A federal judge in Utah has ordered an FBI agent to court next month to respond to allegations that he tampered with a witness who backed out of testifying in a trial about Oklahoma City bombing videos.
Utah lawyer Jesse Trentadue told U.S. District Judge Clark Waddoups this week that former government operative John Matthews decided not to testify after the FBI agent contacted him and pressured him not to do so.
Attorney Kathryn Wyer said Thursday that the FBI in Utah gave her a much different version of events. Wyer said John Matthews reached out to the agency to ask how he could get out of testifying.
Waddoups says the allegation is too serious to ignore. He set a court date of Aug. 25 for the agent to testify.
The four-day trial to determine if the FBI has done an adequate search for additional videos of the 1995 Oklahoma City bombing has come to an end.
U.S. District Judge Clark Waddoups didn't issue a ruling Thursday. Instead, he requested final court briefs summarizing arguments from both sides: FBI attorneys and Jesse Trentadue, the Utah man who filed the lawsuit against the federal agency.
A ruling is likely months away.
The FBI on Thursday capped off its attempt to persuade Waddoups that it is not hiding unreleased surveillance videos by bringing witnesses who testified that there have never been any security-camera videos of the bomb going off.
Trentadue says he still believes there is a video showing McVeigh was not alone in detonating the bomb.
Trentadue says he believes the presence of a second suspect explains why his brother, who resembled a police sketch of a suspect, was flown to Oklahoma months after the bombing. His brother died in a federal holding cell.
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