Were There Others?

May 30 -- The disclosure that the FBI failed to turn over more than 4,000 documents to the defense in the Timothy McVeigh case raises additional questions about whether there were others involved in the bombing of the Alfred P. Murrah Federal Building in Oklahoma City in 1995.

It also raises the question of whether the FBI thoroughly investigated claims by a number of witnesses who claim they saw McVeigh with an accomplice.

Bill Maloney told the FBI he met Timothy McVeigh and Terry Nichols. They came to Maloney's real estate office in the Ozarks in November, months before the bombing. They were with a man who called himself Robert Jacques.

"He was very articulate; he was smart," Bill Maloney described Jacques. "He did about all the talking, and during that period of time, he was in charge. He was the boss man."

Jacques said they wanted to buy some remote land.

"You know, he looked like a military guy," said Maloney. "I spent a long time in the service and I can pretty well spot 'em."

Five months later, Timothy McVeigh set off the truck bomb in front of the Murrah building. McVeigh and Nichols were soon in custody and the FBI announced it was looking for a man named Robert Jacks. Maloney was relieved. It seemed the FBI already knew about the connection between McVeigh and Jacques.

But when he saw who they arrested, a drifter named Robert Jacks, Maloney called the FBI and told them they had the wrong Jacques. The drifter was soon released, and the FBI went to see Bill Maloney.

He said the Robert Jacques with McVeigh and Nichols had brown eyes and olive skin. "He was real muscular," recalled Maloney. "He looked maybe like a weightlifter."

Sketch Never Released

A sketch was drawn for the FBI from Maloney's description. However, special agent Richard Marquise said, "The decision was made at that time not to release the sketch of Mr. Jacques."

The artist who drew the sketch, criminal profiler Jeanne Boylan, says plenty of other witnesses reported seeing the olive-skinned man with McVeigh in Oklahoma City, just before the bombing.