The Giant Killers

State Rep. Charles Key, Oklahoma
Press Release

OKLAHOMA CITY -- State Representative, Charles Keys, Okolahoma, held a press conference in Oklahoma City on 15 January 1998 at which time he introduced two witnesses, Auxiliary Deputy Sheriff's, who claim that a U.S. Congressman and his attorney independently told each one of them that the government had known for 10 days prior to the bombing that a radical fundamental Islamic group was in Oklahoma City and that they were going to bomb the federal building. Both the Congressman and attorney have denied having ever said anything regarding prior knowledge. Here is a transcript of the press conference:

State Representative CHARLES KEY, Oklayhoma: No one of us, and no one, would have ever wanted anything to have happened that happened here two-and-a-half years ago or the ordeal that we've gone through to simply find the truth. As we've seen with the deadlocked jury recently in Denver, it's obvious that there is much more to this case than what some in the government want us to know about. But the government refuses to admit that there were other murders and we know that there were.

Why do they refuse to admit that and why do they refuse to continue to look for them? Why has it been so difficult to get answers to the questions? Why have we been fought every step of the way in an unprecidented manner? When Glenn and I and Kathy and Edye and many others began this quest more than two years ago, we had a lot of questions, and we've had a lot of those questions answered since then. With these two witnesses coming forward today, we hope that many more questions will begin to be answered.

In October, Don Hammonds and David Kulkendorfer came to us... contacted my office, I should say. It took us several weeks of playing phone tag before we could finally make contact. And just approximately six weeks ago we got together, sat down, and talked to them and heard their story -- the same story you're going to hear in just a few minutes. These men are very courageous. They're telling just the truth, just what they know, and we think that people deserve to know what the truth is. And the grand jury has had this information passed to them and they'll hear this testimony and see their sworn affidavits in the very near future. So I want to introduce right now to you David and Don. They'll tell their stories. After they finish, I'll come up and make a few comments, and then after that time, all of us will be glad to field any questions. So I'll introduce to you David at this time.

Reserve Deputy, Oklahoma County Sheriff, DAVID KULKENDORFER : Hello. Can you hear me okay? My name is David Kulkendorfer and I'm an insurance agent in Oklahoma City by occupation. I'm also a reserve for the Oklahoma County Sheriff's office, a reserve deputy, which is my public service. And during the day of the bombing, I was on South Shields heading north to an appointment when I saw a plume of smoke go up. I was at the intersection of S.E. 66th and Shields. At that time, I knew something bad happened. By the black smoke, I thought possibly an oil tanker or something exploded. And by the direction of the smoke, I said, "That's right downtown and something is wrong. They're going to need some help." So I got on the phone and called my office and told them to cancel my appointment, that I wasn't going to be in. I said, "There is something going on in the city and I'm going to check." I think that was my responsibility as a reserve.

When I got here... I got here about 9:30 and it was very chaotic, obviously most of you know. So I just basically started to help and tried to do what I could do to be of assistance. I wound up down at the northwest corner of the building, and I entered the building at that point and worked my way through the building looking for survivors, calling out to see if anybody could hear me. And I worked my way along with an Oklahoma City police officer and an FBI agent. We worked our way to the seventh floor. And at that time, we were heading west to east on the seventh floor and a fireman came from the other direction and said, "You don't need to go that way. I've already cleared it."

So we were in the hallway heading back to go down the stairway, and on the south side of the building we could see people running, scattering. We kind of looked at each other and said, "Well, what's going on?" And we heard, "A bomb! There's another bomb! Get out of the building!" So we immediately gathered ourselves and ran to the stairway and started down the stairs. And as we were going down the stairs, this lady police officer, she stepped on some debris and twisted her ankle so we basically had to carry her the rest of the way. As we left the building, the FBI agent picked up her up and carried her to the safe area. Well, after the "all clear," I came back up and I said, "Well, what I need to do is I need to get organized and get in uniform." So I called my wife and told her, "Call the office. I'm not coming back today. Get my uniform. I'll meet you at the Sheriff's Office." I met her at the Sheriff's Office and changed clothes and came back and pretty well just tried to do what I could do. We went into the building continuing with the search and rescue. Well, that went on throughout the day.

Then that evening, when the rains came, we'd pretty well backed off and we went to our command post and got rain gear, came back out after the rain. And I was pretty well working the northwest corner when I was approached by a U.S. Marshal and said, "We got the building. The fire department turned it over to us. This is now a federal crime scene. We need to secure the area. Nobody comes in except...." He said, "Keep all non-essentials out." I said, "What's non-essential?" And he said, "The only ones to come in are the search and rescue and law enforcement." I said, "Okay." So, basically that was my responsibility from that point on, to keep everybody out.

Well, later on, during the evening, a lot of public officials started to show up. The mayor showed up with a contingency, and the district attorney, the governor, and several dignitaries. I was standing approximately in front of the Water Resources Building, to try to keep people out and watching the search and rescue. As I looked to my left, I could see Congressman Istook kind of working his way east to west. Well, he worked his way up to me and he stopped to my left and introduced himself and we kind of small-talked a little bit about, "How's everything? It's a bad, bad, bad deal."

And he made the comment to me, he says, "Yeah, we knew this was going to happen."

And I said, "Excuse me?"

And he says, "Yeah, we knew this was going to happen. We got word through our sources that there is a radical fundamental Islamic group in Oklahoma City and that they were going to bomb the federal building."

And I didn't say anything because I really had nothing to say. But a little bit of small talk later, he kind of looked at me and said, "What department are you with?"

He came over in front of me, and at that time I had a raincoat on and my campaign hat from the county. He looked at the emblem on the campaign hat.

And I said, "Well, I'm a deputy with the Oklahoma County Sheriff's Office."

And he said, "Oh! I thought you were with the Highway Patrol," and immediately stopped talking and turned around and walked away.

And really, the reason I haven't said anything to this point... Don and I have talked about it every time we were on duty, and I thought, "Since the grand jury was in session, I'm sure this informoation is going to come out. It's got to. Because I'm sure if he made a comment to me, other people know also."

And this last fair, when Don and I were working, we got to discussing it again, and Don said, "Well, let me do this." He said, "Let me call Representative Key anonymously and tell him what we have to say, and if they want to hear us, fine; if they don't, fine. But at least we'll know either they know it or they don't." So he called Representative Key and through telephone tag we finally made an appointment and we basically said what we had to say. And later, Representative Key called us back for another appointment... another conference and said, "We need to take this to another level." He said, "What you have to say is very important." So that's why we're here. And like I said, that's all I know. I don't know the befores, the afters, or the what fors. All I know is this is what was said to me and that's what I'm repeating to you.

DON HAMMONDS: (Oklahoma County Sheriff's Reserve Deputy): My name is Don Hammonds and I'm a businessman and I've also been a reserve deputy with Oklahoma County since 1992. And I'm just going to jump in right kind of where Dave... where we were working together on the northwest side. And our job was to also give people coming in, like the mayor and stuff like that, hard hats and make sure they had hard hats, and also not to let anybody take pictures.

I noticed a lady back behind me by a back hoe over there taking pictures. I went up there and approached her and told her that, you know, "You can't take pictures here, ma'am." And she identified herself as an attorney, Lanney... Lana Tyree , and she was with Ernest Istook. She said they were friends and she was an amateur photographer and that she was taking pictures for Ernest Istook.

So I agreed to let her come on in, but I told her she had to make sure she took pictures of... up, and no facial shots of anybody because they were photo sensitive. So she was... I was with her as she was taking pictures of the building and stuff like that. And she made a comment to me that Istook told her that they were aware of a bomb threat since April 9th, and that's all she said to me.

That's the kind of stuff that... after it all happened... I mean, you didn't really think much about it until this grand jury and stuff stated probing into it and people were claiming that there wasn't any prior knowledge. I started thinking about it and got with Dave, and we put two and two together. I mean, hey! Somebody knew about a prior bomb threat. This ought to be known. And you know, I was given a date -- April 9th -- that they knew about it, ten days before. And you know...

So we feel like, you know, it's only fair that everyone knows the truth that there is... you know, what's going on and who else knows about this. Thank you.

CHARLES KEY: Again, we'll take questions here in just a moment, but I guess some final thoughts are that we've had a lot of information. It's been a long process that we've been through, and it's probably still got a long ways to go. We've had a lot of people contact us with information, and I'm sure, and I understand the county grand jury, now that the two trials are over, they've had a lot of information come forward. And I can say to you that there will be more very significant, dynamic information like this come forward in the future. This is just the first of some major revelations that prove what Glenn Wilburn said quite a number of months ago, and that he was right -- that there was significant prior knowledge. And there are those that know that.

And I want to take this time to call again on people that do know information to come forward, take it to the grand jury. You can get it to our organization if you'd like. Because the truth needs to be told. It deserves to be told. And many people may be implicated because of their silence and their lack of action in regard to this. The people of this State and of this city and of this country deserve to know the truth.

There is no reason why you can't just lay all of the facts and the truth out about this case or any other case and let justice find its way through what the truth and what the facts are. And that's all we want. That's all most people want. And I can't think of any reason why that can't be done in this case.

Again, we've had so much trouble. We've been fought in an unprecidented way, at every turn and every step.
Grand jury to probe cover-up http://www.denver-rmn.com/news/bomb/0612okc4.htm OKC INVESTIGATOR UNDER ATTACK http://www.execpc.com/~jfish/na/062397n1.txt THE FBI'S "TEN MOST UN-WANTED LIST" http://www.execpc.com/~jfish/na/033197n2.txt Bob Macy's 'Can of Worms' http://www.thnet.com/~deckard/mkokc.htm THE OBSTRUCTION OF THE OKLAHOMA BOMBING GRAND JURY INVESTIGATION http://www.future.net/~thetruth/hoffman5.txt LEGISLATOR SAYS FEDERAL AGENTS SEEN WITH BOMBING DEFENDANT, the American Reporter http://www2.htl-hl.ac.at/ar/ar463.part002.html KEY QUESTIONS, by Joe Shea American Reporter Editor-in-Chief http://www2.htl-hl.ac.at/ar/ar463.part008.html http://www.parascope.com/articles/1296/okc6.htm Oklahoma City Bombing: Seismic Data Suggests A Series of Blasts http://www.lsb.state.ok.us/house/news53.htm Key Will Sponsor Legislation to Strengthen Juries http://www.tv-u.com/KEY.html OKLAHOMA BOMBING UPDATE by Oklahoma State Rep. Charles Key


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