Text Excerpt 13: Waco Holocaust Electronic Museum The Collapsed Bunker that Wasn't a Bunker Didn't Collapse [Note to readers: Many of the official autopsy reports of the Branch Davidians, autopsy photographs, and official diagrams showing the locations of body recoveries are available for viewing at the Waco Holocaust Electronic Museum website. Unfortunately, this documentation cannot be included in a text excerpt.] When Dr. Peerwani of the Tarrant County Medical Examiners Office testified at the 1994 San Antonio trial of the Branch Davidians, he told the jury about the conditions under which the mothers and children died in the concrete room. He repeatedly claimed that many died of blunt force trauma or suffocation due to the structural collapse of the building. Dr. Peerwani said that when he first went to the "bunker" on April 21, 1993, he saw bodies "very badly burned, charred, mutilated, as well as fragmented . . ." (Transcript, pg. 5962). He also said: "Well, there were multiple bodies in the bunker. The bunker was a structure that housed food and other stored material, as well as ammunition. And we had recovered thus far approximately six bodies that were on the bunk--inside the bunker on the surface. We realized that there were a lot of bodies buried beneath the rubble of the collapsed bunker, but the bunker was very unsafe. There were ammunition that we were not sure they were live rounds or exploded rounds, and certainly there was the danger of the roof collapsing on us." (Transcript, pg. 5963 and 5964.) Note that Dr. Peerwani has just stated that (a) the bunker had already collapsed, and (b) there was danger of the roof collapsing. A sharp lawyer, even without photographs, should have required a clarification: Had it collapsed, or was it about to collapse? But Peerwani was not challenged. Some months earlier, in November, 1993, Dr. Rodney Crow, the Tarrant County forensic dentist, who had accompanied Dr. Peerwani to the "bunker" on April 21, 1993, appeared on the Maury Povich show. He spoke about the deaths of the mothers and children. He said, in part: "Three children had blunt force trauma. But it was from the falling concrete in the bunker that fell on them. There's an opening in the top of the bunker, eight feet, approximately, in diameter and large chucks of concrete fell on these people." Dr. Crow also said that he believed that the mothers inside the concrete room shot their children and then committed suicide to prevent all from being burnt to death. Official diagrams from the McLennan County Justice of the Peace, as well as the testimony of Texas Ranger Sgt. Raymond Coffman during the 1994 San Antonio trial of the Branch Davidians all confirm that the "bunker" Drs. Peerwani and Crow were talking about was indeed the concrete room (a old vault, measuring 19x20 feet) which the Davidians used as a pantry. There are several problems with this "they died when the bunker collapsed" account of the deaths of the mothers and children. We shall examine a number of problems in this and upcoming excerpts. The first problem with the story is that the concrete room did NOT collapse! The word "collapse" carries with it the notion of sudden and complete ruin. The word "erode" carries with it the notion of gradual falling away from the original form. Dr. Peerwani obviously understood what "collapse" meant, because he attributed burial, suffocation, and blunt force trauma deaths to the collapse of the building. But aerial photos of the concrete room taken after the fire show the structure standing and the roof still in place. A small hole, measuring perhaps two feet in diameter, can be seen toward the center. Visitors to the Museum's web site can see these photos as they appeared in US News and World Report, May 3, 1993, pg. 26 and Newsweek, May 3, 1993. There seems to be an irregular circular pattern around the hole, possibly seven feet in diameter, suggesting that the roof was weakened in that area. Photographs taken from the ground after the fire also show that the structure had not collapsed, and that men were standing and kneeling on top of the roof. These photos are also on view at the Museum's website: Time, May 5, 1993, pgs. 30-31; US News and World Report, May 3, 1993, pg. 34; US News and World Report, July 24, 1995, pg. 30; Time, July 24, 1995, pg 28; three photographs on loan to the Museum by Indianapolis attorney Linda Thompson; and another photo presented to the Museum by an unofficial source. The aerial and ground photos show all three (visible) walls were intact. Some of the photos also show the doorway to the room--the utter blackness within testifies to the integrity of all four walls. After the April 19 fire, Texas Ranger Raymond Coffman was assigned responsibility for collecting evidence in the concrete room. He talked about the hole in the roof. He said that an explosion had caused it; the initial hole was "pretty small" and " . . . The hole just got bigger and bigger and bigger" as men moved on the roof day after day (Transcript, pgs. 900, 938, 939). Next: Excerpt 14, Missing Heads, and Other Problems ------------------------------------------------------------ Entire set of text excerpts from the Museum available with anonymous ftp from ftp://ftp.public-action.com/wm2-0txt.zip Excerpted by Carol Valentine. Images omitted. Visit the Museum at http://www.Public-Action.com/SkyWriter/WacoMuseum SkyWriter@Public-Action.com Copyright 1996-2000 by Carol A. Valentine, on loan to Public Action, Inc. All commercial rights are reserved. 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