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The HORRIFIC Branch Davidian Cult Tragedy · The conspiracy

• 0:00
  Speaker 1: Texas in the early nineteen nineties, a stretch of flat,
• 0:03
  Speaker 1: dusty land just outside of Waco sits quiet. At first glance,
• 0:07
  Speaker 1: it seems like just another compound he ramshackled buildings, some trailers,
• 0:12
  Speaker 1: and a playground for kids. But inside those walls, something
• 0:16
  Speaker 1: else was brewing, something dangerous and deeply devoted, a man
• 0:20
  Speaker 1: who called himself the Lamb of God, a prophecy of
• 0:24
  Speaker 1: the end times, and an arsenal stockpiled for war. This
• 0:29
  Speaker 1: is a story of faith twisted into control of prophecy power,
• 0:34
  Speaker 1: and the quiet terror that can grow behind locked doors.
• 0:38
  Speaker 1: It's about how one man became David Koresh, and how
• 0:41
  Speaker 1: he let a community down a path they would never
• 0:44
  Speaker 1: return from. Crime, conspiracy, gults, serial killers, and murder, all
• 0:49
  Speaker 1: things that I love to consume and I know you
• 0:51
  Speaker 1: do too, You sick, twisted, beautiful, intellectually minded. Big didn't
• 1:00
  Speaker 1: expect that, did you? Or maybe he did. I don't
• 1:02
  Speaker 1: really know anymore. But today we are diving into another cult.
• 1:07
  Speaker 1: It's been a minute since we dove into one of those,
• 1:11
  Speaker 1: and my God, did I not miss it? This is
• 1:15
  Speaker 1: this is a doozy. So without further ado, let's unbuckle
• 1:18
  Speaker 1: our seat belts, go mock five down the highway, slam
• 1:20
  Speaker 1: on the brakes, and buster this windshield into this disturbing
• 1:24
  Speaker 1: cult together. David Koresh was born Vernon Wayne Howell on
• 1:42
  Speaker 1: August seventeenth, nineteen fifty nine, in Houston, Texas, and his mother,
• 1:47
  Speaker 1: Bonnie Sue Clark, was only fourteen years old at the
• 1:50
  Speaker 1: time and his father was twenty year old Bobby Wayne
• 1:53
  Speaker 1: Howell and actually abandoned the family before Vernon was even born.
• 1:58
  Speaker 1: Really bad start. Bonnie's brief marriage to another man ended
• 2:02
  Speaker 1: soon after she was being treated very very poorly, if
• 2:05
  Speaker 1: you know what I mean, forcing her to leave Vernon
• 2:08
  Speaker 1: in the care of his maternal grandmother, Erline Clark, when
• 2:12
  Speaker 1: he was about four years old. So already four years old,
• 2:16
  Speaker 1: he's already gone through a lot in life, seemingly not
• 2:19
  Speaker 1: really being wanted by anybody so young. Vernon spent his
• 2:23
  Speaker 1: early childhood believing his grandmother was his mother actually, and
• 2:27
  Speaker 1: a charade that the family actually kept up during Bonnie's
• 2:30
  Speaker 1: occasional visits and when she would pose as Vernon's aunt.
• 2:35
  Speaker 1: But at age five, that illusion was shattered when Bonnie
• 2:38
  Speaker 1: married a man named Roy Holdman and just reclaimed her son.
• 2:43
  Speaker 1: I can't imagine just being this kid, like I feel
• 2:46
  Speaker 1: bad for a little kid, David, because that is that's
• 2:49
  Speaker 1: a lot to go through at just the age of five.
• 2:52
  Speaker 1: So they just revealed to this confused boy that his
• 2:55
  Speaker 1: aunt was actually his real mother, and his mother that
• 2:59
  Speaker 1: he thought was his mother was actually his grandmother, and
• 3:01
  Speaker 1: his father was somewhere else, nowhere to be found, you know.
• 3:05
  Speaker 1: So this revelation had a profound impact on Vernon, not
• 3:10
  Speaker 1: giving excuses by the way, just it had a profound impact,
• 3:14
  Speaker 1: who reportedly carried this emotional wound for the rest of
• 3:17
  Speaker 1: his life. So returning to live with Bonnie and his
• 3:20
  Speaker 1: new stepfather, Roy in the Dallas area, Vernon's childhood did
• 3:24
  Speaker 1: not become any easier. And starting around this time as
• 3:27
  Speaker 1: a kindergartener, he was actually by an older male relative,
• 3:31
  Speaker 1: and in July of nineteen sixty five, Bonnie and Roy
• 3:34
  Speaker 1: had a son together, and Vernon's half brother was named Roger.
• 3:38
  Speaker 1: So the turbulent life of Vernon, it just keeps, it
• 3:40
  Speaker 1: just keeps stacking on itself, and it's terrible. So the
• 3:44
  Speaker 1: family settled in Richardson, Texas, but Vernon's relationship with his
• 3:48
  Speaker 1: stepfather was rocky and marked by very strict discipline, and
• 3:52
  Speaker 1: he would later tell of harsh spankings from Roy that
• 3:55
  Speaker 1: made me fly like a kite, and even an instant
• 3:59
  Speaker 1: where Bonnie beat him in front of guests at his
• 4:01
  Speaker 1: thirteenth birthday. And by contrast, Vernon remained very attached to
• 4:06
  Speaker 1: his grandmother, often begging to return to her home after visits,
• 4:10
  Speaker 1: and relatives recall seeing him chase their car on his bicycle,
• 4:14
  Speaker 1: crying whenever he had to stay with his mother and Roy.
• 4:18
  Speaker 1: And Academically young Vernon struggled because he suffered from dyslexia
• 4:22
  Speaker 1: and poor eyesight, leading to placement in special education classes
• 4:27
  Speaker 1: and making him a target for merciless bullying, and classmates
• 4:31
  Speaker 1: dubbed him mister Ritardo. Kids are just mean man, especially
• 4:38
  Speaker 1: back then. I'm not saying it, okay, these are the
• 4:40
  Speaker 1: kids that said it to him, poor little guy.
• 4:43
  Speaker 2: Again.
• 4:43
  Speaker 1: I'm not like we're going to get into some other stuff.
• 4:45
  Speaker 1: Obviously this doesn't excuse what an adult man does. But
• 4:49
  Speaker 1: my god, did this kid have it. He had a
• 4:51
  Speaker 1: pretty rough and that nickname was due to his repeated
• 4:54
  Speaker 1: failures in school, and Vernon himself later admitted.
• 4:58
  Speaker 2: There's not one grade in school that I didn't fail.
• 5:00
  Speaker 2: I failed first grade twice, so I failed second grade.
• 5:04
  Speaker 1: So the constant ridicule left him socially isolated and very lonely,
• 5:09
  Speaker 1: so seeking refuge in religion, Vernon developed an intense interest
• 5:13
  Speaker 1: in the Bible from a young age. By his early teens,
• 5:16
  Speaker 1: he was devoting hours to prayer and scripture, and he
• 5:19
  Speaker 1: allegedly had even memorized large portions of the Bible by
• 5:23
  Speaker 1: heart at age twelve. That is very very hard coming
• 5:28
  Speaker 1: from someone who was made to read the Bible as
• 5:31
  Speaker 1: a kid. That's it does not make sense to a
• 5:34
  Speaker 1: kid usually. I would think I read it now at
• 5:36
  Speaker 1: as adults sometimes and I'm just like what you know.
• 5:40
  Speaker 1: And it was around that same time when he found
• 5:42
  Speaker 1: a positive outlet in sports, which improved his confidence somewhat,
• 5:46
  Speaker 1: but academics remained a challenge, and he would bounce back
• 5:49
  Speaker 1: and forth between living with his mother and grandparents through
• 5:52
  Speaker 1: his adolescence, and when he was sixteen, his family enrolled
• 5:55
  Speaker 1: him in the Dallas Junior Academy, a private church run
• 5:58
  Speaker 1: seventh day at Bist school, hoping a religious environment might
• 6:03
  Speaker 1: help him, and Vernon attended for a time but got
• 6:05
  Speaker 1: into disputes with teachers and conflicts at home, and eventually
• 6:09
  Speaker 1: dropped out in the tenth grade without graduating. But despite
• 6:13
  Speaker 1: his troubles at school teenage, Vernon had a knack for
• 6:16
  Speaker 1: practical skills and music actually, and he taught himself guitar
• 6:20
  Speaker 1: on an old instrument that he found taking a few
• 6:23
  Speaker 1: lessons at a local music shop, and he formed a
• 6:26
  Speaker 1: small garage band in his teens, dreaming of rock and
• 6:30
  Speaker 1: roll stardom, though these bands fell apart and he later
• 6:33
  Speaker 1: blamed that on other members' drug use. So socially he
• 6:37
  Speaker 1: started to attract attention at this point, especially from the ladies.
• 6:42
  Speaker 1: And when Vernon was living again with his grandmother in Tyler, Texas,
• 6:45
  Speaker 1: he fixed up a backyard shed into a private hangout
• 6:48
  Speaker 1: decked with rock posters and a black light, and neighborhood
• 6:52
  Speaker 1: girls would drop by, just drawn to the handsome teen
• 6:55
  Speaker 1: who played guitar and had his own place. Behind the
• 6:59
  Speaker 1: house was a glorified shed with a black light and posters.
• 7:04
  Speaker 1: Sounds terrifying to me, but to each their own. And
• 7:07
  Speaker 1: it said that quote everybody that met Vernon liked him
• 7:11
  Speaker 1: unquote during this period, which seemed to be a trait
• 7:14
  Speaker 1: he would carry on through his life as we will see.
• 7:17
  Speaker 1: As we know he was a cult leader, but this
• 7:20
  Speaker 1: was one of the very few relatively happy interludes in
• 7:24
  Speaker 1: his youth. But it ended abruptly when tensions with his
• 7:27
  Speaker 1: grandmother's husband led to Vernon being sent back to live
• 7:30
  Speaker 1: with Bonnie and Roy yet again. So he had just
• 7:33
  Speaker 1: endured a very chaotic upbringing, an absent father, a teenage mother,
• 7:38
  Speaker 1: shuffling between households, learning disabilities, and relentless bullying, and all
• 7:44
  Speaker 1: of this would shape the troubled, driven young man who
• 7:48
  Speaker 1: was about to seek a new identity and a just
• 7:51
  Speaker 1: a general new purpose in life. The Vernon stumbled into
• 7:55
  Speaker 1: adulthood with little direction, obviously, and in nineteen seventy seven,
• 8:00
  Speaker 1: around the age of nineteen, he allegedly had his first
• 8:03
  Speaker 1: serious romantic relationship with a sixteen year old girl in
• 8:06
  Speaker 1: the community, and it was a relationship that quickly led
• 8:09
  Speaker 1: to pregnancy. Teenage pregnancy, and according to later accounts, Vernon
• 8:14
  Speaker 1: was shocked at the prospect of becoming a father. He said, me,
• 8:19
  Speaker 1: mister Ritardo, going to have a baby. I'm sorry, that's
• 8:23
  Speaker 1: just the seventies were a different time. So his girlfriend
• 8:26
  Speaker 1: would give birth to a daughter, but she decided that
• 8:29
  Speaker 1: Vernon was unfit to be a parent and would actually
• 8:32
  Speaker 1: move away, cutting him out of the child's life. That stings,
• 8:38
  Speaker 1: so Vernon never got to even see his infant daughter,
• 8:41
  Speaker 1: and as if that weren't enough, Allegedly, Vernon had the
• 8:44
  Speaker 1: opportunity to meet Bobby Howell, his biological dad, and what
• 8:49
  Speaker 1: should have been a joyful meeting was actually sadly detached,
• 8:53
  Speaker 1: as Bobby had little desire to build any sort of
• 8:55
  Speaker 1: relationship with his son and they would never meet again
• 8:59
  Speaker 1: after that. So these just rejections were heavy blows and
• 9:04
  Speaker 1: reinforced his feelings of inadequacy and failure. So with many
• 9:08
  Speaker 1: of his relationships in disarray, Vernon turned back to his
• 9:12
  Speaker 1: two main outlets, and that was religion and music. And
• 9:16
  Speaker 1: then Vernon claimed that he had become a born again Christian,
• 9:20
  Speaker 1: and he first joined a local Southern Baptist church, but
• 9:23
  Speaker 1: soon gravitated toward the faith of his childhood, which was
• 9:26
  Speaker 1: his mother's denomination, the Seventh Day Adventist Church, or the SDA,
• 9:31
  Speaker 1: and in the late nineteen seventies he began attending an
• 9:35
  Speaker 1: SDA congregation in Tyler, Texas, hoping to find his place
• 9:39
  Speaker 1: and redemption in devout faith, and for a time, Vernon
• 9:42
  Speaker 1: Howell was just another young church member, fervent, awkward, and
• 9:47
  Speaker 1: eager to belong, but he could not suppress his intense
• 9:50
  Speaker 1: personality as Vernon, in his early twenties, became fixated on
• 9:55
  Speaker 1: a fifteen year old girl in the Tyler Church, the
• 9:58
  Speaker 1: daughter of the past big no, no, not just because
• 10:02
  Speaker 1: of the pastor's daughter, but she's fifteen and he's twenty.
• 10:06
  Speaker 1: But he believed God had shown him a sign in
• 10:09
  Speaker 1: scripture that she was to be his wife. Now we're
• 10:13
  Speaker 1: getting into the goo goo goo oo realm right now,
• 10:18
  Speaker 1: it's starting to become unforgivable. And he later recounts that
• 10:21
  Speaker 1: he opened his Bible and saw a verse Isaiah thirty
• 10:24
  Speaker 1: four to sixteen that he interpreted as divine permission for
• 10:28
  Speaker 1: him to take this girl as his mate. God I
• 10:33
  Speaker 1: hate that term. So convinced it was God's will, Vernon
• 10:36
  Speaker 1: approached the SDA pastor and declared that the Lord wanted
• 10:39
  Speaker 1: him to marry this man's underage daughter. And the pastor
• 10:43
  Speaker 1: was rightfully horrified and immediately forbade Vernon from ever seeing her.
• 10:50
  Speaker 1: But Vernon, however, refused to back down. Continuing this secret
• 10:54
  Speaker 1: relationship for nearly two years, and his behavior alarmed the
• 10:58
  Speaker 1: congregation obviously, and church members found Vernon's intensity and fixation
• 11:03
  Speaker 1: on and prophecy deeply unsettling, because again we see this
• 11:08
  Speaker 1: with most cult leaders. They just kind of cherry pick
• 11:11
  Speaker 1: things out of the Bible or whatever scripture that they're
• 11:13
  Speaker 1: reading to benefit whatever they want, and in Vernon's case,
• 11:18
  Speaker 1: that was relations with girls he shouldn't have been having
• 11:23
  Speaker 1: relations with. So Vernon began confronting church elders during services,
• 11:28
  Speaker 1: arguing about doctrinal issues, and even interpreting sermons with his
• 11:32
  Speaker 1: own long winded interpretations of scripture. And in one Sabbath
• 11:35
  Speaker 1: he marched up to the pulpit and launched into a
• 11:38
  Speaker 1: rambling speech of biblical prophecy, testing the leadership's patients. And
• 11:43
  Speaker 1: when he did it again the very next week, the
• 11:45
  Speaker 1: deacons had had enough and they physically intercepted Vernon and
• 11:50
  Speaker 1: gave him an ultimatum, and that was to leave quietly
• 11:53
  Speaker 1: on your own or be thrown out. And he didn't leave,
• 11:57
  Speaker 1: and the Tyler Seventh day Adventised Church for this, fellowshipped,
• 12:02
  Speaker 1: in other words, expelled Vernon, declaring him unwelcome for his
• 12:06
  Speaker 1: disruptive and immoral behavior. Fair enough, you know, fair enough,
• 12:10
  Speaker 1: and the scandal of his affair with the pastor's daughter
• 12:13
  Speaker 1: and his self righteous outbursts had made him an outcast
• 12:16
  Speaker 1: in the congregation. So Vernon left in disgrace, but also
• 12:21
  Speaker 1: with a sense of grand destiny unfulfilled. Now, So now
• 12:25
  Speaker 1: the ego's starting to just be pumped up. You know,
• 12:30
  Speaker 1: he thinks he's better than everyone else, and he got disavowed,
• 12:33
  Speaker 1: he got abandoned like he got in his childhood, and
• 12:37
  Speaker 1: he feels like he needs revenge, like he's better than
• 12:40
  Speaker 1: everyone else. So what's he going to do? Guys, what's
• 12:43
  Speaker 1: he gonna do? We will see, you know, we already
• 12:46
  Speaker 1: know he's gonna make a doll, all right, because he
• 12:49
  Speaker 1: still harbored the dreams of rock music success from his
• 12:53
  Speaker 1: teens as well, so he actually would start to stab
• 12:56
  Speaker 1: at a music career, moving to Los Angeles for a
• 12:59
  Speaker 1: time in hopes of becoming a rock guitarist. However, this
• 13:03
  Speaker 1: venture proved to be in utter failure. Ah shit stamp
• 13:08
  Speaker 1: on another failure for Vernon, and Vernon would just return
• 13:11
  Speaker 1: to Texas with little to show for it. So cut
• 13:14
  Speaker 1: off from the church of his upbringing, and humbled by
• 13:16
  Speaker 1: his musical experiences in la he was now a religious
• 13:20
  Speaker 1: rebel in search of a new spiritual home in the
• 13:23
  Speaker 1: perfect time period, the seventies, you know, sixties and seventies,
• 13:28
  Speaker 1: ultimate cult period, you know. So the twenty two year
• 13:32
  Speaker 1: old went to a place that he had heard about
• 13:34
  Speaker 1: on the fringe of the inventist world, which was a
• 13:36
  Speaker 1: small apocalyptic sect living on a rule property just outside
• 13:41
  Speaker 1: of Waco, Texas. So Vernon Howell's turbulent youth was over
• 13:45
  Speaker 1: and he was about to reinvent himself. You know that
• 13:49
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• 13:52
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• 13:55
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• 13:58
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• 14:01
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• 14:04
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• 14:07
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• 15:17
  Speaker 1: So in nineteen eighty one, Vernon Howell arrived at the
• 15:20
  Speaker 1: Mount Carmel Center near Waco, Texas, the compound of a
• 15:24
  Speaker 1: breakaway Adventist sect known as the Branch Davidians, and the
• 15:29
  Speaker 1: group was led by Lois Roden, a widow over forty
• 15:32
  Speaker 1: years Vernon's senior and Lois and her late husband Benjamin
• 15:36
  Speaker 1: Rodin had founded the Branch Davidians in the nineteen fifties
• 15:39
  Speaker 1: after splitting from the mainstream Seventh Day Inventism, and when
• 15:42
  Speaker 1: Benjamin died in nineteen seventy eight, Lois assumed leadership. And
• 15:46
  Speaker 1: into this environment walked young Vernon, a high school dropout
• 15:51
  Speaker 1: with a head full of scripture, eager to prove himself
• 15:54
  Speaker 1: a man of God in his own convenient way. So
• 15:58
  Speaker 1: he kind of had like a pre aid cult, you know,
• 16:01
  Speaker 1: for him. He just kind of walked in at this
• 16:03
  Speaker 1: point and he would be welcomed as a new member,
• 16:06
  Speaker 1: and he initially kept a low profile, doing odd jobs
• 16:10
  Speaker 1: and handyman work around the rural compound to earn his keep.
• 16:13
  Speaker 1: But it didn't take long for Vernon to make his
• 16:16
  Speaker 1: presence felt because, as we know, he had a very
• 16:19
  Speaker 1: very big personality and by nineteen eighty three, the earnest
• 16:22
  Speaker 1: newcomer began claiming he had the gift of prophecy u
• 16:27
  Speaker 1: tail ashold his time in the cult leader world. Why
• 16:32
  Speaker 1: are they all profits, They're just they all are just
• 16:35
  Speaker 1: like you know, I know, you know. This guy did
• 16:39
  Speaker 1: in the sixties, this guy did in the seventies. Now
• 16:41
  Speaker 1: we're in the eighties. I think we'll just try it again,
• 16:43
  Speaker 1: see if it works, you know. And it does for
• 16:46
  Speaker 1: whatever reason. And he would spend countless hours pouring over
• 16:50
  Speaker 1: the Bible, especially the apocalyptic books of Daniel and Revelation,
• 16:55
  Speaker 1: and he started sharing bold new interpretations that he insisted
• 16:58
  Speaker 1: were divinely in byed and in private and then in
• 17:02
  Speaker 1: Bible study groups, Vernon revealed his doctrine, which was a complex,
• 17:06
  Speaker 1: controversial teaching he said God had given to him, and
• 17:10
  Speaker 1: sensing his potential, Lois Rodin allowed Vernon to teach his
• 17:14
  Speaker 1: message to the branch Davidians and his serpents. Roots lessons,
• 17:18
  Speaker 1: as they were called, touched on esoteric interpretations of Biblical
• 17:24
  Speaker 1: lineage and sin, which raised eyebrows and created rifts within
• 17:28
  Speaker 1: the community. But Lois herself was evidently impressed by the
• 17:33
  Speaker 1: charismatic young man, and allegedly Vernon and Lois grew disturbingly
• 17:37
  Speaker 1: close despite their age gap. He's going the other way now,
• 17:42
  Speaker 1: he's going up and at least it's legal this time.
• 17:45
  Speaker 1: It's widely believed that Vernon Howell entered into a romantic
• 17:50
  Speaker 1: relationship with Lois, who was in her late sixties at
• 17:54
  Speaker 1: this point and Vernon was in his twenties. Davidian member
• 17:57
  Speaker 1: David Theobodu later wrote that Veron and speculated God chose
• 18:01
  Speaker 1: him to father a special child with Lois, an heir
• 18:05
  Speaker 1: to leadership called the Chosen One, and such whispers unsettled
• 18:10
  Speaker 1: Lois's son, George Roden, who was widely expected to succeed
• 18:14
  Speaker 1: his mother as leader. So to George Vernon was an interloper,
• 18:19
  Speaker 1: seducing his elderly mother and usurping his position. This is
• 18:24
  Speaker 1: literally like turning into Game of Thrones up in here.
• 18:27
  Speaker 1: So Mount Carmel escalated into an all out power struggle,
• 18:31
  Speaker 1: and Vernon fanned the flames by making a bold prophetic move,
• 18:36
  Speaker 1: and he would announce that God had instructed him to
• 18:39
  Speaker 1: marry Rachel Jones and now we're going back down, who
• 18:43
  Speaker 1: was a fourteen year old branch Davidian girl whose family
• 18:47
  Speaker 1: were longtime members. And in nineteen eighty four, Vernon took
• 18:51
  Speaker 1: Rachel as his wife, and her parents consented because they're idiots,
• 18:57
  Speaker 1: adding Koresh to her last name, and this was a
• 19:01
  Speaker 1: significant early use of the surname he would later adopt
• 19:05
  Speaker 1: himself as we know, and Rachel would eventually have two
• 19:09
  Speaker 1: children with Vernon, a boy named Cyrus and a girl
• 19:12
  Speaker 1: named Starr. So for a brief moment, this marriage to
• 19:15
  Speaker 1: seemed to stabilize the community, and Vernon's union with Rachel
• 19:20
  Speaker 1: tied him to a prominent branch Davidian family and momentarily
• 19:24
  Speaker 1: stopped talk of impropriety. But the calm of this group
• 19:29
  Speaker 1: was very short lived. In that same year, a mysterious
• 19:32
  Speaker 1: disaster struck Mount Carmel and a fire broke out and
• 19:36
  Speaker 1: burned down a five hundred thousand dollars administration building, including
• 19:41
  Speaker 1: the sex printing press. So the blaze gutted a key
• 19:45
  Speaker 1: facility for the entire group, and in the aftermath, George
• 19:49
  Speaker 1: publicly accused Vernon of arson, claiming Vernon had set the
• 19:52
  Speaker 1: fire to sabotage him. Sounds pretty pretty pretty accurate to me,
• 19:57
  Speaker 1: but what do want I know? But Vernon coolly denied it,
• 20:00
  Speaker 1: saying quote, no man set that fire, framing the blaze
• 20:04
  Speaker 1: as divine judgment, as if God himself had cast a
• 20:07
  Speaker 1: vote in the leadership conflict. How convenient for Vernon. He's
• 20:13
  Speaker 1: already doing all the convenient things. He's like, ah, what
• 20:16
  Speaker 1: in me? You know, the guy upstairs. I think he's
• 20:18
  Speaker 1: trying to tell us something. You know, What's that gas
• 20:20
  Speaker 1: can behind me? It's and this lighter in my hand.
• 20:25
  Speaker 1: I you know you should I think you've been drinking Dodd.
• 20:28
  Speaker 1: All right, we need to wrap this up, all right.
• 20:30
  Speaker 1: So the fire further poisoned the atmosphere of the entire group,
• 20:34
  Speaker 1: and George, already furious at Vernon's growing influence over his
• 20:37
  Speaker 1: mother and the flock, was convinced Vernon was out to
• 20:40
  Speaker 1: steal the sect, and he decided to take action. So,
• 20:44
  Speaker 1: backed by a band of loyalists and armed with guns,
• 20:47
  Speaker 1: George forced Vernon and his followers off Mount Carmel at
• 20:51
  Speaker 1: gunpoint in late nineteen eighty four. So Vernon and about
• 20:55
  Speaker 1: twenty five of his supporters hastily packed up and fled
• 20:59
  Speaker 1: the property, leaving it for now to George. So the
• 21:02
  Speaker 1: exile group were treated to the east, setting up a
• 21:05
  Speaker 1: makeshift camp in a rural town of Palestine, Texas, about
• 21:09
  Speaker 1: ninety miles away, and they lived in crude conditions, betting
• 21:14
  Speaker 1: down in rusty buses and tents in the woods, and
• 21:17
  Speaker 1: for two years, Vernon's devotees endured hardships in the wilderness refuge,
• 21:22
  Speaker 1: but they stayed because they believed they were like the
• 21:25
  Speaker 1: biblical David running from Saul, persecuted by a wicked ruler
• 21:30
  Speaker 1: who was George, but destined by God to reclaim the kingdom.
• 21:34
  Speaker 1: So Vernon's rise had been temporarily checked, but his resolve
• 21:39
  Speaker 1: only intensified in exile, because, as we know, if this
• 21:42
  Speaker 1: skuy fails or gets exiled or gets abandoned, he doubles down. Okay,
• 21:48
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• 23:27
  Speaker 1: get back to it. So, banished from Mount Carmel, Vernon
• 23:30
  Speaker 1: sett about consolidating his following and plotting his return. So
• 23:34
  Speaker 1: from nineteen eighty five through nineteen eighty six, his little
• 23:38
  Speaker 1: encampment in Palstine, Texas, became the incubator for a more
• 23:42
  Speaker 1: radical messianic version of his message, and Vernon, now in
• 23:46
  Speaker 1: his mid twenties, styled himself as a prophetic leader in waiting,
• 23:51
  Speaker 1: and he recruited new followers, aggressively venturing far beyond Texas
• 23:56
  Speaker 1: to spread his apocalyptic gospel. And he traveled to California
• 24:00
  Speaker 1: and throughout the US, and even made trips overseas, and
• 24:04
  Speaker 1: by his own account, Vernon preached and sought converts in
• 24:07
  Speaker 1: the United Kingdom, Israel, Australia, attracting young seekers intrigued by
• 24:12
  Speaker 1: his command of scripture and End Times teachings. And during
• 24:16
  Speaker 1: a visit to Israel, Vernon experienced a dramatic vision in Jerusalem,
• 24:21
  Speaker 1: and he claimed that God revealed to him that he
• 24:24
  Speaker 1: was a modern day Cyrus, the ancient Persian king anointed
• 24:28
  Speaker 1: by God in the Bible, and like Cyrus, Vernon believed
• 24:32
  Speaker 1: he was chosen to lead God's people and establish a
• 24:35
  Speaker 1: divinely ordained kingdom. And even as he proclaimed these revelations,
• 24:40
  Speaker 1: Vernon and his followers endured a highly regimented and disciplined
• 24:43
  Speaker 1: life in the Palestine Camp, and they made their existence
• 24:47
  Speaker 1: in primitive shelters a scraping by on meager resources and faith.
• 24:52
  Speaker 1: And then a turning point came. In nineteen eighty six,
• 24:55
  Speaker 1: Lois Rodin died, leaving the Branch Davidian leadership in flux,
• 25:01
  Speaker 1: and many exiles wondered maybe they could reclaim Mount Carmel
• 25:05
  Speaker 1: now that their patron was gone. And Vernon's charisma and
• 25:08
  Speaker 1: conviction had secured the loyalty of the majority of Branch
• 25:11
  Speaker 1: Davidians by this time, and even some that remained at
• 25:14
  Speaker 1: Mount Carmel sympathized with him. So the stage was set
• 25:18
  Speaker 1: for a confrontation with George, and it would prove deadly.
• 25:22
  Speaker 1: So in late nineteen eighty seven, the bizarre power struggle
• 25:25
  Speaker 1: between Vernon and George reached its violent climax, and George
• 25:30
  Speaker 1: exhumed corpse from the Mount Carmel community cemetery, and though
• 25:34
  Speaker 1: he allegedly said he was just moving the cemetery, Vernon
• 25:38
  Speaker 1: claimed that he had issued a challenge and that was
• 25:42
  Speaker 1: whoever could resurrect the body would prove divine favor and
• 25:47
  Speaker 1: rightful leadership. Guy thinks he's Jesus Christ, basically. So Vernon
• 25:53
  Speaker 1: sees this stunt as evidence of George's depravity, and he
• 25:57
  Speaker 1: actually went to law enforcement in Waco to report George
• 26:00
  Speaker 1: for illegally disturbing a grave, but authorities told Vernon he
• 26:04
  Speaker 1: needed proof, such as the photograph of the exhumed corpse
• 26:07
  Speaker 1: to pursue charges. So Vernon decided to get that proof himself,
• 26:12
  Speaker 1: and on November third, nineteen eighty seven, Vernon and seven
• 26:16
  Speaker 1: armed followers crept back on to Mount Carmel under cover
• 26:20
  Speaker 1: of night, carrying cameras and guns, and their goal was
• 26:24
  Speaker 1: to photograph the dug up coffin to incriminate George. But
• 26:27
  Speaker 1: George would discover the intruders and a gunfight erupted in
• 26:30
  Speaker 1: the dark grounds of Mount Carmel and bullets flew between
• 26:34
  Speaker 1: the rival Davidians, and by the time the sheriff arrived,
• 26:37
  Speaker 1: Rodin had been shot and was cowering behind a tree,
• 26:40
  Speaker 1: wounded and outnumbered, and Vernon and his men were arrested
• 26:44
  Speaker 1: and charged with attempted murder for the armed insertion, and
• 26:47
  Speaker 1: the ensuing trial took place in nineteen eighty eight, and
• 26:50
  Speaker 1: Vernon testified that he only went to Mount Carmel to
• 26:53
  Speaker 1: gather evidence of criminal disturbance of a corpse, and that
• 26:57
  Speaker 1: George had opened fire first. The jury ultimately believed there
• 27:01
  Speaker 1: was reasonable doubt, so all seven of Vernon's followers were acquitted,
• 27:06
  Speaker 1: and the case against Vernon ended in a mistrial when
• 27:09
  Speaker 1: the jury deadlocked. So he walked free, and he was
• 27:13
  Speaker 1: emboldened by this, to say the least, and he saw
• 27:17
  Speaker 1: it as a sign of God's favor. Meanwhile, George's fortunes plummeted,
• 27:22
  Speaker 1: and in nineteen eighty nine, in a separate incident, he
• 27:24
  Speaker 1: murdered a fellow Davidian named Wayman Edar with an axe
• 27:29
  Speaker 1: what the hell, whom he deliriously believed Vernon had sent
• 27:33
  Speaker 1: to kill him. Guy was starting to get a little crazy. Okay,
• 27:37
  Speaker 1: actually he already was crazy. Guy thought he was Jesus Christ.
• 27:40
  Speaker 1: But he lost it and he was declared criminally insane
• 27:43
  Speaker 1: and locked away in a state psychiatric hospital, eliminating him
• 27:47
  Speaker 1: as a factor. So, with George out of the picture,
• 27:50
  Speaker 1: Vernon finally moved to reclaim Mount Carmel, so the property
• 27:54
  Speaker 1: had by now fallen into neglect and was burdened by
• 27:57
  Speaker 1: unpaid taxes during George's tenure. Vernon and his followers pooled
• 28:01
  Speaker 1: their resources and raised the money to pay off the
• 28:04
  Speaker 1: back taxes, thus assuming legal ownership of the Mount Carmel
• 28:08
  Speaker 1: compound in nineteen eighty nine. So when they took possession,
• 28:11
  Speaker 1: they found that George had rented parts of the land
• 28:14
  Speaker 1: to outsiders who operated methan fetamine labs on the premises
• 28:21
  Speaker 1: George was going wild with it. So Vernon immediately notified
• 28:24
  Speaker 1: local police about the meth lab and had it removed,
• 28:28
  Speaker 1: a calculated move to demonstrate that his Branch Davidians would
• 28:32
  Speaker 1: not be criminals or drug dealers. They would just be
• 28:36
  Speaker 1: doing other illegal stuff, you know. So Vernon was now
• 28:39
  Speaker 1: the uncontested leader at Mount Carmel. By nineteen ninety, the
• 28:44
  Speaker 1: once wayward high school dropout had reinvented himself as the
• 28:48
  Speaker 1: prophetic leader of the Branch Davidians, and to mark his
• 28:52
  Speaker 1: new era, he petitioned for a legal name change, and
• 28:55
  Speaker 1: on May fifteenth, nineteen ninety, in a California court, Vernon
• 28:59
  Speaker 1: Wayne Howell officially became David Koresh, and the name hell
• 29:04
  Speaker 1: deep symbolic meaning obviously David aligned him with the biblical
• 29:09
  Speaker 1: king David, a Messianic lineage of a prophesized end time king,
• 29:14
  Speaker 1: and Koresh is the Hebrew form of Cyrus, the aforementioned
• 29:19
  Speaker 1: Persian king whom God anointed in Isaiah Guy thought a
• 29:23
  Speaker 1: lot of himself. That's that's basically the big picture here.
• 29:27
  Speaker 1: So by taking this name, Koresh signaled that he was
• 29:30
  Speaker 1: a spiritual Cyrus destined to free God's people, and in effect,
• 29:34
  Speaker 1: David Koresh was proclaiming himself Messiah, the anointed one to
• 29:38
  Speaker 1: lead the faithful in the last days. And with Mount
• 29:42
  Speaker 1: Carmelo back under his control and a new name declaring
• 29:44
  Speaker 1: his biblical authority, Koresh began to exert total control over
• 29:49
  Speaker 1: the branch. Davidians and most of the community accepted him
• 29:52
  Speaker 1: as their rightful prophet, especially after George's disgrace, and they
• 29:56
  Speaker 1: believe Koresh had outlasted Satanic opposition and proven himself chosen
• 30:01
  Speaker 1: by God. And Koresha's teachings also evolved in these years,
• 30:06
  Speaker 1: becoming more and more and more extreme, and in nineteen
• 30:10
  Speaker 1: eighty nine he introduced what he called the New Light Doctrine,
• 30:15
  Speaker 1: and in it he declared that all women in the
• 30:18
  Speaker 1: community were spiritually his wives, even if legally married to
• 30:23
  Speaker 1: other men, and that all men followers besides himself, of course,
• 30:29
  Speaker 1: must remain celibate. Oh of a convenience of the cult. Yeah, yeah,
• 30:38
  Speaker 1: So basically he had a lot of wives and all
• 30:41
  Speaker 1: the men had to be celibate, so he got to
• 30:44
  Speaker 1: do all the spicy tango dances, if you know what
• 30:48
  Speaker 1: I mean. And he claimed this command came straight from
• 30:52
  Speaker 1: God as part of establishing the House of David. And
• 30:56
  Speaker 1: again it always comes from God, so he can't take
• 30:58
  Speaker 1: any any flak. He's like, gosh, I'm just the messenger,
• 31:01
  Speaker 1: all right, don't shoot the messenger. It's the guy upstairs.
• 31:04
  Speaker 1: He's crazy, but I'm just going with it. I know
• 31:07
  Speaker 1: it's crazy. In the House of David is his growing clan
• 31:11
  Speaker 1: of children who would allegedly reign in God's kingdom. You know,
• 31:15
  Speaker 1: in researching for these cases, I tend to give into
• 31:18
  Speaker 1: my bad habits that could be board snacking, biting my nails,
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  Speaker 1: and supporting the channel, and let's get back to it. So,
• 32:38
  Speaker 1: starting around nineteen eighty six, Koresh had taken spiritual wives
• 32:43
  Speaker 1: from among the sect, but after nineteen eighty nine he
• 32:47
  Speaker 1: openly taught that every female member, whether single or married,
• 32:50
  Speaker 1: belonged to him.
• 32:51
  Speaker 2: As we said, so.
• 32:53
  Speaker 1: Men were no longer allowed to have any sort of
• 32:55
  Speaker 1: relations at all, even with their own legal spouses, while
• 33:00
  Speaker 1: Koresh himself took a harem of women and girls as
• 33:04
  Speaker 1: his own. A disgusting monster. So under this new light teaching,
• 33:10
  Speaker 1: Koresh pressured parents to give their daughters to him and
• 33:14
  Speaker 1: convinced husbands to surrender their wives. And some of Koresh's
• 33:18
  Speaker 1: wives were young, to say the least too young, okay.
• 33:25
  Speaker 1: Michelle Jones, the youngest sister of Koresh's wife, Rachel, was
• 33:29
  Speaker 1: just twelve years old when Koresh claimed her as a bride,
• 33:33
  Speaker 1: and she would end up boring one of his children's
• 33:36
  Speaker 1: later on, and another girl, Kirie Jewel, later alleged that
• 33:40
  Speaker 1: Koresh took her as a wife at only the age
• 33:42
  Speaker 1: of ten ten a child like grade three four, just disgusting,
• 33:55
  Speaker 1: like he's a disgusting piece of shit. But Koresh justified
• 33:59
  Speaker 1: these acts with twisted scripture, telling followers that God wanted
• 34:03
  Speaker 1: him to father twenty four children by many women to
• 34:07
  Speaker 1: serve as the twenty four ruling elders in the impending
• 34:11
  Speaker 1: Kingdom of God, and many branch Davidian women conditioned to
• 34:15
  Speaker 1: revere Koresh considered it an honor to be chosen as
• 34:19
  Speaker 1: a wife of the Lamb. So all of this doctrine
• 34:23
  Speaker 1: being placed just laid the groundwork for future conflict with
• 34:27
  Speaker 1: authorities because a lot of illegal stuff was going down,
• 34:31
  Speaker 1: and it was at the same time that Koresh was
• 34:34
  Speaker 1: redefining and family life at Mount Carmel, and he was
• 34:38
  Speaker 1: also turning the community into an armed apocalyptic sect on
• 34:43
  Speaker 1: top of everything. So in the late nineteen eighties, Koresh
• 34:46
  Speaker 1: began stockpiling weapons and the Davidians acquired firearms at an
• 34:50
  Speaker 1: astonishing rate, outwardly as a means of income buying and
• 34:54
  Speaker 1: selling guns at gun shows, but also clearly to prepare
• 34:58
  Speaker 1: for an anticipated final battle with the forces of evil,
• 35:01
  Speaker 1: and they spent large sums purchasing military style semi automatic rifles, shotguns, pistols,
• 35:07
  Speaker 1: and ammunition in bulk, and they even ordered grenades and
• 35:12
  Speaker 1: fifty caliber armor piercing rounds. Those are huge, They're massive.
• 35:18
  Speaker 1: That's very scary. And by the early nineteen nineties, Kuresh's
• 35:22
  Speaker 1: followers had amassed over two hundred firearms and at least
• 35:26
  Speaker 1: a million rounds of ammunition at Mount Carmel, and many
• 35:30
  Speaker 1: of these weapons were bought legally through mail order and
• 35:33
  Speaker 1: at gun shows in Texas. Gun culture at the time
• 35:36
  Speaker 1: made such purchases pretty easily, but there were signs that
• 35:40
  Speaker 1: Davidians were illegally modifying some guns to make them fully
• 35:44
  Speaker 1: automatic and assembling homemade grenades, which were serious federal offenses.
• 35:50
  Speaker 1: Garsh preached that this arsenal was to defend the faithful
• 35:54
  Speaker 1: in the coming apocalypse, and the name Mount Carmel gave
• 35:57
  Speaker 1: way to a foreboding new nickname among followers, and that
• 36:01
  Speaker 1: was Ranch Apocalypse. Really, I feel like that's really obvious,
• 36:06
  Speaker 1: But what do w I now? Mkresh truly believed and
• 36:09
  Speaker 1: told his flock that they were God's chosen army, destined
• 36:12
  Speaker 1: to clash with the corrupt government Babylon. So as nineteen
• 36:17
  Speaker 1: ninety ended, David Koresh had completely transformed the Branch Davidians,
• 36:22
  Speaker 1: and he was their undisputed prophet their lamb of God,
• 36:27
  Speaker 1: with many wives and children and an armory fit for war.
• 36:32
  Speaker 1: So by the early nineteen nineties, David Koresh presided over
• 36:35
  Speaker 1: the Branch Davidian sect as an absolute ruler, a tyrant,
• 36:39
  Speaker 1: if you will, and vigorously prepared his flock for what
• 36:43
  Speaker 1: he insisted were the end times at Ranch apocalypse, and
• 36:47
  Speaker 1: daily life under Koresh's leadership became even more regimented and extreme,
• 36:51
  Speaker 1: and he would continue to collect wives and former members
• 36:56
  Speaker 1: later estimated Koresh ultimately took on at least a dozen
• 36:59
  Speaker 1: spirit virtual wives and fathered more than a dozen children
• 37:03
  Speaker 1: within the group, and he controlled every aspect of the
• 37:06
  Speaker 1: compound member's lives. Women were made to dress modestly in
• 37:10
  Speaker 1: long blouses and forbidden to wear makeup or jewelry, and
• 37:14
  Speaker 1: Koresh even dictated their diets. He actually banned sugar, processed flour,
• 37:19
  Speaker 1: and dairy products, saying quote.
• 37:21
  Speaker 2: Milk is what you drink when you're a baby, and
• 37:24
  Speaker 2: were adults now.
• 37:25
  Speaker 1: Unquote and cutting off anything he deemed a worldly indulgence,
• 37:31
  Speaker 1: and adult males aside from Koresh, of course, were still
• 37:36
  Speaker 1: expected to remain celibate, dictating themselves wholly to Bible study
• 37:40
  Speaker 1: and labor, and the men's marriages were essentially annulled by
• 37:44
  Speaker 1: Koresh's decree. And meanwhile, Koresh continued to bed whomever he pleased,
• 37:50
  Speaker 1: claiming divine sanction. So their lifestyle was audacious and disturbing.
• 37:55
  Speaker 1: But inside the cult, Koresh's word was law, and H's
• 38:00
  Speaker 1: apocalyptic teachings also intensified, and the sermons and Bible classes
• 38:05
  Speaker 1: held frequently and sometimes at marathon length, not unlike Jim Jones,
• 38:11
  Speaker 1: focused on the impending end of the world, and Koresh
• 38:14
  Speaker 1: cultivated in us versus them mentality, which is just called
• 38:20
  Speaker 1: to one oh one, like be more creative. You know,
• 38:24
  Speaker 1: it's just the same thing every time, and it's flacking, sickening.
• 38:30
  Speaker 2: But that was the.
• 38:31
  Speaker 1: Outside world was Babylon, utterly evil and destined for destruction.
• 38:37
  Speaker 1: And he warned as followers that anyone who left the
• 38:39
  Speaker 1: group would forfeit salvation and be doomed when the end came.
• 38:43
  Speaker 1: So we're putting just fear into everyone just in case
• 38:49
  Speaker 1: they want to leave, they can't and they'll like burn
• 38:51
  Speaker 1: in hell, brimstone, fire and brimstone. And this kept many
• 38:56
  Speaker 1: in line out of just sheer terror, and they were
• 38:59
  Speaker 1: taught that to abandon Koresh was to invite eternal damnation
• 39:04
  Speaker 1: and to enforce loyalty and isolation. Koresh strongly discouraged outside influences,
• 39:09
  Speaker 1: called one oh one, just completely insulating them, saying, quote.
• 39:13
  Speaker 2: You're supposed to separate yourselves from the world. The world
• 39:16
  Speaker 2: is sim unquote.
• 39:18
  Speaker 1: Former member David Bunns explained of the branch Davidian mindset.
• 39:22
  Speaker 1: So Koresh drilled this into his followers, insisting they avoid
• 39:26
  Speaker 1: contact with worldly family and friends who might lure them
• 39:30
  Speaker 1: away from the truth.
• 39:32
  Speaker 2: The truth you know.
• 39:33
  Speaker 1: So in nineteen ninety one and nineteen ninety two, Koresh
• 39:36
  Speaker 1: continued his recruitment efforts abroad, and he sent emissaries to
• 39:40
  Speaker 1: Australia and the United Kingdom, where he planted seeds. During
• 39:43
  Speaker 1: the nineteen eighties, and Koresh's charisma was undeniable. Unfortunately, and
• 39:49
  Speaker 1: despite only a ninth grade education, he could quote scripture
• 39:52
  Speaker 1: effortlessly and exude confidence. He was the epitome of fake
• 39:56
  Speaker 1: it till you make it, and he convinced people from
• 39:59
  Speaker 1: all over the world to pack up their entire lives
• 40:02
  Speaker 1: and move to Central Texas to join his apocalyptic community,
• 40:06
  Speaker 1: and he didn't even need to leave Texas to do so.
• 40:09
  Speaker 1: As one observer noted, even decades later, true believers struggled
• 40:13
  Speaker 1: to articulate the pull that he had quote there was
• 40:17
  Speaker 1: just this force within him unquote, a force that made
• 40:21
  Speaker 1: people uproot themselves to follow Koresh's vision. However, defectors from
• 40:26
  Speaker 1: the group also began to emerge, carrying alarming stories to outsiders,
• 40:31
  Speaker 1: like Mark Brolt, an Australian devotee who had been an
• 40:35
  Speaker 1: Inner Circle member, became delusioned by Koresh's excess and left
• 40:40
  Speaker 1: the sect in nineteen eighty nine, and Brolt immediately started
• 40:43
  Speaker 1: warning authorities about Koresh, and he contacted police and media
• 40:48
  Speaker 1: in Texas, but was largely dismissed as a disgruntled ex member,
• 40:52
  Speaker 1: and Waco sheriff allegedly waived off reports as sour grapes.
• 40:58
  Speaker 1: What a fighting idiot. This guy's telling the police that
• 41:03
  Speaker 1: Koresh is taking wives that are much too young, and
• 41:07
  Speaker 1: they're just like, ah, he's just mad. They pay their taxes.
• 41:11
  Speaker 1: It's fine. But Berlt would reach out to anyone who
• 41:16
  Speaker 1: would listen in the outside world, and he found an
• 41:19
  Speaker 1: ally in David Jewell, a man whose ex wife had
• 41:22
  Speaker 1: become one of Koresh's wives and took their young daughter
• 41:26
  Speaker 1: into the cult, and in March of nineteen ninety two,
• 41:29
  Speaker 1: Jewel and Braldt contacted at least two US Congressmen desperately
• 41:33
  Speaker 1: warning that Koresh was s girls and might orchestrate a
• 41:37
  Speaker 1: mass cancer if cornered, if you know what I mean.
• 41:41
  Speaker 1: And these warnings were relayed to the FBI nearly a
• 41:44
  Speaker 1: year before the Waco tragedy, but apparently were not acted
• 41:47
  Speaker 1: upon at the time. Bralt had better success, soundingly alarm
• 41:51
  Speaker 1: in Australia, where both the media and even the US
• 41:54
  Speaker 1: embassy took his information seriously, you know, like you should.
• 41:59
  Speaker 1: And they said a cable to Washington warning that a
• 42:02
  Speaker 1: mass k at the ranch was imminent and that Koresh
• 42:06
  Speaker 1: would kill anyone who tried to arrest him. But despite
• 42:10
  Speaker 1: these massive red flags, Koresh's reign at Mount Carmel continued
• 42:15
  Speaker 1: unchecked through nineteen ninety two, and that year Texas state
• 42:19
  Speaker 1: authorities did attempt a closer look, prompted by whispers of
• 42:24
  Speaker 1: child inside the compound, and the Texas Department of Child
• 42:28
  Speaker 1: Protective Services or the CPS, opened an investigation into the
• 42:32
  Speaker 1: allegations against Koresh, specifically in mistreating children, and caseworkers interviewed
• 42:38
  Speaker 1: Koresh and actually some of the children, but the branch
• 42:41
  Speaker 1: Davidians were evasive and well coached, and crucially, the group
• 42:46
  Speaker 1: hid Koresh's underage marriages by falsely assigning younger girls to
• 42:51
  Speaker 1: men their own age as cover absolutely disgusting. For example,
• 42:57
  Speaker 1: twelve year old Michelle Jones was presented as being married
• 43:01
  Speaker 1: to member David Thibodeaux, who was ten years younger than Koresh,
• 43:06
  Speaker 1: to disguise the fact that Koresh was actually her husband.
• 43:11
  Speaker 1: What is going on here and why is that?
• 43:13
  Speaker 2: Okay?
• 43:14
  Speaker 1: You know? CPS investigators never found concrete evidence to substantiate
• 43:19
  Speaker 1: the claims, and no child would implicate Koresh, and no
• 43:23
  Speaker 1: one would admit to the spiritual polygamy, and after six
• 43:28
  Speaker 1: months in June, the child investigation was closed with no
• 43:32
  Speaker 1: action taken. But in retrospect, this was a hugely missed
• 43:36
  Speaker 1: opportunity to intervene before things escalated. But by late nineteen
• 43:41
  Speaker 1: ninety two, another branch of government had Koresh on its radar,
• 43:45
  Speaker 1: and that was a US Bureau of Alcohol Tobacco and Firearms,
• 43:50
  Speaker 1: otherwise known as the ATF, and reports from various sources
• 43:55
  Speaker 1: indicated that Koresh's group was amassing a massive arsenal of
• 43:58
  Speaker 1: weapons and possibly converting semi automatic rifles into machine guns.
• 44:03
  Speaker 1: An ATF opened an investigation into the branch Davidians firearm activities,
• 44:08
  Speaker 1: and agents learned that the Davidians had ordered hundreds of
• 44:11
  Speaker 1: high capacity gun magazines, dozens of AR fifteens and AK
• 44:15
  Speaker 1: forty seven style rifles, grenade components and black powder, and
• 44:20
  Speaker 1: a package of inner grenade casings had even burst open
• 44:24
  Speaker 1: on delivery, alarming a UPS driver who reported it to
• 44:28
  Speaker 1: the sheriff, and by the fall of nineteen ninety two,
• 44:30
  Speaker 1: the ATF was growing increasingly concerned. I love how the
• 44:35
  Speaker 1: government's more concerned about firearms than children being mistreated, But
• 44:42
  Speaker 1: what do I know? So here was a cult led
• 44:45
  Speaker 1: by a man accused of mistreating children, predicting an apocalyptic showdown,
• 44:50
  Speaker 1: and stockpiling an armory of military grade weapons in a
• 44:54
  Speaker 1: compound with scores of children, and in early nineteen ninety three,
• 44:58
  Speaker 1: authorities were closing in. In a local newspaper, the Wayco Tribune,
• 45:02
  Speaker 1: Harold was finishing an extensive investigative series on Koresh titled
• 45:06
  Speaker 1: Sinful Messiah, poised to expose his and arraignments at least
• 45:12
  Speaker 1: someone stepping up, and the ATF, for its part, was
• 45:15
  Speaker 1: preparing a major raid on Mount Carmel, and they requested
• 45:19
  Speaker 1: that the series release be delayed so as not to
• 45:22
  Speaker 1: interfere with their operations. So, as David Koresh preached to
• 45:25
  Speaker 1: his followers about the looming end of days, law enforcement's
• 45:29
  Speaker 1: net was tightening around the Branch Davidians, prepping for that
• 45:32
  Speaker 1: fateful siege that would make Koresh infamous. So David Koresh
• 45:37
  Speaker 1: created an elaborate theology to justify his actions and solidify
• 45:42
  Speaker 1: his hold over the Branch Davidians. And at the core
• 45:44
  Speaker 1: of his doctrine was Koresh's claim to be the one
• 45:48
  Speaker 1: true interpreter of Scripture, literally the only person on earth
• 45:54
  Speaker 1: who understood the Bible's deepest secrets. Isn't just the most
• 45:58
  Speaker 1: convenient job in the world world. And he taught that
• 46:01
  Speaker 1: the prophecies of the Book of Revelation were unfolding in
• 46:04
  Speaker 1: real time, and that he was the Lamb of God
• 46:07
  Speaker 1: prophesied in Revelation and in the Christian New Testament. Only
• 46:11
  Speaker 1: the Lamb, often understood as Jesus Christ, is worthy to
• 46:16
  Speaker 1: open the mysterious Seven Seals that usher in the end
• 46:19
  Speaker 1: of the New World. But Koresh, like George, just basically
• 46:23
  Speaker 1: thinks he's Jesus Christ, and he appropriated that role for himself,
• 46:29
  Speaker 1: of course, declaring that he had a unique God given
• 46:31
  Speaker 1: authority to decode and execute the divine plan of the
• 46:35
  Speaker 1: end times. In other words, Koresh convinced his followers that
• 46:39
  Speaker 1: their eternal fate hinged on him. He as the Lamb,
• 46:43
  Speaker 1: held the keys to unlock the final chapter written history.
• 46:47
  Speaker 1: And because of this, Koresh insisted that only his interpretations
• 46:51
  Speaker 1: of scripture were valid, and anything anybody else said was absolute.
• 46:56
  Speaker 1: Bs according to Koresh, and former Davidians were hall that
• 47:00
  Speaker 1: Koresh presented himself as the conduit of God's truth. No
• 47:04
  Speaker 1: one else could correctly interpret the Bible except Koresh himself,
• 47:08
  Speaker 1: no pastor, scholar or elder, and he poured over prophetic
• 47:12
  Speaker 1: books like Daniel, Isaiah and Revelation for hours on end,
• 47:15
  Speaker 1: weaving an intricate end time scenario. And according to Koresh,
• 47:19
  Speaker 1: the apocalypse was imminent unfolding in the now, and the
• 47:23
  Speaker 1: Davidians firmly believed they were living in the final generation
• 47:27
  Speaker 1: of Earth's history, and Koresh taught that the prophecies of
• 47:31
  Speaker 1: Daniel would be fulfilled at Waco and that the Mount
• 47:35
  Speaker 1: Carmel Center was essentially the new Jerusalem where Christ's return
• 47:39
  Speaker 1: would occur. The community lived in a constant state of expectancy,
• 47:44
  Speaker 1: convinced that any day the forces of Babylon or secular
• 47:48
  Speaker 1: government would attack and trigger a Holy war. Korsha's sermons
• 47:52
  Speaker 1: bristled with violent imagery and warnings of doom for the wicked,
• 47:57
  Speaker 1: and he emphasized passages about God's wrath and the annihilation
• 48:01
  Speaker 1: of unbelievers, instilling fear as a means of control. Fire
• 48:06
  Speaker 1: and brimstone, as we said before, and children were raised
• 48:09
  Speaker 1: on terrifying tales at the end of the world, and
• 48:13
  Speaker 1: one young survivor remembered quote Koresh constantly told us the
• 48:18
  Speaker 1: end of the world was coming, unquote, leaving her in
• 48:21
  Speaker 1: perpetual fear. I remember as a kid just being so
• 48:25
  Speaker 1: scared of the rapture. I only heard about it once
• 48:27
  Speaker 1: as a kid, about like how a rapture could happen,
• 48:30
  Speaker 1: And I woke up every day, like if my parents
• 48:33
  Speaker 1: were like not in the room they are, or my
• 48:35
  Speaker 1: siblings weren't, and I thought everyone was gone. I thought
• 48:37
  Speaker 1: the rapture happened and I was the only one left
• 48:39
  Speaker 1: on her. So I can't imagine how these kids felt,
• 48:42
  Speaker 1: just getting it pushed into them every single day that
• 48:45
  Speaker 1: they'll go to hell if they don't do everything that
• 48:47
  Speaker 1: they're told, and all this stuff. It's just so sad.
• 48:50
  Speaker 1: And in Koresh's apocalyptic framework, the branch Davidians held an
• 48:54
  Speaker 1: exalted place. He taught that his followers were the chosen elect,
• 48:59
  Speaker 1: the one hundred and forty four thousand mentioned in Revelation
• 49:03
  Speaker 1: who would be saved out of the dying world, very strange,
• 49:07
  Speaker 1: precise number, and this conferred on the group as a
• 49:10
  Speaker 1: powerful sense of purpose and superiority. Right, they were God's
• 49:14
  Speaker 1: end time army, the very first fruits of salvation, and
• 49:18
  Speaker 1: everybody else was just at they're just gonna be all
• 49:21
  Speaker 1: damned and they suck and they're not as good as us,
• 49:23
  Speaker 1: you know, So this wasn't just some ragtag cult on
• 49:26
  Speaker 1: a farm in Texas. Scrash even hinted that once the
• 49:29
  Speaker 1: final battle was won, his offspring would reign as princes
• 49:33
  Speaker 1: in God's kingdom. I guess the girls just didn't matter
• 49:37
  Speaker 1: at all, and he reportedly used Psalm forty five to
• 49:40
  Speaker 1: prophesize that he needed to father twenty four children who
• 49:44
  Speaker 1: would be the future princes ruling the new kingdom of God.
• 49:47
  Speaker 1: And his followers believed they were literally living out biblical
• 49:50
  Speaker 1: prophecy under Kuoresh's leadership, and departing the group meant losing
• 49:54
  Speaker 1: one's place among God's elite, which was a fate worse
• 49:59
  Speaker 1: than death in in their minds, so it's really hard
• 50:02
  Speaker 1: to overstate the psychological domination this represented. He rationalized these
• 50:07
  Speaker 1: relationships by claiming God's law superseded mans, and Koresh enforced
• 50:12
  Speaker 1: this by coercion and charisma, and most followers eventually accepted
• 50:16
  Speaker 1: it as God's will, however painful it was. So. From
• 50:20
  Speaker 1: the outside, looking in, the branch, Davidians under David Koresh
• 50:24
  Speaker 1: looked like a classic closed cult world of fanaticism and coercion,
• 50:30
  Speaker 1: and it can be hard to fathom why dozens of
• 50:33
  Speaker 1: seemingly ordinary people would join and remain in such a group.
• 50:37
  Speaker 1: But those who were inside Mount Carmel describe a mix
• 50:41
  Speaker 1: of factors that bound them to Koresh, even as his
• 50:45
  Speaker 1: demands grew darker. Charisma and spiritual allure were certainly part
• 50:50
  Speaker 1: of it, and David Koresh possessed a magnetic persuasive presence,
• 50:55
  Speaker 1: and he had an uncanny ability to quote scripture and
• 50:57
  Speaker 1: we've elaborate explanations of biblical prout. He was really good
• 51:01
  Speaker 1: on the spot, leaving listeners just totally entranced. One of
• 51:05
  Speaker 1: the followers was quoted to say Koresh was charismatic. This
• 51:09
  Speaker 1: was someone who only had a ninth grade education, but
• 51:12
  Speaker 1: he had a knack for memorizing and repeating Bible sections.
• 51:16
  Speaker 1: So his sheer confidence and command of the Bible convinced
• 51:19
  Speaker 1: many that he truly was to finally inspired. But in actuality,
• 51:23
  Speaker 1: he was just really good at memorizing stuff. That's about it.
• 51:26
  Speaker 1: That was his superpower. And new recruits often encountered Koresh
• 51:30
  Speaker 1: during his recruitment tours or Bible studies and were taken
• 51:33
  Speaker 1: in by his intense conviction and apparent mastery of the
• 51:36
  Speaker 1: Word of God, and he would often promise to reveal
• 51:39
  Speaker 1: the secrets of revelation and to open the Seven Seals,
• 51:43
  Speaker 1: something that felt incredibly profound and special and Oftentimes people
• 51:48
  Speaker 1: that joined cults don't feel special, They feel extremely lost,
• 51:53
  Speaker 1: similar to how Koresh felt. But he just poned it
• 51:56
  Speaker 1: in in a beat bit and he found people that
• 52:00
  Speaker 1: were lost and broken, and he took them in and
• 52:06
  Speaker 1: basically brainwashed them with fear because a newcomer, Because newcomers
• 52:10
  Speaker 1: to the Branch Davidians often report being loved bombed at
• 52:14
  Speaker 1: the start, showered with warmth, biblical camaraderie, and a sense
• 52:19
  Speaker 1: of being chosen. And the communal living meant shared meals,
• 52:22
  Speaker 1: group prayers multiple times a day, and a break from
• 52:25
  Speaker 1: loneliness in the outside world. So Koresh just cultivated an
• 52:28
  Speaker 1: atmosphere of collective devotion where everyone called each other brother
• 52:34
  Speaker 1: and sister, and this just fostered strong emotional bonds, and
• 52:38
  Speaker 1: the isolation just reinforced those bonds. So by the time
• 52:43
  Speaker 1: of the Waco standoff, many Branch Davidians were so entrenched
• 52:48
  Speaker 1: that surrendering or betraying Koresh was completely unthinkable. It wasn't
• 52:53
  Speaker 1: an option, and they had given him their minds, their bodies,
• 52:56
  Speaker 1: their souls, and in the end most would also give
• 53:00
  Speaker 1: their lives. So February twenty eighth, nineteen ninety three was
• 53:04
  Speaker 1: Operation Showtime, and just before nine thirty am on a
• 53:08
  Speaker 1: quiet Sunday, ATF agents in full tactical gear stormed the
• 53:12
  Speaker 1: Mount Carmel Center to execute search and arrest warrants on
• 53:15
  Speaker 1: Koresh and his followers, but the element of surprise was
• 53:18
  Speaker 1: lost because the Davidians had been tipped off the raid
• 53:22
  Speaker 1: was coming, and it was actually a local reporter who
• 53:24
  Speaker 1: unwittingly alerted Koresh's brother in law while asking for directions,
• 53:29
  Speaker 1: and Koresh and his men were armed and waiting, so
• 53:32
  Speaker 1: as ATF agents approached the ramshackle compound, gunfire erupted in
• 53:37
  Speaker 1: a furious two way shootout, and within minutes bullets tore
• 53:41
  Speaker 1: through walls, doors, and windows, and the agents of the
• 53:44
  Speaker 1: yard scrambled for cover as lead pelted them from the
• 53:47
  Speaker 1: building and inside, terrified women and children crouched low, while
• 53:52
  Speaker 1: Koresh and his Mighty Men, a term used within the
• 53:56
  Speaker 1: group to describe his core of trusted male defenders, were
• 53:59
  Speaker 1: turned far with assault rifles and the firefight was intensed
• 54:03
  Speaker 1: and prolonged, and several ATF officers went down, and by
• 54:08
  Speaker 1: the time cease fire was negotiated, the firefight had exacted
• 54:11
  Speaker 1: a deadly toll. Four ATF agents lay dead and twenty
• 54:16
  Speaker 1: more were wounded. And on the Branch Davidian side, five
• 54:19
  Speaker 1: members were killed in the gun battle that morning, and
• 54:22
  Speaker 1: another member was allegedly executed later that day for attempting
• 54:26
  Speaker 1: to flee. And Koresh himself was severely wounded at this point,
• 54:31
  Speaker 1: but he survived the initial clash, and the ATF's raid
• 54:34
  Speaker 1: had failed catastrophically, devolving into a complete bloodbath with bodies
• 54:40
  Speaker 1: on both sides. So it began as a law enforcement
• 54:43
  Speaker 1: action and now spiraled into one of the longest standoffs
• 54:46
  Speaker 1: in American history. So the morning's violence quickly brought in
• 54:50
  Speaker 1: the FBI, which has jurisdiction whenever federal agents are killed,
• 54:55
  Speaker 1: and by that evening the FBI's Hostage Rescue Team were
• 54:58
  Speaker 1: the HRT and Negotiation Unit had taken over the scene,
• 55:02
  Speaker 1: and they established a perimeter around Mount Carmel and thus
• 55:05
  Speaker 1: began the tense siege that held the nation in thrall
• 55:08
  Speaker 1: from February twenty eighth to April nineteenth, fifty one days.
• 55:15
  Speaker 1: Ueco was a tale of a religious fringe group that
• 55:20
  Speaker 1: decided to fight back against the federal government. There's a
• 55:25
  Speaker 1: man standing in the room with an AK forty seven.
• 55:28
  Speaker 1: The FBI takes over after fifty one days. They began
• 55:32
  Speaker 1: ramming the main building and in the first days telephone
• 55:35
  Speaker 1: negotiations were opened. With Koresh and his top lieutenants nursing
• 55:39
  Speaker 1: his gunshot wound. Koresh spoke in dense biblical rhetoric, making
• 55:44
  Speaker 1: it hard for FBI negotiators to get straight answers, and
• 55:48
  Speaker 1: though initially there were some signs of progress, Koresh agreed
• 55:52
  Speaker 1: to release some of the children inside, and in a
• 55:55
  Speaker 1: surprising move, on day two of the siege, he allowed
• 55:59
  Speaker 1: a local radio interview because you know, he loves attention.
• 56:02
  Speaker 1: It's not against law by firearm. It's not against law
• 56:06
  Speaker 1: because by anything that they sell in the gun show,
• 56:09
  Speaker 1: and Koresh would deliver an hour long sermon over the airwaves,
• 56:14
  Speaker 1: proclaiming his identity and message to the world in a
• 56:17
  Speaker 1: rambling monologue, and in exchange for that moment of glory,
• 56:22
  Speaker 1: Koresh did send out a group of his followers, and
• 56:25
  Speaker 1: over the next week, about thirty five people left the
• 56:28
  Speaker 1: compound voluntarily, including twenty one children, thank goodness, and fourteen adults,
• 56:35
  Speaker 1: but Koresh refused to let any able body men. The
• 56:38
  Speaker 1: mighty men exit and each soul that emerged was whisked
• 56:42
  Speaker 1: away by agents, and the children, some as young as infants,
• 56:47
  Speaker 1: were placed in custody of social services, and they told
• 56:50
  Speaker 1: harrowing stories to psychiatrists of life under Koresh, and tales
• 56:55
  Speaker 1: of beatings and of David's young wives inside Mount Carmel,
• 56:59
  Speaker 1: and roughly one hundred and thirty Davidians remained, including Koresh,
• 57:03
  Speaker 1: dozens of loyal men and women, and still many children
• 57:07
  Speaker 1: and Koresh's own and others. So as days dragged on,
• 57:11
  Speaker 1: the FBI grew very frustrated and negotiators pleaded with Koresh
• 57:15
  Speaker 1: to surrender peacefully, and Koresh would promise to come out,
• 57:19
  Speaker 1: then go back on his word, just constantly taunting the FBI,
• 57:24
  Speaker 1: And at one point early on, Koresh said he would
• 57:26
  Speaker 1: lead everyone out if one of his sermons was broadcasted
• 57:30
  Speaker 1: on national TV. Remember he's just always wanted to be famous,
• 57:34
  Speaker 1: And the FBI actually arranged four taped message of Koresh
• 57:38
  Speaker 1: to be broadcasted, but once it aired, Koresh changed his
• 57:42
  Speaker 1: mind and refused to surrender, claiming God had told him
• 57:46
  Speaker 1: to wait. In Psalm's forty you learned by the key
• 57:49
  Speaker 1: of David.
• 57:50
  Speaker 3: I waited patiently on the lore he inclined to me.
• 57:53
  Speaker 3: When you heard my cry, he brought me up out
• 57:56
  Speaker 3: of a horrible pit. And all the Marie Clay established
• 57:59
  Speaker 3: might be on the rock. Where's the rocket class?
• 58:02
  Speaker 1: And this pattern just kept repeating, just delays and broken promises.
• 58:07
  Speaker 1: While inside the compound, conditions started to deteriorate, and Koresh
• 58:11
  Speaker 1: said he needed time to write down his religious revelations,
• 58:15
  Speaker 1: particularly a lengthy manuscript explaining the Seven Seals prophecy, and
• 58:20
  Speaker 1: only when that was completed would God permit him to surrender.
• 58:23
  Speaker 1: So as weeks passed, the FBI became more aggressive in
• 58:27
  Speaker 1: its tactics, and they cut power and water to the compound,
• 58:31
  Speaker 1: and they blasted high decipel noises through loudspeakers at night,
• 58:35
  Speaker 1: including sleep depriving sounds like jet engines, pop music, and
• 58:39
  Speaker 1: even the screams of rabbits and being slaughtered. Oh my god,
• 58:46
  Speaker 1: that's that sounds darable. And I don't feel bad for
• 58:50
  Speaker 1: Koresh and his manner, but I feel bad for the children.
• 58:53
  Speaker 1: You know, that kind of endure that by I mean
• 58:55
  Speaker 1: they're trying to save them. I get that, but my
• 58:57
  Speaker 1: Lord and tanks rumbled around to flat the Davidians cars
• 59:01
  Speaker 1: and outer fences. This was a full on war zone
• 59:05
  Speaker 1: in the middle of Texas, and the FBI was just
• 59:07
  Speaker 1: trying to apply pressure and stress to force a breakthrough.
• 59:11
  Speaker 1: But to the Davidians it felt like their profits predictions
• 59:15
  Speaker 1: just coming true because Koresh had long said Babylon the
• 59:20
  Speaker 1: US government would attack them, and now here it was
• 59:24
  Speaker 1: with tanks and floodlights. And the unique problem the Bureau
• 59:28
  Speaker 1: faced at Waco was that nearly all those inside wanted
• 59:33
  Speaker 1: to remain there, and there were no hostages to rescue.
• 59:37
  Speaker 1: One analysis noted, which is stupid, because there's literal children
• 59:42
  Speaker 1: in there. They don't have a choice. But indeed the
• 59:46
  Speaker 1: branch Davidians just honkered down, interpreting the FBI's actions as
• 59:51
  Speaker 1: fulfillment of scripture, and negotiators did manage to coax out
• 59:55
  Speaker 1: a few more individuals over March, but the majority stayed
• 59:58
  Speaker 1: with Koresh, and in total, around forty six people left
• 1:00:02
  Speaker 1: alive during the siege, and by mid April, patients in
• 1:00:05
  Speaker 1: Washington had worn thin, and after fifty one days, Attorney
• 1:00:10
  Speaker 1: General Janet Reno approved the FBI's plan to end the
• 1:00:14
  Speaker 1: stalemate by force, and Koresh had still not surrendered or
• 1:00:18
  Speaker 1: finished his so called manuscript at this point, and the
• 1:00:22
  Speaker 1: FBI believed negotiations were at an impasse, and there were
• 1:00:25
  Speaker 1: increasing fears, justified or not, that Koresh might orchestrate a
• 1:00:30
  Speaker 1: mass cancelation or execute a violent breakout. So in the
• 1:00:35
  Speaker 1: pre dawn hours of April nineteenth, nineteen ninety three, the
• 1:00:38
  Speaker 1: FBI put their final operation in motion and at six am,
• 1:00:42
  Speaker 1: loudspeakers blared a warning to those inside, this is not
• 1:00:47
  Speaker 1: an assault, encouraging them to surrender peacefully, and then armored
• 1:00:51
  Speaker 1: vehicles began punching holes in the compound walls and through
• 1:00:55
  Speaker 1: these breaches, FBI agents pumped in massive amounts of cs gas,
• 1:01:01
  Speaker 1: a powerful tear gas intended to flush people out of bunkers,
• 1:01:05
  Speaker 1: and for several hours the tanks intermittently smashed and gassed
• 1:01:09
  Speaker 1: the building. And the Davidians, however, had prepared by putting
• 1:01:13
  Speaker 1: gas masks. At least the adults had masks, but tragically
• 1:01:16
  Speaker 1: the children did not. So unfortunately the FBI and the
• 1:01:21
  Speaker 1: government were gasing children. It just so awful, and they
• 1:01:28
  Speaker 1: all just huddled in interior rooms and the expected rush
• 1:01:31
  Speaker 1: of panicked people fleeing just never happened, and shortly after
• 1:01:37
  Speaker 1: twelve pm a fire ignited inside Mount Carmel and within
• 1:01:42
  Speaker 1: seconds flames are visible on multiple sides of the sprawling
• 1:01:45
  Speaker 1: wooden building, and the fire spread with explosive speed, accelerating
• 1:01:50
  Speaker 1: by strong winds and supposedly flammable materials within, and television
• 1:01:55
  Speaker 1: cameras broadcasting live caught this horrifics, with flames shooting out
• 1:02:02
  Speaker 1: of windows and thick column of black smoke rising into
• 1:02:05
  Speaker 1: the Texas sky and the compounds makeshift construction turned it
• 1:02:09
  Speaker 1: into a tinder box and walls and tunnels collapsed as
• 1:02:14
  Speaker 1: the blaze consumed everything, and some Davidians attempted to flee
• 1:02:18
  Speaker 1: at the last minute, and a handful of men, women
• 1:02:20
  Speaker 1: and children burst out through a rear breach and jumped
• 1:02:23
  Speaker 1: from windows, and some were burned, but most would remain
• 1:02:28
  Speaker 1: trapped inside.
• 1:02:29
  Speaker 2: Unfortunately, and the.
• 1:02:30
  Speaker 1: Fire raged intensely, engulfing Mount Carmel and burning it to
• 1:02:34
  Speaker 1: the ground in less than an hour, and government firefighters,
• 1:02:38
  Speaker 1: who had been kept at a distance for safety, arrived
• 1:02:41
  Speaker 1: too late to save the structure or those within, and
• 1:02:44
  Speaker 1: when the smoke cleared, the scope of the tragedy became
• 1:02:47
  Speaker 1: very evident, and seventy six Branch Davidians, including David Koresh himself,
• 1:02:53
  Speaker 1: perished in the blaze, and only nine people inside survived
• 1:02:57
  Speaker 1: by escaping the fire, but everyone else else was dead,
• 1:03:01
  Speaker 1: either from the flames or smoke inhalation, or by gunshot wounds,
• 1:03:06
  Speaker 1: and autopsies revealed that many Davidians, including Koresh, died of
• 1:03:10
  Speaker 1: a single gunshot wound to their head. So it appeared
• 1:03:14
  Speaker 1: that as the fire closed in, some devotees or Koresh himself,
• 1:03:19
  Speaker 1: chose mercy killing or camp over burning alive, and at
• 1:03:25
  Speaker 1: least twenty Davidians had been shot, some of which were
• 1:03:29
  Speaker 1: not adults, and that is gut wrenchingly heartbreaking, and Koresh's
• 1:03:36
  Speaker 1: body was found charred beyond recognition, identified later on by
• 1:03:41
  Speaker 1: dental records, and the Waco siege had ended in unspeakable
• 1:03:45
  Speaker 1: horror as a flaming apocalypse that eerily mirrored the doomsday
• 1:03:49
  Speaker 1: Koresh had prophesied, and Koresh's death marked the end of
• 1:03:53
  Speaker 1: the Branch Davidian's standoff, but the tragedy was far from
• 1:03:56
  Speaker 1: over in the public's consciousness, as a smoldering ruins of
• 1:04:00
  Speaker 1: Mount Carmel became a scene of national trauma and controversy.
• 1:04:05
  Speaker 1: The siege had lasted fifty one days, and its final
• 1:04:09
  Speaker 1: day would spark decades of debate over why it ended
• 1:04:12
  Speaker 1: the way it did and who was to blame. So
• 1:04:15
  Speaker 1: the immediate aftermath of the Waco siege saw shock, outrage,
• 1:04:19
  Speaker 1: and a demand for accountability, and the US government moved
• 1:04:23
  Speaker 1: quickly to prosecute the Branch Davidians who survived at the fire,
• 1:04:26
  Speaker 1: and in total, twelve members were charged with various crimes
• 1:04:30
  Speaker 1: ranging from murder of federal agents to weapons violations, and
• 1:04:34
  Speaker 1: one woman made a plea deal and eleven Davidians stood
• 1:04:38
  Speaker 1: trial in nineteen ninety four in San Antonio, and the
• 1:04:40
  Speaker 1: trial outcome was a surprising rebuke to the government, and
• 1:04:44
  Speaker 1: the jury actually acquitted all eleven of the most serious
• 1:04:48
  Speaker 1: charges of murder and conspiracy in the deaths of the
• 1:04:51
  Speaker 1: four ATF agents. So essentially, jurors did not hold the
• 1:04:55
  Speaker 1: survivors directly responsible for initiating the gunfight, and many obs
• 1:05:00
  Speaker 1: felt the jurors placed more blame on the ATF's tactics. However,
• 1:05:05
  Speaker 1: the Davidians were not off the hook entirely, and five
• 1:05:09
  Speaker 1: members were convicted of voluntary manslaughter, a lesser charge for
• 1:05:12
  Speaker 1: aiding and a betting the deaths of federal agents, and
• 1:05:15
  Speaker 1: seven were convicted on various firearm charges. In all, eight
• 1:05:19
  Speaker 1: Branch Davidians received prison sentences raging up to forty years,
• 1:05:24
  Speaker 1: though most were around five to fifteen years, and the
• 1:05:27
  Speaker 1: judge and prosecution expressed disappointment, but the verdict indicated the
• 1:05:31
  Speaker 1: jury felt the Davidians had acted in what they believed
• 1:05:35
  Speaker 1: was self defense during the raid, and over time these
• 1:05:38
  Speaker 1: individuals served their sentences and were released, and by two
• 1:05:42
  Speaker 1: thousand and seven all the imprisoned Davidians had regained freedom,
• 1:05:45
  Speaker 1: and public controversy over Waco only intensified in the years
• 1:05:49
  Speaker 1: following nineteen ninety three, and the fiery end of the
• 1:05:52
  Speaker 1: siege provoked multiple investigations and congressional hearings, and in nineteen
• 1:05:57
  Speaker 1: ninety five, the US Congress, particularly the House of Representatives,
• 1:06:01
  Speaker 1: under pressure from a skeptical public, held extensive hearings on Waco,
• 1:06:06
  Speaker 1: and testimony from survivors, atf and FBI officials and experts
• 1:06:11
  Speaker 1: was presented to determine if the government had acted recklessly
• 1:06:14
  Speaker 1: or if koresh bore soul blame because the optics of
• 1:06:18
  Speaker 1: tanks and gas and a charred compound of bodies, amongst
• 1:06:23
  Speaker 1: them non adults, led many to condemn federal tactics, and
• 1:06:27
  Speaker 1: conspiracy theories also blossomed, like claims that the FBI deliberately
• 1:06:32
  Speaker 1: started the fire or shot the escaping Davidians, et cetera.
• 1:06:35
  Speaker 1: And to address lingering doubts, in nineteen ninety nine, the
• 1:06:39
  Speaker 1: Justice Department appointed former Senator John C. Danforth as a
• 1:06:42
  Speaker 1: special counsel to conduct an independent investigation, and after an
• 1:06:47
  Speaker 1: exhaustive review of evidence, the Danforth report delivered clear conclusions,
• 1:06:52
  Speaker 1: and that was that quote, government agents did not start
• 1:06:54
  Speaker 1: the fire at Waco. Government agents did not shoot at
• 1:06:58
  Speaker 1: the Branch Davidians on April nineteenth, nineteen ninety three. There
• 1:07:01
  Speaker 1: was no mass conspiracy to cover up wrongdoing unquote, and
• 1:07:05
  Speaker 1: Danforth placed the blame for the tragedies squarely on David
• 1:07:09
  Speaker 1: Koresh and certain Branch Davidians, stating that they quote burned.
• 1:07:13
  Speaker 2: Down the complex and shot at least twenty of their.
• 1:07:16
  Speaker 1: Own people unquote, and the report exonerated high officials like
• 1:07:21
  Speaker 1: Attorney General Reno and the FBI leadership of malicious intent,
• 1:07:25
  Speaker 1: though it did criticize some operational lapses, and despite these
• 1:07:29
  Speaker 1: official findings, a debate persists to this day that some
• 1:07:33
  Speaker 1: believe the FBI's use of cs gas and aggressive tactics
• 1:07:37
  Speaker 1: precipitated the disaster, but others hold that Koresh was hell
• 1:07:41
  Speaker 1: bent on a deadly end regardless of what authorities did.
• 1:07:45
  Speaker 1: But what is undeniable is that Waco became a symbol,
• 1:07:49
  Speaker 1: a rallying cry for anti government groups, and a case
• 1:07:53
  Speaker 1: study in how not to handle a cult standoff, and
• 1:07:57
  Speaker 1: the legacy of Waco took a dark turn on April
• 1:08:00
  Speaker 1: nineteenth of nineteen ninety five, exactly two years after the
• 1:08:03
  Speaker 1: Mount Carmel fire, because that morning, Timothy McVeigh, an Army
• 1:08:07
  Speaker 1: veteran with anti government views, detonated a truck bomb at
• 1:08:11
  Speaker 1: the Mirror Federal Building in Oklahoma City, killing one hundred
• 1:08:15
  Speaker 1: and sixty eight people, including a day care, in the
• 1:08:20
  Speaker 1: worst act of domestic terrorism in US history, and McVeigh
• 1:08:25
  Speaker 1: explicitly cited the Waco siege and the earlier Ruby Ridge incident,
• 1:08:30
  Speaker 1: which saw an innocent woman shot and killed by federal
• 1:08:33
  Speaker 1: agents in an eleven day armed standoff, as his motivation
• 1:08:37
  Speaker 1: and justification for what he did. Because he saw the
• 1:08:40
  Speaker 1: Waco fire as government murder and chose April nineteenth as
• 1:08:45
  Speaker 1: a symbolic date of revenge, and thus the Oklahoma City
• 1:08:49
  Speaker 1: bombing was a grim followut from Waco, demonstrating how the
• 1:08:53
  Speaker 1: tragedy in Texas fueled the anger of the militia movement
• 1:08:57
  Speaker 1: and extremists who viewed the federal government as tyrannical, and
• 1:09:01
  Speaker 1: in the decades after nineteen ninety three, Mount Carmel became
• 1:09:05
  Speaker 1: a somber memorial and a point of pilgrimage for different groups,
• 1:09:09
  Speaker 1: and not long after the siege, a few surviving Davidians
• 1:09:12
  Speaker 1: and some supporters were turned to the property, and in
• 1:09:14
  Speaker 1: nineteen ninety nine survivors actually built a small chapel on
• 1:09:17
  Speaker 1: the site to serve as a church and a memorial
• 1:09:20
  Speaker 1: to those who passed, and the names of the deceased
• 1:09:23
  Speaker 1: Davidians and even the names of the four ATF agents
• 1:09:27
  Speaker 1: were inscribed on simple memorials and a chain link fence
• 1:09:31
  Speaker 1: that once surrounded the compound gradually filled up with homemade tributes,
• 1:09:36
  Speaker 1: crosses and flowers from visitors and a handful of brands.
• 1:09:39
  Speaker 1: Davidian survivors continued to meet for Bible study and worship
• 1:09:43
  Speaker 1: every Saturday on the grounds, keeping their faith very much alive,
• 1:09:47
  Speaker 1: and chief among them was Clive Doyle, an Australian born
• 1:09:51
  Speaker 1: Davidian who had escaped the fire with burns on his hands.
• 1:09:55
  Speaker 1: And Doyle remained in Waco and became the de facto
• 1:09:58
  Speaker 1: keeper of the Mount Carmel site and the Branch Davidian memory,
• 1:10:02
  Speaker 1: and he steadfastly believed Koresh would one day be resurrected
• 1:10:06
  Speaker 1: and vindicated, and for nearly thirty years after the siege,
• 1:10:10
  Speaker 1: Doyle led quiet Sabbath services in the little chapel, sometimes
• 1:10:14
  Speaker 1: joined by other survivors like Sheila Martin, who lost her
• 1:10:17
  Speaker 1: husband and children in the fire. And in parallel, a
• 1:10:20
  Speaker 1: new Branch Davidian faction emerged, and a man named Charles Pace,
• 1:10:25
  Speaker 1: who claimed to be a successor to Koresh's mission, though
• 1:10:28
  Speaker 1: not a prophet himself yet I guess, moved onto Mount
• 1:10:33
  Speaker 1: Carmel in the early two thousands, and Pace gathered a
• 1:10:36
  Speaker 1: small community of about a dozen people living in a
• 1:10:39
  Speaker 1: cluster of mobile homes on the site, and they called
• 1:10:42
  Speaker 1: their group branch the Lord Our Righteousness. They built their
• 1:10:47
  Speaker 1: own new church on a monument at Mount Carmel and
• 1:10:50
  Speaker 1: Pace's community, like Koresh's, preaches apocalyptic adventist beliefs and awaits
• 1:10:56
  Speaker 1: end times, and though Pace distanced himself from Koresh's more
• 1:11:00
  Speaker 1: criminal behaviors if you will, tensions sometimes arose between Pace's
• 1:11:05
  Speaker 1: group in Doyle's survival circle over who represents the true
• 1:11:09
  Speaker 1: branch Davidians, but both factions have the same ultimate expectation,
• 1:11:14
  Speaker 1: the fulfillment of end time prophecy, and though Pace denounced
• 1:11:18
  Speaker 1: Koresh overall, while Doyle continued to defend Koresh's teachings and
• 1:11:22
  Speaker 1: character in interviews. Quote, people ask me, well, how come
• 1:11:26
  Speaker 1: you still believe in David after all these years, And
• 1:11:29
  Speaker 1: Doyle said, well, I didn't buy into David as a person.
• 1:11:33
  Speaker 1: I bought into an idea he presented. I still believe
• 1:11:37
  Speaker 1: in that idea, the foundation of which is the Bible unquote.
• 1:11:41
  Speaker 1: So Doyle remained faithful to the end, and he died
• 1:11:44
  Speaker 1: in Waco in June twenty twenty two at the age
• 1:11:46
  Speaker 1: of eighty one, never wavering from his conviction that David
• 1:11:49
  Speaker 1: Koresh was chosen by God and would rise again. And
• 1:11:53
  Speaker 1: with Doyle's passing, one of the last direct eyewitness voices
• 1:11:56
  Speaker 1: from inside Mount Carmel fell silent, and Pacer remains alive
• 1:12:00
  Speaker 1: and continues to lead his followers today. But the tragedy
• 1:12:04
  Speaker 1: that unfolded in Texas in nineteen ninety three remains one
• 1:12:07
  Speaker 1: of the most controversial and haunting events in American history,
• 1:12:11
  Speaker 1: and its lessons paid for in blood Endore. But that
• 1:12:16
  Speaker 1: is that for the deep dive on David Koresh and
• 1:12:18
  Speaker 1: the Branch Davidians.
• 1:12:20
  Speaker 2: It was a lot.
• 1:12:22
  Speaker 1: But let me know what you think of this whole
• 1:12:24
  Speaker 1: case down in the comments below. We can have a
• 1:12:26
  Speaker 1: discussion about it. And if you have any other cases
• 1:12:29
  Speaker 1: you want me to dive into, let me know down below.
• 1:12:32
  Speaker 1: I always read the comments. Until then I will see
• 1:12:34
  Speaker 1: your beautiful face and stay safe, okay Bye,