Nichols bombing role

last updated 8 January 2015

McAlester, Okla.

A death-row inmate said that Oklahoma City bombing conspirator Terry Nichols helped store explosives for the attack but refused to help build or plant the bomb, an Oklahoma newspaper reported this week. The inmate, David Paul Hammer, is expected to be a defense witness in Nichols’ trial on state murder charges, which begins this month. Prosecutors say Nichols played a far more active role, and call Hammer “one of the least credible sources ever to serve time.” Nichols is already serving a life sentence for a federal conviction in the 1995 bombing, which killed 168 people, but the state charges carry the death penalty. Hammer said he learned about Nichols’ role while he was on death row with bomber Timothy McVeigh, who was executed in 2001.