Oklahoma City Bombing and Life Study Theory - Essay Example

The Oklahoma City Bombing Abstract: A homemade bomb aimed at the federal building’s second floor daycare center destroyed the Alfred P. Murrah Federal Building, killing 167 people and crumbling nine stories. Seeking to address this horrific event and situate it within a larger narrative, of Timothy McVeigh’s life will be explored in this analysis of the most destructive incident of homegrown terrorism in American history. INTRODUCTION The Oklahoma City Bombing was chosen as the subject of this analysis because of a personal interest in the event as well as the penalty phase of the crime, namely the death penalty. On April 19, 1995, the Alfred P. Murrah Federal Building was blown up and 167 people were killed. This building was blown up by 4,800 pounds of explosives and all 50 of those standing outside of the building were hit with more than 37 tons of explosives. Although many people survived, those who did lost eyes, arms, legs and fingers after they crawled and walked away from the disaster. In the aftermath of this calamity, police officers, firemen, rescue units and civilians from all over the United States came and helped rescue people from the rubble. The victims of the attack ranged in age from four months to seventy-three years old. More than two weeks after the explosion, bodies continued to be pulled out of the rubble. In addition to injuries sustained as a result of impact, many more injuries were caused by the shower of falling glass and debris, a direct effect of the blast’s sheering effects on the north face of the Alfred P. Murrah Federal Building. The blast penetrated deep into the complex, catastrophically damaging blowing away about a third of the Building. In addition to completely destroying the Murray complex, nearby buildings felt the ramifications of the blast and several buildings, including the Water Resource Board building, the Athenaeum and The Journal Record building were destroyed and/or irrevocably damaged by the explosion. Accordingly, the force of the blast was so powerful that it could be felt throughout the entire Oklahoma City downtown core. At the scene, investigators searched for clues to find out who had done this and specifically, how this heinous act had been carried out. Initial speculation pointed the finger at Arab or Middle Eastern terrorists, and later at American militia groups. How were the true culprits to this crime found out? Curiously, a bank machine recorded a video in which a yellow Ryder truck was parked across the street of the Alfred P. Murrah Federal Building before the bombing took place. After the explosion and two blocks away from ground zero, a piece of metal and a truck axle displaying a vehicle identification were identified as belonging to a Ryder truck from Kansas. In addition, the staff where the suspect Ryder truck was rented were able to give a composite description of the two individuals who rented the truck. Describing them white Americans, investigative forces turned their attentions to an analysis of a homegrown terrorist network. Further analysis of the blow-up van showed that ammonium nitrate had been mixed with fuel oil. A potent combination which proved deadly that fateful April morning. Hearing his name being broadcast on television, Terry Nichols walked into the local police station in Herrington, Oklahoma at the outset of the investigation. Prior to this, witnesses at the scene of the bombing had given FBI agents a description of possible suspects. While interviewing people in Junction City, Oklahoma agents spoke to the manager of the Dreamland Motel who recognized a composite sketch of a suspect named Tim McVeigh, a former guest of the Dreamland Motel. Having stayed at the Dreamland from April 14 to April 18 under his own name, Tim McVeigh arrived at the motel in a yellow Mercury and provided an address on North Van Dyke Road in Decker, Michigan when checking in. The hotel clerk remarked to the FBI that McVeigh had expressed extreme anger towards the Federal Government. Ironically enough, after feeding McVeigh's name into the National Crime Information Center, the FBI discovered that their suspect sitting quietly in the Noble County jail on a traffic and weapons charge, not far from the calamity in Perry, Oklahoma (Johnson 1993). Etiology I chose the Oklahoma City Bombing because Timothy McVeigh was executed at the United States Penitentiary, Terre Haute, Indiana. I have a personal connection because this is where I worked and I followed the case up to his execution. My personal belief is that when there is a taking of innocent human life, the individual who committed the crime must be given the death penalty, if his or her guilt is shown to be beyond a reasonable doubt. In this case, Timothy McVeigh and his co-conspirators committed a heinous crime to get back at the American government for the assault and killings at Waco, Texas two years prior. A loner and disaffected former member of the US Armed Forces, what was Timothy McVeigh’s life like prior to the attack on the Alfred P. Murrah Federal Building? Seeking to explore the life of Timothy McVeigh and draw a correlation between his early years and his murderous future, the following will explore the life and times of the most destructive homegrown terrorist in American history. Growing up in the Northeastern United States, Timothy McVeigh was born in Lockport, New York, and raised in nearby Pendleton, New York. The middle child of three and the only male child, he earned his high school diploma from Starpoint Central High School. His parents, Mildred Noreen (“Mickey”) Hill and William McVeigh, divorced when he was 10 and this may have had ramifications on the young boy. Known throughout his life as a loner, his only known affiliations were voter registration with the Republican Party when he lived in New York and a membership in the National Rifle Association (NRA) while in the military. After graduating from high school and not sure of what career path he wished to take, in May 1988 he enlisted in the U.S. Army and was decorated as a veteran of the United States Army, having served in the Gulf War, where he was awarded a Bronze Star Medal. A top scoring gunner with the 25mm cannon of the light-armored Bradley Fighting Vehicles used by the U.S. 1st Infantry Division to which he was assigned, McVeigh was a competent soldier but there was little remarkable about his experience as a soldier. Given an honorable discharge from the Army reserve in May 1992, McVeigh went on the road after the Army, worked a variety of odd and menial jobs including security guard, sold bumper stickers vendor (during the Waco siege), as well as a jack of all trades on the gun show circuit. He remained disillusioned following his tour of duty in Iraq and was forthcoming and open with his opinions about the United Nations, the federal government and possible threats to American liberty. During this period, McVeigh experimented with methamphetamines and many of his associates prior to the bombing and were involved in heavy methamphetamine use and some were even involved in its manufacture. Researchers have found that methamphetamine use is associated with paranoid ideation and this may have altered McVeigh's thinking, or even led to a pathological state of mind. This correlation, however, is pure speculation. While working at a lakeside campground near his old Army post, Timothy McVeigh constructed an ANNM explosive device arranged in the back of a rented Ryder truck. Consisting of about 5,000 pounds (2,300 kg) of ammonium nitrate (an agricultural fertilizer) and nitro methane, an explosive motor-racing fuel, the bomb represented a potent cocktail with future disastrous consequences. That fateful morning, on April 19, 1995, McVeigh drove his truck to the front of the Alfred P. Murrah Federal Building just as its offices and day-care center were opening for the day. Prosecutors said that McVeigh casually walked away from the truck after he ignited a timed fuse to trigger the explosion. Later, McVeigh wrote in prison: Do people think that government workers in Iraq are any less human than those in Oklahoma City? Do they think that Iraqis don't have families who will grieve and mourn the loss of their loved ones? Do people believe that the killing of foreigners is somehow different than the killing of Americans? (Johnson 1993). Against the wishes of his defense team, McVeigh instructed his lawyers to use a “necessity defense”, arguing that his bombing of the Murrah building was a justifiable response to the crimes of the U.S. Government at Waco, Texas, during the 51-day siege of the Branch Dravidian complex that resulted in the death of 76 Branch Davidian members (Johnson 1993). Aftermath On June 2, 1997, McVeigh was found guilty on all 11 counts of the indictment. Eleven days later, on June 13, 1997 the same jury recommended that McVeigh receive the death penalty. Importantly, the U.S. Department of Justice brought Federal charges against McVeigh for causing the deaths of the eight Federal officers leading to a possible death penalty for McVeigh; it could not bring charges against McVeigh for the remaining 160 murders in federal court because those deaths fell under the jurisdiction of the state of Oklahoma. After McVeigh's conviction and sentencing (and after the Terry Nichols trial), the state of Oklahoma did not file state charges against McVeigh for the other 160 murders since he had already been sentenced to death in the Federal trial. Naturally, the application of McVeigh's death sentence was delayed pending appeal and his appeal was taken directly to the Supreme Court of the United States, which denied his motion on March 8, 1999, leading to his impending execution (Johnson 1993). Timothy McVeigh was ultimately executed by lethal injection at 7:14 a.m. on June 11, 2001, at the U.S. Federal Penitentiary in Terre Haute, Indiana. After having dropped all of his existing appeals, and while presenting no reason for doing so, he appeared ready to face the ramifications of his actions. Executed at the age of 33 years old, I believe that there is a direct correlation between the future actions of Timothy McVeigh and his life. Brought up by a single parent and a disaffected army recruit, he joined the army and was given special training and taught special tactics to carry out his heinous crime. While his disenchanted life may have provided him with the motives to carry out the deadly assault, his career in the armed forces provided him with the tools to prepare such a murderous act. The Waco killings provided a strong motivation for his action and perhaps they should have never have happened. In fact, we will never know that if the deaths at Waco never occurred would the Alfred P. Murrah Federal Building still be standing today? (Lou and Herbeck 2001. PREDICTION AND PREVENTION The Life Theory cannot predict and or prevent an event like the Oklahoma City bombing or the World Trade center. It can however be used to study the lives of individuals into early adulthood. It has been found that both imprudent and criminal behavior can be predicted by a common characteristic: namely a lack of self-control. The general theory of crime assumes that although the individual's personality (i.e., the characteristic of self-control) remains stable through time, the relationship between self-control and crime is amenable to change Accordingly, a lack of self-control does not mean that a crime will necessarily exist but it is also important to note that self-control can be modified by opportunities and other constraints. The causal relationship between early and later deviant behavior, an important tenant of the persistent heterogeneity approach, is that the relationship between each is a reflection of an enduring personality trait – such as a lack of self-control – which remains stable over time (Laub et al. 1993; Laub et al. 1998) Within developmental perspectives on crime, there is a growing tendency in developmental criminology to subdivide offender populations and presume different causal influences at different stages of an individual’s criminal career. Although at first it may seem counterintuitive, the fundamental argument is that persistent offending and desistance—meaning the process by which an individual does not offend—can be understood as belonging within the same framework. Accordingly it can be argued that there is a life long trajectory towards criminal behavior and future antisocial behavior can be predicted early on in one’s life. (Cernkovich & Giordano 1987; Grasmick et al. 1993; Laub et al. 1998) In Crime in the Making, scholars developed a theoretical framework to explain childhood antisocial behavior, adolescent delinquency, and crime occurring in early adulthood. The general organizing principle behind this project is that crime is more likely to occur when an individual’s bond to society is strained. Accordingly, the transition to young adulthood brings new social control institutions and potential turning points in one’s life. The calamities associated with changes during the transition from youth to adulthood sometimes manifest themselves in criminal and antisocial behavior. These scholars then developed an age-graded theory to emphasize how informal social controls, which are manifested in shifting and possibly transformative ways, affect an individual as they age Laub et al. 1998; Sampson & Laub 1998; Sampson & Laub 1996; Sampson et al. 2005). Delinquents and non delinquents in the study above displayed considerable between-individual stability in crime and many problematic behaviors well into adulthood. This correlative stability held independent of age, IQ, ethnicity, and neighborhood. Indeed, delinquency and other forms of antisocial conduct in childhood were strongly related to troublesome adult behavior across a variety of experiences (e.g. crime, military offenses, economic dependence, and marital discord). The scholars found that job stability and marital attachment in adulthood were positively and significantly related to changes in adult manifestations of crime— and the stronger the adult ties to work and family, the less crime and deviance among both delinquents and non-delinquent controls. Social ties are thus important and when embedded in adult transitions (e.g., marital attachment, job stability), help explain variations in crime unaccounted for by childhood. Accordingly, the authors of this study argue that “all stages of the life course matter and that ‘turning points’ are crucial for understanding processes of adult change.” (Morsely & Thompson 1995; Grasmick et al. 1993; Laub et al. 1998; Nagin and Farrington 1992; Paternoster and Bram 1997). The data mentioned above represented the longest longitudinal study to-date and the study of male participants in criminology over an extended period of time. The following section will briefly summarize the key findings of this analysis. The research has found enormous variability in terms of offending, by age as well as by desistance. It was also found that crime declines with age even for active offenders and trajectories of desistance cannot be properly identified based upon purely childhood factors and individual difference. Whether offenders have low IQ, an aggressive temperament or early onset of antisocial behavior, desistance processes are at work even for the highest-risk and life-course persistent offenders. Childhood prognosis can be difficult and wrought with potential problems. Despite this, long term observation can lend further credence to analyses of crime and future crime prevention. While we will never be able to 100% predict or prevent crime without extensive social surveillance and the infringement of certain social rights. Despite this, we can only hope that most individuals are able to be rehabilitated after committing a crime and receiving punishment for their criminal acts (Longshore et al 1998; McCord 1991; McCord 1979; McGee 1992; Grasmick et al. 1993; Laub et al. 1998; Nagin and Farrington 1992; Paternoster and Bram 1997) RECOMMENDED CRIMINAL JUSTICE RESPONSES: We already know that Timothy McVeigh received the death Penalty. But why did Nichols get a life sentence? Is future rehabilitation a legitimate goal for Terry Nichols? A theoretical analysis of the theorists above shows that self-control appears to be a trait that exists on a continuum and it can be directly modified. Thus, self-control does not consistently predict crime and anti-social/imprudent behavior. Additionally, low self-control does not preclude the later likelihood of job or relational attachments among formerly persistent offenders. Clearly, these perspectives are capable of being linked in a side-by-side fashion through the use of the common construct of attachment. What this research also suggests is that empathy may be critical to the development of an attachment relationship (McCord 1991; Grasmick et al. 1993; McCord 1979; McGee 1992; Laub et al. 1998; Nagin and Farrington 1992). Future research must continue to investigate the role empathy plays in the process of attachment and desistance. To accomplish this, criminologists must utilize findings from sociological and psychological research on marital quality, martial satisfaction, and work satisfaction in order to better understand how these relationships can supplant a damaged attachment template through the provision of empathic understanding. This may be the key to more clearly explaining how the early experience of empathic understanding leads to secure attachment, the development of empathy, and desistance (Paternoster & Brame, 1997; Pithers 1994; Pulkkinen & Pulkkinen 1993; Raine et al. 1997). James Messerschmidt's (1993) structured action theory may be useful in explaining the relationship between violence against women, substance abuse among men, and these men's inability to receive empathy. The sequential order of parenting behaviors in absent fathers leads to poor parental attention, which then affects a father's and mother's disciplinary style. Also as expected, most of the early family variables affect later violent behavior through their effect on self-control. In order for children to have a chance at life after they mature early infant-parent attachment, and later attachment relationships, must be more carefully studied in accordance with the child's needs. A recent study found that an early absent father is positively related to insecure attachment of the infant, especially males and it can be the cause of early delinquency. They also found that males have lower levels of self-control. Thus, insecure parent-infant attachment is inversely related to self control and empathy and positively related to violent behavior across the life-course (Pulkkinen & Pulkkinen 1993; Raine et al. 1997; Laub et al. 1998). Furthermore, insecure parent-infant attachment is positively related to inadequate attention to the child. This will affect parental ability to discipline the child, which is directly related to an individual’s later self-control. Physically neglectful parents and parents who do not reward their children for good behavior, are quick to provide unreasonable and harsh punishments or to over-control their child. There is then a direct and causal relationship between an individual’s life, life cycle experiences and future anti-social and deviant behavior. CONCLUSION Although we may never stop every criminal from committing a crime, research can be still be undertaken to help understand the motives and motivations for criminal antisocial behavior. While some individuals have a mental illness and others come from families that do not care about the child, there are a variety of reasons for the incidents of crime today. The Life Theory and the Oklahoma City Bombing are thus correlated and connected. 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