman who died in the explosion.
Prosecutors said Nichols and McVeigh were retaliating against the U.S. government for the federal raid on the compound of the Branch Davidian religious sect, near Waco, Texas, in which about 80 people died, two years to the day before the Oklahoma City bombing.
Nichols was at home in Kansas at the time of the blast.
05/26/04 16:34