Specifically, McVeigh arranged the barrels in the shape of a backwards J ; he later said that for pure destructive power, he would have put the barrels on the side of the cargo bay closest to the Murrah Building ; however, such an unevenly distributed load might have broken an axle, flipped the truck over, or at least caused it to lean to one side, which could have drawn attention.

They included a confession said to have been inadvertently included on a computer disk that was given to the press, which McVeigh believed seriously compromised his chances of getting a fair trial.

McVeigh had indeed contemplated the assassinations of Attorney General Janet Reno, Lon Horiuchi, and others in preference to attacking a building, and after the bombing he said that he sometimes wished he had carried out a series of assassinations instead.

McVeigh is said to have had one girlfriend during his childhood, later stating to journalists he did not know how to impress girls.

McVeigh later said he considered " a campaign of individual assassination ," with " eligible " targets including Attorney-General Janet Reno, Judge Walter S. Smith Jr. of Federal District Court, who handled the Branch Davidian trial, and Lon Horiuchi, a member of the FBI hostage-rescue team who shot and killed Vicki Weaver in a standoff at a remote cabin at Ruby Ridge, Idaho, in 1992.

According to Michel and Herbeck, McVeigh claimed not to have known there was a daycare center in the Murrah Building and said that if he had known it, in his own words:

Before the sentence was formally pronounced by Judge Matsch, McVeigh addressed the court for the first time and said simply:

McVeigh said:

In a 1996 interview, McVeigh professed belief in " a God ", although he said he had " sort of lost touch with " Catholicism and " I never really picked it up, however I do maintain core beliefs.

In interviews following the Oklahoma City bombing, McVeigh said he began harboring anti-government feelings during the Gulf War.

Lodging in Vian Includes the El Siesta Motel, the place where Timothy McVeigh was said to have stayed the night before he bombed The Alfred P. Murrah Federal Building in Oklahoma City.

McVeigh said that he bombed the Murrah building on the two-year anniversary of the Waco Siege in 1993 to retaliate for US government actions there and at the siege at Ruby Ridge.

Before his execution, McVeigh said that he did not know a day care center was in the building and that, had he known, " It might have given me pause to switch targets.

" The FBI said that McVeigh scouted the interior of the building in December 1994 and likely knew of the day-care center before the bombing.

He said he helped McVeigh survey the building before the attack.

She said her husband had been living a double life prior to the bombing, using aliases, renting storage lockers and lying that he had broken off his relationship with McVeigh.

Marife also failed to give Nichols an alibi for April 18, 1995, the day the prosecution said Nichols helped McVeigh assemble the truck bomb.

The defense attempted to cast doubt on the case against Nichols by calling witnesses who said they saw other men with McVeigh before the bombing and by claiming the government had manipulated the evidence against Nichols.

Nichols's lawyers said he was the " fall guy " and that others had conspired with McVeigh.

In their concluding argument, the defense said, " People who are still unknown assisted Timothy McVeigh.

In a 2006 letter requesting that a judge give his son a light sentence for assault with a deadly weapon, battery of a police officer, and possession of a stolen vehicle, Nichols admitted his participation in the Oklahoma City bombing but said that McVeigh had forced and intimidated him into cooperating.

Nichols also said that in 1995 McVeigh told him that FBI official Larry Potts, who had supervised the Ruby Ridge and Waco operations, had directed McVeigh to blow up a government building.

Timothy McVeigh, who was convicted of killing 168 people in the Oklahoma City bombing of 1995, said that the Ruby Ridge incident was a contributing factor in his anger at the federal government.

That same day convicted murderer Richard Wayne Snell, who had ties to one of the bombers, Timothy McVeigh, is executed in Arkansas.

McVeigh, an American militia movement sympathizer who was a Gulf War veteran, had detonated an explosive-filled Ryder truck parked in front of the building.

McVeigh had previously visited Moore's ranch, but doubts have been raised about Nichols and McVeigh's involvement in the robbery for several reasons.

McVeigh wrote a letter to Moore in which he claimed that the robbery had been committed by government agents.

In October 1994, McVeigh showed Michael Fortier and his wife, Lori, a diagram he had drawn of the bomb he wanted to build.

McVeigh had originally intended to use hydrazine rocket fuel, but it proved to be too expensive.

McVeigh rented a storage space, in which he stockpiled seven crates of 18-inch-long Tovex sausages, 80 spools of shock tube, and 500 electric blasting caps, which he and Nichols had stolen from a Martin Marietta Aggregates quarry in Marion, Kansas.

" Underneath, McVeigh had scrawled, " Maybe now, there will be liberty!

After booking McVeigh, Hanger searched his police car and found a business card McVeigh had hidden while he was handcuffed.

McVeigh was also identified by Lea McGown of the Dreamland Motel, who remembered him parking a large yellow Ryder truck in the lot ; McVeigh had signed in under his real name at the motel, using an address that matched the one on his forged license and the charge sheet at the Perry Police Station.

Before signing his real name at the motel, McVeigh had used false names for his transactions.

FBI investigators used the resulting information gained, along with the fake address McVeigh had been using, to begin their search for the Nichols brothers, Terry and James.

McVeigh later stated that he was unaware of the day-care center when choosing the building as a target, and if he had known "... it might have given me pause to switch targets.

Both Fortiers testified that McVeigh had told them of his plans to bomb the Alfred P. Murrah Federal Building.

Michael revealed that McVeigh had chosen the date, and Lori testified that she created the false identification card McVeigh used to rent the Ryder truck.

In addition to arguing that the bombing could not have been carried out by two men alone, Jones also attempted to create reasonable doubt by arguing that no one had seen McVeigh near the scene of the crime, and that the investigation into the bombing had lasted only two weeks.

In addition to Michael assisting McVeigh in scouting the federal building, Lori had helped McVeigh laminate a fake driver's license which was later used to rent the Ryder truck.

Even many who agreed with some of McVeigh's politics viewed his act as counterproductive, with much of the criticism focused on the deaths of innocent children ; critics expressed chagrin that McVeigh had not assassinated specific government leaders.