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The Kansas City
Firefighters Case: The Framing of Five Innocent People
By J. Patrick O’Connor
The investigation into the explosion that killed
six Kansas City firefighters on November 29, 1988, had the federal
government running for more than six years in one direction – toward
organized labor – while local police were chasing down rumors that
implicated a wide array of ne’er-do-wells from Marlborough, the
impoverished southeast Kansas City neighborhood adjacent to the
construction site where the explosions occurred. For reasons the
police or the ATF have ever explained, they chose to ignore the
mountain of evidence that pointed directly to the involvement of
Deborah and Robert Riggs – the two security guards on duty at the
construction site the night of the explosion – in the crime.
By 1994 both teams of investigators had come to
such dead ends that, for all intents and purposes, the investigation
was over. The killers had escaped the wide net; the most horrific
unsolved crime in Kansas City history would remain unsolved.
At this juncture, the local ATF office and the
KCPD decided to join forces and conduct one investigation. To
accommodate the ATF, the KCPD agreed to replace its Crime Against
Persons investigative team with detectives from its Bombs and Arson
unit. This switch would put ATF Special Agent Dave True in firm,
out-of-control control.
True, nearing retirement but not wanting to
retire with the biggest case of his career still unsolved, had
steadfastly maintained that organized labor was responsible for the
explosions. As late as February of 1995 he said on the TV program
“Unsolved Mysteries” that the fire and explosion were consistent with
previous acts by organized labor in the year preceding the explosions.
Toward the end of 1994, the investigation got the
jump start it had been seeking after True announced a $50,000 reward
for information leading to the arrest and conviction of those
responsible for causing the explosion that killed the firefighters.
The reward was posted in all Missouri and Kansas prisons and jails, on
a number of overpasses, and was widely reported in the news media.
Between 60 and 70 convicts in Missouri and Kansas contacted the ATF in
response to the award offer. One of the neighborhood callers told True
that Richard Brown had admitted being involved in the explosions. True
testified at trial that this call “was a starting point for
investigating the Marlborough area.”
Although no two of the informants who surfaced
would ever tell the same story, much less name the same cast of
perpetrators, True eventually focused the investigation on five
Marlborough neighborhood residents with shady pasts: Richard Brown,
Bryan Sheppard, Frank and Skip Sheppard, and Darlene Edwards. True
then used entrapment, deception and intimidation in an effort to turn
each of the suspects against one or more of the others.
In early 1995, True also orchestrated coverage of
the Firefighters Case on the TV series “Unsolved Mysteries.” Two days
before the segment aired, The Kansas City Star ran a front-page
story that quoted Richard Cook, the ATF agent in charge of the Kansas
City office, as saying, “We’ve identified some individuals we believe
are at least connected to the fire.”
The day after the “Unsolved Mysteries” segment
ran, police arrested Bryan Sheppard on drug charges (selling drugs to
an uncover officer). When Bryan appeared in court, True was there to
argue that a high bond should be set because Bryan had been
threatening witnesses in the Firefighters Case. No such witnesses were
ever identified, but the allegation was publicized. (Bryan had been
arrested and charged by the State of Missouri with this crime in 1989
based on the false statements of two jailhouse snitches. He was
released nine months later when his attorney was able to prove that
the snitches had lied.)
Eight days later, in January of 1995, True
orchestrated the arrest of Darlene Edwards on drug charges. True had
gotten her stepson, Ronnie Edwards, to set her up for the bust in a
school zone.
In February of 1995, when Skip Sheppard had a
court appearance on a charge of transporting guns across a state line,
True appeared in court to request a high bond, alleging that Skip had
been threatening Firefighter Case witnesses. U.S. Magistrate John
Maughmer released Skip on standard bond when True was unable to
identify any such witnesses.
On March 14, 1995, The Star ran a
front-page story saying the government’s investigation was focusing on
the Sheppards and Darlene Edwards. The story cited possible physical
evidence, “including a two-way radio that may have been stolen shortly
before the explosion…Some witnesses said the suspects were stealing
construction equipment, while others said they intended to steal
dynamite. Some said the fire was a diversion. Others said it was done
for spite.”
This article would become a script for perjury by
many of the government witnesses at both the grand jury and at trial.
Over and over again the jailhouse informants would claim the Sheppards
were up there stealing construction equipment, or dynamite, or
walkie-talkies, and that the fire was a diversion for these thefts. At
trial the general manager of the construction site would testify that
nothing was ever stolen from the site.
Using perjured testimony and the alleged thefts
of construction site materials such as explosives, batteries, and
walki-talkies, U.S. Assistant Attorney Paul Becker got a grand jury to
indict Bryan Sheppard, Richard Brown, Frank Sheppard, Skip Sheppard
and Darlene Edwards in June of 1996 for causing the blast that killed
the firefighters.
In early 1997, a federal jury found all five
defendants guilty of causing the deaths of the firefighters. Judge
Joseph Stevens sentenced each of them to life in prison without the
possibility of parole. All subsequent appeals have been denied.
Not one of the convicted had a single thing to do
with the explosion. Their crime was that they were poor and
expendable. Three of the convicted passed police-administered
polygraph tests; Darlene Edwards’s request to be polygraphed was
denied by True, and Skip Sheppard was never asked to take a polygraph.
None of the convicted ever admitted to any personal involvement in the
crime, nor did any ever take the Fifth Amendment. None ever requested
an attorney be present while being interviewed by the police or ATF.
Each of the defendants turned down numerous government offers to turn
state’s evidence and receive a significantly reduced sentence.
No trial in U.S. history used more convicts and
ex-convicts as government witnesses. Few trials in U.S. history
represent a more concerted effort by the U.S. government to frame
innocent people.
New
Questions Arise in Deadly 1988 Blast
By
MIKE McGRAW
The
Kansas City Star
February
19, 2007
It
was clear and cool that terrible Tuesday morning when the call came:
A fire at a southeast Kansas City highway construction site.
Firefighters found a 40-foot trailer ablaze. The trailer held 25,000
pounds of ammonium nitrate and fuel oil simmering toward a disaster
that would shake the city. The trailer blew, six firefighters died,
and police called it arson. That was Nov. 29, 1988. It took nearly
nine years to find and convict suspects in the killings - five
small-time criminals. The courts rejected their appeals. End of
story. Until now.....
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