July 25, 2024 • 32 mins
Another bombing, this time with two discrete bombs at an abortion clinic in Sandy Springs.
The motivation behind the bombs was still unclear to law enforcement, but some were beginning to sense that they were somehow related. Three bombs, two locations, one with a warning call to 911. The pieces were beginning to come together, but the bomber was still on the loose. Standing back, standing by, ready to strike again.
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Episode Transcript
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Speaker 1 (00:00):
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Speaker 2 (00:17):
You're listening to Flashpoint, a production of tenderfoot TV and
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This podcast also contains subject matter which may not be
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Speaker 1 (00:41):
They argue that you stop for a second, please. For months,
Richard Jewel, the security guard who was initially hailed a
hero for discovering the bomb, was investigated by law enforcement
and bombarded by the press, who framed him as the
prime suspect. They speculated that he was a villainous attention seeker,
(01:05):
one suffering from hero syndrome.
Speaker 3 (01:08):
It's also called the Messiah complex, a person who wants.
Speaker 1 (01:12):
To be godlike.
Speaker 3 (01:14):
It's again that power thing they want to feel superior
to all others.
Speaker 1 (01:18):
Then six months later, those accusations quietly faded after he
was cleared by the US government.
Speaker 4 (01:25):
With regard to Richard Jewel, I deeply regret that his
name was linked to the media. This not only damaged
mister Jewell and his reputation, but it caused the FBI
substantial damage to its investigation.
Speaker 5 (01:41):
Richard answered a lot of questions the FDI and other
long enforces who followed up, and at the end of
the day, there certainly wasn't substantial evidence. It looked like
he didn't do it.
Speaker 1 (01:51):
Retired US attorney Kent Alexander remembers the man hunt for
the Centennial Park bomber well. He showed up to our
interview in the nineteen ninety six at Leant Olympics Polo
with a framed letter that he sent to Richard Jewel
during the investigation. Can you can you read the letter?
Speaker 5 (02:07):
Sure? It's addressed to Jack Martin, who's one of several
attorneys for Richard Jewel. Says, Dear Jack, this to advise
you that, based on the evidence developed to date, your client,
Richard Jewel, is not considered a target of the federal
criminal investigation at the bombing on July twenty seven, nineteen
ninety six, at Centennial Olympic Park in Atlanta. Barring any
(02:30):
newly discovered evidence, the status will not change. I'm hopeful
that mister Jewel will provide further cooperation as a witness
in the investigation. Sincerely, Kent be Alexander, US Attorney.
Speaker 1 (02:43):
After clearing Richard Jewel, the FBI, atf and GBI, collectively
known as the Scent Bomb Task Force, we're left with
really no leads.
Speaker 5 (02:54):
We had no shortage of potential bombers. The more you
dig into things, you realize there are just a lot
of crazy people out there, so there wasn't one particular suspect.
In fact, at that point, there was still poster that
some agent had drawn up. It was a squiggly figure
of a guy sitting on a bench and something under
(03:16):
the bench, and then written in black marker was wanted
by the FBI. We called him Blobman because there was
a picture of the actual bomber, but it was so
grainy that we could make out no facial features at all,
So you just basically had this guy who looked like
kind of a blob sitting on the bench. So that
Blobman pretty much captured the investigation. There were plenty of
(03:42):
people we kept looking at, but nobody really jumped a
four as the likely bomber, much less the primary.
Speaker 1 (03:49):
Suspect episode two. Twin bomb.
Speaker 3 (04:15):
My wife at the time, and we had twins arrive
about eight months previous, so it was kind of a
crazy household when you get invaded with kids all of
a sudden. So my day started at four am, and
it was a regular work day.
Speaker 1 (04:33):
It's January sixteenth, nineteen ninety seven, six months after the
bombing at the Olympics, and Rob Stadler is the news
director at Star ninety four, a popular radio station in Atlanta.
Speaker 3 (04:46):
And because we have the twins, I was able to
get away after the show ended at nine and go
to my wife's law office was located on the third
floor of the Sandy Springs Profes Building.
Speaker 1 (05:01):
Just off Roswell Road. The Sandy Springs Professional Building was
a three story complex that housed a handful of different offices.
On the top floor was Rob's wife's law firm. On
the first was Atlanta North Side Planning Services, an abortion clinic.
Rob's wife was a few counties north that morning for
a trial.
Speaker 3 (05:23):
We'd set up a kind of a nursery inside the office,
so I would stop by and scoop them up and
take them home. And it was dad duty the rest
of the day, and I called the office up on
my cell phone and it was probably the most important
call I made in my life. I told them the
folks at the office, I said, I'm kind of a rush.
(05:46):
I won't really want to get home, so if you
could take the girls out of the crib and have
them ready to go in their carry all chairs, that
would be great. And I went up to the third
floor and walked into the office there the girls were
right there in the lobby part of the law office,
and I sat down just for a second to hold
(06:08):
one of them and noticed a blue light, bright flash
in the window, and then a tremendous, tremendous blast, and
it just the shaking was unbelievable. Ceiling tiles started coming down,
(06:29):
things were happening in the office is collapsing and one
of the people in the office said that was a bomb.
Speaker 1 (06:38):
Rob and his twin girls made it out of the
building safely with many of the staff. Immediately, yellow tape
was rolled out and the area was labeled a crime scene.
Speaker 3 (06:47):
We put the girls, my daughters in my mini pickup,
and the office staff, one of them, drove them to
our house in Sandy Springs, away from the site. That
gave me a chance then to do my job being
the news guy on Star ninety four. It's like, okay,
this is a news story. I got as close as
(07:09):
I could to where the smoke was coming out from
the first floor window where the abortion clinic was located.
So then I dialed up my cell phone and then
called the radio station and jumped on Live.
Speaker 1 (07:26):
E three Industrial Boulevards, darn ninty four.
Speaker 6 (07:29):
It's nine thirty five and we go to Rob Standler,
our news director, with a breaking news story.
Speaker 7 (07:33):
Steve, I am at two seventy five Carpenter Drive. This
is a three story building that parallels Roswell Road. It's
right behind Good Old Days in Sandy Springs where a
suspected bomb has gone off in this building. I was
on the third floor of this building at the time
when we were rocked by a flash and a loud boom,
(07:54):
and it shattered windows on the southeastern part of the building.
Speaker 8 (08:02):
I was in the car with a couple of my
friends and we were listening to radio.
Speaker 7 (08:10):
You can hear the sirens coming. Fire and Cruise are
just now arriving. I can tell you what happened as
best as I can.
Speaker 9 (08:17):
I was on the third floor of.
Speaker 8 (08:18):
The facility so and I think it was in the morning,
and they said there had been an explosion at an
abortion clinic in Sandy Springs, and my stomach dropped and
I couldn't speak. I mean, all I could think was
holy shit, Like, what am I going to do? Now?
Speaker 1 (08:45):
I'm talking again with Leah. You probably remember her from
the last episode. Leah also grew up in Atlanta, lived
here all her life, and she remembers of the Olympic
Park bombing well, but at the time, she couldn't know
that the bombing was just the first in a series
of events that would forever change her life in the
lives of her entire family.
Speaker 8 (09:06):
I was born knowing what I want to do from
day one, knowing what I want to be, where I
want to go to college. I didn't want to get married,
didn't want kids. I've always known.
Speaker 1 (09:20):
Among the many stories connected to the Olympic Park bombing,
Leah's was unexpected and powerful, also complicated. It began the
year before the Centennial Olympics.
Speaker 8 (09:32):
I met Bo when I was fifteen. I was a sophomore.
Bo was three years older. He had gotten involved with
a group of guys that were stealing cars. He was
awaiting trial for a series of felonies.
Speaker 1 (09:50):
Leah and Bow began dating, but the way you do
in high school, and you don't know much yet, and
there's not much to a relationship except the fact that
you're just together. It wasn't too long before Bow would
be convicted it would have to serve time in prison.
After six months behind bars, he took a deal which
required him to serve six additional months of boot camp,
followed by house arrest.
Speaker 8 (10:12):
And for me, the absence and the time away made
me realize, this is a lot to wrap my head around.
I mean, I didn't get into a relationship with someone to.
Speaker 9 (10:25):
Settle down at fifteen.
Speaker 8 (10:28):
I wasn't choosing a lifelong partner. And Bo wrote me constantly.
I don't know if I would say that he was needy,
but he was more talking about long term. I love you,
I want to marry you. I remember he would always
put at the bottom of the letter, relax and hang
(10:49):
in there, baby. To this day, if somebody tells me
to relax, it makes my skin crawl, just assuming that
I belonged to him.
Speaker 9 (10:59):
That's the most selfish thing. That's not loving somebody.
Speaker 1 (11:06):
While Bou was in boot camp, Leah was living her
high school life. Bo was less and less on her radar,
but she was still very much on his. Their time
apart made her realize that their relationship was over.
Speaker 8 (11:19):
It was more one of those things where I just
decided to wait to discuss it until he was out.
So Bo was released from boot camp and my best
friend and I drove down to pick him up, and
he's super excited to see me, want to ride in
(11:42):
the backseat with me, and was overly affectionate. All he
could focus on was the fact that he was going
to spend the next several months in house arrest, and
that I was going to spend it with him. It
was the longest car I feel like I've ever had.
(12:05):
I did eventually muster up the courage to tell him,
and it went as terribly as you could imagine, and
it became a dynamic where it felt more territorial, and
he wanted me to come over every night because he
couldn't leave the house. There were times that if I
(12:29):
didn't go to Bow's house and I didn't go stay
with him, Bou would show up.
Speaker 9 (12:36):
He would break house arrest and come to find me.
Speaker 8 (12:42):
I didn't know how to get out of what I
was in with bo. I remember, he was upset and
he called me and called me and called me repeatedly,
and so I went to his place and I staying
in the night with him. We had sex that night,
(13:04):
which I don't know why, but we did. I overslept
the next morning for work. I left his house in
a panic, and I ended up getting in a wreck
and totaling my car, not knowing that I had just
(13:25):
conceived a child.
Speaker 1 (13:35):
Leah was pregnant at age seventeen. She spoke in confidence
to a teacher at her school about it, and her
teacher told her that she should tell her mom. Leah
decided not to.
Speaker 8 (13:48):
It wasn't real to me, but in my mind there
was no choice. I knew I was having an abortion,
and that's it. It was just very, you know, matter
of fact, like okay, well you just do it.
Speaker 9 (14:03):
I mean, I didn't have an option in my mind.
Speaker 8 (14:08):
My mom didn't believe an abortion, so I knew there
was no discussion to be had, and I knew I
didn't want kids.
Speaker 9 (14:17):
So I don't think.
Speaker 8 (14:18):
I don't think I felt anything at the time, or
I didn't let myself think about it.
Speaker 9 (14:23):
It didn't feel real to me.
Speaker 1 (14:27):
Leah did, however, break the news to Bo. They scoured
the Yellow Pages for an abortion clinic in Atlanta. They'd
eventually land on an office in Sandy Springs, but since
she was under eighteen to legally have the procedures, she
needed parental permission or a parent with her. But Bo
had a solution to that.
Speaker 8 (14:45):
So given his skill sets, he made an id for
me and we scheduled an appointment. Yeah, and I thought
at the time that that was it, that's what was happening.
There'd be nothing more to it.
Speaker 1 (15:00):
Leah scheduled the appointment January seventeenth, nineteen ninety seven. She
wasn't scared. She decided it needed to be done. But
the day which would forever take root in her memory
was the day before January sixteenth, the day the clinic
was bombed.
Speaker 10 (15:19):
I'm sitting at my desk and my boss, Jim Tapman,
came out and he goes, Mike, she's been a bomb
went off an abortion clinic up in Sandy Springs. Here's
the address, Get on up there.
Speaker 1 (15:31):
Mike Rising as a cold case homicide investigator in Walton County,
which is about forty minutes outside Atlanta, but back in
ninety seven. He was a supervisory special agent with the FBI.
Speaker 10 (15:44):
So I drive up to the location and when I
arrived at her ems people, some fire trucks, a lot
of government cars. An FBI agent came up to me.
I didn't know him, but he knew me and identified
himself and took me over to where the door of
the abortion clinic was and they had just taped it off.
(16:07):
My role was find out the lay of the land.
So who had responded to take a look at the site,
and I walked around to the northwest corner. I had
gotten my phone out. This was an old, antique, huge
Miami vice looking goofy old phone with an antenna that
you would pull out, and then I typically answered directly
(16:29):
to the number two guy in the US Attorney's office,
John Davis. Called John Davis and let him know what
was going on. At that point, I want to say
there were two or three other attorneys in the office
because they had me on a speakerphone. When the second
device went off, it goes off and I just remember
(16:51):
going fuck. I had this immediate deja vu flashback to
September fifteenth.
Speaker 1 (17:00):
It's nineteen sixty nine.
Speaker 10 (17:01):
I was hit with a rocket propel grenade in Vietnam,
and when it hit, it came from the left side.
I was actually holding a radio set and in this
case I'm holding a cell phone and a force of
the blast just shoved me a couple of feet, and
I'm thinking, I don't think I said it, but I'm
(17:23):
going not again.
Speaker 8 (17:25):
Where were you in the building and where was the explosion.
Speaker 3 (17:29):
This second explosion, about an hour later, injured a television photographer,
an ATF agent, and at least four others.
Speaker 1 (17:38):
Rob Stadler's wife rushed back from trial to her law firm,
which was housed just two stories above the abortion clinic
in the same building. Both she and Rob were standing
at the top of the hill overlooking the crime scene
when the second bomb exploded.
Speaker 3 (17:53):
It was kind of like when you're too close to
a firework and you feel it in your chest if
it goes off way too close. It was like that,
except the shockwave from the bomb enters the front part
of your brain, goes through your brain and exits the back.
It's the weirdest feeling in the world. Split second, but
(18:15):
it seemed like it lasted forever. Shrapnel was buzzing by
our heads, so at that point it was like, Okay,
they're going to be a third boone, and that's a
really frightening thing.
Speaker 5 (18:33):
No one has claimed credit for these explosions.
Speaker 6 (18:35):
Police say there were no calls to nine one one beforehand,
and clinic workers received no threats.
Speaker 3 (18:42):
I was in a funk for about six to nine months,
definitely a PTSD. That weekend, we have remote broadcasts that
we go out to a store or something and we
bring our radio truck and all that stuff, and we
always have helium balloons that we blow up and give
(19:02):
the kids or whatever. One of the balloons popped, and
I swear I jumped about five feet because again that's
just that PTSD, and it kind of gave me a
feeling of impending doom, and it really caused me. I
(19:23):
just wanted to stay at home a lot, so many
sleepless nights and thinking about how come we managed to
survive this. I really felt that I was a chest
piece being moved around that day. It's weird, bizarre feeling.
I mean. That was the thing is we came within
(19:44):
so close of losing my twin daughters. I said earlier
that it was the most important phone call I made
their playpen was directly two floors above where that bomb
went off. When the bomb went off, the first bomb,
(20:05):
it brought down the entire ceiling and the broken glass
and the debris that had piled up in the crib.
If I hadn't made that phone call, they probably still
would have been there. I can't tell you how many
times that my wife and I would go into their
(20:26):
bedroom and you know, we start crying because we came
so close to losing them, and now they're healthy and
twenty five years old, and you know, tearing up the world.
But I think that was what weighed especially heavy on us.
Speaker 1 (20:48):
It's worth noting that the timing and placement at the
second bomb is a well known military tactic used by
the US and by foreign terrorists. But what's new here
is that this was a Domestically, it may have been
the first such incident on home soil, so to speak.
In light of this, law enforcement was scrambling, just trying
(21:09):
to get their ducks in a row. But at this
point it didn't help that there were so many cooks
in the kitchen.
Speaker 5 (21:15):
I remember that bombing situation especially well because we were
all standing in this command center. Woody Johnson was head
of the FBI, and a guy Jack Calaurin, whose first
day on the jobs, head of the Atlanta ATF, were there.
They were each on the phone with their respective bosses,
and Woody's case it was Louis Free and each of
(21:38):
the directors of the FBI and ATF were saying, fine,
glad you're working together, as long as we're in charge.
So there was no decision on the ground who was
going to actually run the investigation for the Sandy Springs
clinic case. Unbelievably, they decided to call it twin bomb,
which is unfortunate for an abortion clinic, but it was
(21:58):
because the twin bombs. So the status was he still
had sent bomb the task force. He had the separate
bombing task force for TWM bomb the abortion clinic bombing,
so they were going on parallel courses, sharing information here
and there.
Speaker 1 (22:15):
The Sandy Springs bombings came six months after the bomb
at the Olympics. There were serious injuries this time, but
no one was killed. There had now been three bombings
in Atlanta, but no streamlined, cohesive plan of action from
law enforcement. Not yet. All they had to run on
were theories that didn't quite connect.
Speaker 6 (22:36):
As far as a motive. I know a lot of
you are assuming this is related to abortion clinic violence.
That is definitely a possibility, but we are not ruling
out the possibility of domestic terrorism unrelated to clinic violence.
Speaker 5 (22:49):
We took a look at what the purpose could possibly
be of the second bomb. It was put in a
location where law enforcement would gather, So there was a
working theory almost right off the bat that whoever did this,
they might have been after abortion clinics to make a statement,
but there was a good chance they were after something else,
and the theory was it was law enforcement. Going forward,
(23:11):
the protocol became always checked the perimeter for a second bomb.
Speaker 1 (23:16):
The various task forces may not have been in lockstep yet,
but they were starting to put the pieces together.
Speaker 5 (23:23):
One of the things that we focused on from the
Olympic bomb there was a directional plate, a steel plate
that backed the bomb.
Speaker 1 (23:31):
This directional plate was the first big clue.
Speaker 5 (23:34):
Fast forward to January the Sandy Springs clinic bombing, there
was directional plate in that bomb as well, so they
took samples from there and started comparing it. Not too
long after that, it was clear that these plates came
from the same basically piece of large metal, same production.
(23:55):
It looked like it was either unbelievable happenstance or these
bombs might be connected.
Speaker 1 (24:03):
While the motivation behind these three bombs was still unclear,
what was clear is that these bombs were related. Three bombs,
two locations, one with a warning called a nine to
one one, the others no warning. The pieces were beginning
to come together, but the bomber was still on the loose,
(24:23):
standing by, ready to strike again, just waiting for the
right time.
Speaker 9 (24:39):
Holy crap, what am I going to do? That was
my initial thought.
Speaker 1 (24:43):
With an appointment set for the following day at the
clinic that was just bombed, Leah's seventeen year old mind
was racing.
Speaker 8 (24:50):
This is like, maybe I'm not supposed to just make
another appointment. Maybe I need to tell my mom. Like
That's where I think it became an actual reality. I
was actually pregnant. I was actually about to just go
have an abortion without even saying anything. I think in
the back of my mind I thought that by saying
something to my mom, deep down, it meant I was
(25:11):
going to have to keep the baby, because I knew
if I told her, she wouldn't allow me to have
an abortion.
Speaker 9 (25:17):
That's what I thought.
Speaker 8 (25:20):
My stepdad was out of town, so I thought it
was a good opportunity. We were talking one night and
she it was the worst. It was the worst setup
ever because she said to me how proud she is
of me and all my accomplishments and how well I'm
doing in school and this and that, and I'm thinking, oh,
(25:41):
dear god, ladies, stop talking because I'm about to drop
the biggest bomb on you. And so I kind of
turned it around and I said, Mom, how do you
always know the right thing to do? And she said, well,
what do you mean? I said, well, it just seems
like you have all the answers. How do you know?
How do you know what the right decision is? And
(26:03):
I don't know how. But she looked at me and
she said, are you pregnant? And the relief I felt
because I didn't have to say it, but I said yes.
Speaker 9 (26:17):
She said, well, we'll deal with it, but you're having
an abortion. That was the first thing she said. And
I was like what.
Speaker 8 (26:27):
I thought, maybe I mishard her and I thought, she
said you're not and she said, yes, you are having
an abortion.
Speaker 9 (26:34):
This will ruin your life.
Speaker 8 (26:37):
I mean, I can hear it. I can hear her
saying it, this will ruin your life. I mean that
is how she's her cadence. That just exactly how she
would say it. And the following day she called the
pediatrician to get a referral to an obstetrician and she
went in with me. And I was not the typical
(26:59):
patient in the way room. I mean I was very young, obviously,
I certainly was the only one there with my mommy,
you know, And at that appointment when they did an ultrasound,
I remember sitting laying there in the room and deciding
that I was keeping the baby. And if there is
(27:24):
one thing about me that hasn't changed, when I decide something,
I'm pretty firm.
Speaker 1 (27:31):
Have you ever talked with mom about this?
Speaker 9 (27:34):
No? Not, well, not until we started talking about it.
Speaker 1 (27:39):
And you never considered having an abortion after that moment.
Speaker 8 (27:42):
No. I was a very headstrong person, and once my
mind was made up on something, it was made up.
And I mean I knew from the second sitting in
that doctor's office that I just knew it wasn't something
that I could do, wasn't a choice that I could make.
Speaker 9 (28:06):
I knew I was keeping you.
Speaker 1 (28:11):
So yeah, that's my mom. The circumstances that led to
my birth, they're pretty complicated. I'm not okay with any
of the bomber's actions. That part isn't complicated to me.
But in a fucked up kind of way, you could
say that bomb saved my life. There's a Jason isbel
(28:36):
song I always come back to. It's called Children of Children,
and there's a line in there that says, all the
years you took from her just by being born. My
mom's my best friend, So for her, I wish she
could have had those years back. But I also wish,
in this ridiculous alternative multiverse way, that I could have
(28:58):
been around to see what her life would have become
and what she would have done if she had the abortion.
None of this is logical, it's emotional. I'm glad that
I'm here, but I wonder for her what her life
could have become without a baby at seventeen. I wish
she'd had a chance to find out what she could do.
(29:19):
So obviously, this particular bomb that exploded my mom's life
has marked me, and over the years, I've become obsessed
with a paradox, this bomber, with this demented sense of
righteousness is responsible for the birth of a child me,
but also for the death of a mother, Alice Hawthorne
(29:40):
at the Olympics. This story has me holding two contradictory
truths at once. My life was saved and so many
others were destroyed. I'm going to take you through all
of it. I'm going to tell you about the ripples.
But back in ninety seven, all around Atlanta people were scared,
(30:03):
and the terror, the violence, all that was still far
from over. Once again, a bomb in the night.
Speaker 3 (30:14):
It happened outside a lesbian club called The Other Side.
Speaker 1 (30:17):
Because there's nails everywhere, and that's I bled on the
dance floor and.
Speaker 10 (30:21):
All we will be searching out the possibility that we
have a cereal bomber.
Speaker 7 (30:26):
At latimay Er Bill Campbell.
Speaker 4 (30:28):
We clearly believe that we are dealing with a deranged killer,
but one who is very clever as well.
Speaker 1 (30:49):
Flashpoint is a production of Tenderfoot TV in association with iHeartMedia.
I'm Your Host, Cola Cassio, Donald Albright and Payne Lindsay
executive producers on behalf of Tenderfoot TV. Flashpoint was created, written,
and executive produced by Doug Mattica and myself on behalf
of seven nine ninety seven. Lead producer is Alex Espastad,
(31:14):
along with producers Jamie Albright and Meredith Stadman. Our Associate
producer is witt Lukassio. Editing by Alex Espastad with additional
editing by Liam Luxon and Sidney Evans. Supervising producer is
Tracy Kaplan. Artwork by Station sixteen, original music by Jay
(31:35):
Ragsdale mixed by Dayton Cole. Thank you to Orrin Rosenbaum
and the team at Uta Beck Median Marketing and the
Nord Group. Special thanks to Angela q, Tyleie Revied, Mattica
and Tim Livingston. For more podcasts like Flashpoint, search Tenderfoot
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(31:58):
tenderfoot dot tv. Thanks for listening. Thanks for listening to
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Flashpoint is released weekly and brought to you absolutely free,
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Subscribe to tenderfoot Plus at tenderfootplus dot com or on
Apple Podcasts.
Speaker 2 (00:17):
You're listening to Flashpoint, a production of tenderfoot TV and
association with iHeartMedia. The views and opinions expressed in this
podcast are solely those of the individuals participating in the podcast.
This podcast also contains subject matter which may not be
suitable for everyone. Listener discretion is advised.
Speaker 1 (00:41):
They argue that you stop for a second, please. For months,
Richard Jewel, the security guard who was initially hailed a
hero for discovering the bomb, was investigated by law enforcement
and bombarded by the press, who framed him as the
prime suspect. They speculated that he was a villainous attention seeker,
(01:05):
one suffering from hero syndrome.
Speaker 3 (01:08):
It's also called the Messiah complex, a person who wants.
Speaker 1 (01:12):
To be godlike.
Speaker 3 (01:14):
It's again that power thing they want to feel superior
to all others.
Speaker 1 (01:18):
Then six months later, those accusations quietly faded after he
was cleared by the US government.
Speaker 4 (01:25):
With regard to Richard Jewel, I deeply regret that his
name was linked to the media. This not only damaged
mister Jewell and his reputation, but it caused the FBI
substantial damage to its investigation.
Speaker 5 (01:41):
Richard answered a lot of questions the FDI and other
long enforces who followed up, and at the end of
the day, there certainly wasn't substantial evidence. It looked like
he didn't do it.
Speaker 1 (01:51):
Retired US attorney Kent Alexander remembers the man hunt for
the Centennial Park bomber well. He showed up to our
interview in the nineteen ninety six at Leant Olympics Polo
with a framed letter that he sent to Richard Jewel
during the investigation. Can you can you read the letter?
Speaker 5 (02:07):
Sure? It's addressed to Jack Martin, who's one of several
attorneys for Richard Jewel. Says, Dear Jack, this to advise
you that, based on the evidence developed to date, your client,
Richard Jewel, is not considered a target of the federal
criminal investigation at the bombing on July twenty seven, nineteen
ninety six, at Centennial Olympic Park in Atlanta. Barring any
(02:30):
newly discovered evidence, the status will not change. I'm hopeful
that mister Jewel will provide further cooperation as a witness
in the investigation. Sincerely, Kent be Alexander, US Attorney.
Speaker 1 (02:43):
After clearing Richard Jewel, the FBI, atf and GBI, collectively
known as the Scent Bomb Task Force, we're left with
really no leads.
Speaker 5 (02:54):
We had no shortage of potential bombers. The more you
dig into things, you realize there are just a lot
of crazy people out there, so there wasn't one particular suspect.
In fact, at that point, there was still poster that
some agent had drawn up. It was a squiggly figure
of a guy sitting on a bench and something under
(03:16):
the bench, and then written in black marker was wanted
by the FBI. We called him Blobman because there was
a picture of the actual bomber, but it was so
grainy that we could make out no facial features at all,
So you just basically had this guy who looked like
kind of a blob sitting on the bench. So that
Blobman pretty much captured the investigation. There were plenty of
(03:42):
people we kept looking at, but nobody really jumped a
four as the likely bomber, much less the primary.
Speaker 1 (03:49):
Suspect episode two. Twin bomb.
Speaker 3 (04:15):
My wife at the time, and we had twins arrive
about eight months previous, so it was kind of a
crazy household when you get invaded with kids all of
a sudden. So my day started at four am, and
it was a regular work day.
Speaker 1 (04:33):
It's January sixteenth, nineteen ninety seven, six months after the
bombing at the Olympics, and Rob Stadler is the news
director at Star ninety four, a popular radio station in Atlanta.
Speaker 3 (04:46):
And because we have the twins, I was able to
get away after the show ended at nine and go
to my wife's law office was located on the third
floor of the Sandy Springs Profes Building.
Speaker 1 (05:01):
Just off Roswell Road. The Sandy Springs Professional Building was
a three story complex that housed a handful of different offices.
On the top floor was Rob's wife's law firm. On
the first was Atlanta North Side Planning Services, an abortion clinic.
Rob's wife was a few counties north that morning for
a trial.
Speaker 3 (05:23):
We'd set up a kind of a nursery inside the office,
so I would stop by and scoop them up and
take them home. And it was dad duty the rest
of the day, and I called the office up on
my cell phone and it was probably the most important
call I made in my life. I told them the
folks at the office, I said, I'm kind of a rush.
(05:46):
I won't really want to get home, so if you
could take the girls out of the crib and have
them ready to go in their carry all chairs, that
would be great. And I went up to the third
floor and walked into the office there the girls were
right there in the lobby part of the law office,
and I sat down just for a second to hold
(06:08):
one of them and noticed a blue light, bright flash
in the window, and then a tremendous, tremendous blast, and
it just the shaking was unbelievable. Ceiling tiles started coming down,
(06:29):
things were happening in the office is collapsing and one
of the people in the office said that was a bomb.
Speaker 1 (06:38):
Rob and his twin girls made it out of the
building safely with many of the staff. Immediately, yellow tape
was rolled out and the area was labeled a crime scene.
Speaker 3 (06:47):
We put the girls, my daughters in my mini pickup,
and the office staff, one of them, drove them to
our house in Sandy Springs, away from the site. That
gave me a chance then to do my job being
the news guy on Star ninety four. It's like, okay,
this is a news story. I got as close as
(07:09):
I could to where the smoke was coming out from
the first floor window where the abortion clinic was located.
So then I dialed up my cell phone and then
called the radio station and jumped on Live.
Speaker 1 (07:26):
E three Industrial Boulevards, darn ninty four.
Speaker 6 (07:29):
It's nine thirty five and we go to Rob Standler,
our news director, with a breaking news story.
Speaker 7 (07:33):
Steve, I am at two seventy five Carpenter Drive. This
is a three story building that parallels Roswell Road. It's
right behind Good Old Days in Sandy Springs where a
suspected bomb has gone off in this building. I was
on the third floor of this building at the time
when we were rocked by a flash and a loud boom,
(07:54):
and it shattered windows on the southeastern part of the building.
Speaker 8 (08:02):
I was in the car with a couple of my
friends and we were listening to radio.
Speaker 7 (08:10):
You can hear the sirens coming. Fire and Cruise are
just now arriving. I can tell you what happened as
best as I can.
Speaker 9 (08:17):
I was on the third floor of.
Speaker 8 (08:18):
The facility so and I think it was in the morning,
and they said there had been an explosion at an
abortion clinic in Sandy Springs, and my stomach dropped and
I couldn't speak. I mean, all I could think was
holy shit, Like, what am I going to do? Now?
Speaker 1 (08:45):
I'm talking again with Leah. You probably remember her from
the last episode. Leah also grew up in Atlanta, lived
here all her life, and she remembers of the Olympic
Park bombing well, but at the time, she couldn't know
that the bombing was just the first in a series
of events that would forever change her life in the
lives of her entire family.
Speaker 8 (09:06):
I was born knowing what I want to do from
day one, knowing what I want to be, where I
want to go to college. I didn't want to get married,
didn't want kids. I've always known.
Speaker 1 (09:20):
Among the many stories connected to the Olympic Park bombing,
Leah's was unexpected and powerful, also complicated. It began the
year before the Centennial Olympics.
Speaker 8 (09:32):
I met Bo when I was fifteen. I was a sophomore.
Bo was three years older. He had gotten involved with
a group of guys that were stealing cars. He was
awaiting trial for a series of felonies.
Speaker 1 (09:50):
Leah and Bow began dating, but the way you do
in high school, and you don't know much yet, and
there's not much to a relationship except the fact that
you're just together. It wasn't too long before Bow would
be convicted it would have to serve time in prison.
After six months behind bars, he took a deal which
required him to serve six additional months of boot camp,
followed by house arrest.
Speaker 8 (10:12):
And for me, the absence and the time away made
me realize, this is a lot to wrap my head around.
I mean, I didn't get into a relationship with someone to.
Speaker 9 (10:25):
Settle down at fifteen.
Speaker 8 (10:28):
I wasn't choosing a lifelong partner. And Bo wrote me constantly.
I don't know if I would say that he was needy,
but he was more talking about long term. I love you,
I want to marry you. I remember he would always
put at the bottom of the letter, relax and hang
(10:49):
in there, baby. To this day, if somebody tells me
to relax, it makes my skin crawl, just assuming that
I belonged to him.
Speaker 9 (10:59):
That's the most selfish thing. That's not loving somebody.
Speaker 1 (11:06):
While Bou was in boot camp, Leah was living her
high school life. Bo was less and less on her radar,
but she was still very much on his. Their time
apart made her realize that their relationship was over.
Speaker 8 (11:19):
It was more one of those things where I just
decided to wait to discuss it until he was out.
So Bo was released from boot camp and my best
friend and I drove down to pick him up, and
he's super excited to see me, want to ride in
(11:42):
the backseat with me, and was overly affectionate. All he
could focus on was the fact that he was going
to spend the next several months in house arrest, and
that I was going to spend it with him. It
was the longest car I feel like I've ever had.
(12:05):
I did eventually muster up the courage to tell him,
and it went as terribly as you could imagine, and
it became a dynamic where it felt more territorial, and
he wanted me to come over every night because he
couldn't leave the house. There were times that if I
(12:29):
didn't go to Bow's house and I didn't go stay
with him, Bou would show up.
Speaker 9 (12:36):
He would break house arrest and come to find me.
Speaker 8 (12:42):
I didn't know how to get out of what I
was in with bo. I remember, he was upset and
he called me and called me and called me repeatedly,
and so I went to his place and I staying
in the night with him. We had sex that night,
(13:04):
which I don't know why, but we did. I overslept
the next morning for work. I left his house in
a panic, and I ended up getting in a wreck
and totaling my car, not knowing that I had just
(13:25):
conceived a child.
Speaker 1 (13:35):
Leah was pregnant at age seventeen. She spoke in confidence
to a teacher at her school about it, and her
teacher told her that she should tell her mom. Leah
decided not to.
Speaker 8 (13:48):
It wasn't real to me, but in my mind there
was no choice. I knew I was having an abortion,
and that's it. It was just very, you know, matter
of fact, like okay, well you just do it.
Speaker 9 (14:03):
I mean, I didn't have an option in my mind.
Speaker 8 (14:08):
My mom didn't believe an abortion, so I knew there
was no discussion to be had, and I knew I
didn't want kids.
Speaker 9 (14:17):
So I don't think.
Speaker 8 (14:18):
I don't think I felt anything at the time, or
I didn't let myself think about it.
Speaker 9 (14:23):
It didn't feel real to me.
Speaker 1 (14:27):
Leah did, however, break the news to Bo. They scoured
the Yellow Pages for an abortion clinic in Atlanta. They'd
eventually land on an office in Sandy Springs, but since
she was under eighteen to legally have the procedures, she
needed parental permission or a parent with her. But Bo
had a solution to that.
Speaker 8 (14:45):
So given his skill sets, he made an id for
me and we scheduled an appointment. Yeah, and I thought
at the time that that was it, that's what was happening.
There'd be nothing more to it.
Speaker 1 (15:00):
Leah scheduled the appointment January seventeenth, nineteen ninety seven. She
wasn't scared. She decided it needed to be done. But
the day which would forever take root in her memory
was the day before January sixteenth, the day the clinic
was bombed.
Speaker 10 (15:19):
I'm sitting at my desk and my boss, Jim Tapman,
came out and he goes, Mike, she's been a bomb
went off an abortion clinic up in Sandy Springs. Here's
the address, Get on up there.
Speaker 1 (15:31):
Mike Rising as a cold case homicide investigator in Walton County,
which is about forty minutes outside Atlanta, but back in
ninety seven. He was a supervisory special agent with the FBI.
Speaker 10 (15:44):
So I drive up to the location and when I
arrived at her ems people, some fire trucks, a lot
of government cars. An FBI agent came up to me.
I didn't know him, but he knew me and identified
himself and took me over to where the door of
the abortion clinic was and they had just taped it off.
(16:07):
My role was find out the lay of the land.
So who had responded to take a look at the site,
and I walked around to the northwest corner. I had
gotten my phone out. This was an old, antique, huge
Miami vice looking goofy old phone with an antenna that
you would pull out, and then I typically answered directly
(16:29):
to the number two guy in the US Attorney's office,
John Davis. Called John Davis and let him know what
was going on. At that point, I want to say
there were two or three other attorneys in the office
because they had me on a speakerphone. When the second
device went off, it goes off and I just remember
(16:51):
going fuck. I had this immediate deja vu flashback to
September fifteenth.
Speaker 1 (17:00):
It's nineteen sixty nine.
Speaker 10 (17:01):
I was hit with a rocket propel grenade in Vietnam,
and when it hit, it came from the left side.
I was actually holding a radio set and in this
case I'm holding a cell phone and a force of
the blast just shoved me a couple of feet, and
I'm thinking, I don't think I said it, but I'm
(17:23):
going not again.
Speaker 8 (17:25):
Where were you in the building and where was the explosion.
Speaker 3 (17:29):
This second explosion, about an hour later, injured a television photographer,
an ATF agent, and at least four others.
Speaker 1 (17:38):
Rob Stadler's wife rushed back from trial to her law firm,
which was housed just two stories above the abortion clinic
in the same building. Both she and Rob were standing
at the top of the hill overlooking the crime scene
when the second bomb exploded.
Speaker 3 (17:53):
It was kind of like when you're too close to
a firework and you feel it in your chest if
it goes off way too close. It was like that,
except the shockwave from the bomb enters the front part
of your brain, goes through your brain and exits the back.
It's the weirdest feeling in the world. Split second, but
(18:15):
it seemed like it lasted forever. Shrapnel was buzzing by
our heads, so at that point it was like, Okay,
they're going to be a third boone, and that's a
really frightening thing.
Speaker 5 (18:33):
No one has claimed credit for these explosions.
Speaker 6 (18:35):
Police say there were no calls to nine one one beforehand,
and clinic workers received no threats.
Speaker 3 (18:42):
I was in a funk for about six to nine months,
definitely a PTSD. That weekend, we have remote broadcasts that
we go out to a store or something and we
bring our radio truck and all that stuff, and we
always have helium balloons that we blow up and give
(19:02):
the kids or whatever. One of the balloons popped, and
I swear I jumped about five feet because again that's
just that PTSD, and it kind of gave me a
feeling of impending doom, and it really caused me. I
(19:23):
just wanted to stay at home a lot, so many
sleepless nights and thinking about how come we managed to
survive this. I really felt that I was a chest
piece being moved around that day. It's weird, bizarre feeling.
I mean. That was the thing is we came within
(19:44):
so close of losing my twin daughters. I said earlier
that it was the most important phone call I made
their playpen was directly two floors above where that bomb
went off. When the bomb went off, the first bomb,
(20:05):
it brought down the entire ceiling and the broken glass
and the debris that had piled up in the crib.
If I hadn't made that phone call, they probably still
would have been there. I can't tell you how many
times that my wife and I would go into their
(20:26):
bedroom and you know, we start crying because we came
so close to losing them, and now they're healthy and
twenty five years old, and you know, tearing up the world.
But I think that was what weighed especially heavy on us.
Speaker 1 (20:48):
It's worth noting that the timing and placement at the
second bomb is a well known military tactic used by
the US and by foreign terrorists. But what's new here
is that this was a Domestically, it may have been
the first such incident on home soil, so to speak.
In light of this, law enforcement was scrambling, just trying
(21:09):
to get their ducks in a row. But at this
point it didn't help that there were so many cooks
in the kitchen.
Speaker 5 (21:15):
I remember that bombing situation especially well because we were
all standing in this command center. Woody Johnson was head
of the FBI, and a guy Jack Calaurin, whose first
day on the jobs, head of the Atlanta ATF, were there.
They were each on the phone with their respective bosses,
and Woody's case it was Louis Free and each of
(21:38):
the directors of the FBI and ATF were saying, fine,
glad you're working together, as long as we're in charge.
So there was no decision on the ground who was
going to actually run the investigation for the Sandy Springs
clinic case. Unbelievably, they decided to call it twin bomb,
which is unfortunate for an abortion clinic, but it was
(21:58):
because the twin bombs. So the status was he still
had sent bomb the task force. He had the separate
bombing task force for TWM bomb the abortion clinic bombing,
so they were going on parallel courses, sharing information here
and there.
Speaker 1 (22:15):
The Sandy Springs bombings came six months after the bomb
at the Olympics. There were serious injuries this time, but
no one was killed. There had now been three bombings
in Atlanta, but no streamlined, cohesive plan of action from
law enforcement. Not yet. All they had to run on
were theories that didn't quite connect.
Speaker 6 (22:36):
As far as a motive. I know a lot of
you are assuming this is related to abortion clinic violence.
That is definitely a possibility, but we are not ruling
out the possibility of domestic terrorism unrelated to clinic violence.
Speaker 5 (22:49):
We took a look at what the purpose could possibly
be of the second bomb. It was put in a
location where law enforcement would gather, So there was a
working theory almost right off the bat that whoever did this,
they might have been after abortion clinics to make a statement,
but there was a good chance they were after something else,
and the theory was it was law enforcement. Going forward,
(23:11):
the protocol became always checked the perimeter for a second bomb.
Speaker 1 (23:16):
The various task forces may not have been in lockstep yet,
but they were starting to put the pieces together.
Speaker 5 (23:23):
One of the things that we focused on from the
Olympic bomb there was a directional plate, a steel plate
that backed the bomb.
Speaker 1 (23:31):
This directional plate was the first big clue.
Speaker 5 (23:34):
Fast forward to January the Sandy Springs clinic bombing, there
was directional plate in that bomb as well, so they
took samples from there and started comparing it. Not too
long after that, it was clear that these plates came
from the same basically piece of large metal, same production.
(23:55):
It looked like it was either unbelievable happenstance or these
bombs might be connected.
Speaker 1 (24:03):
While the motivation behind these three bombs was still unclear,
what was clear is that these bombs were related. Three bombs,
two locations, one with a warning called a nine to
one one, the others no warning. The pieces were beginning
to come together, but the bomber was still on the loose,
(24:23):
standing by, ready to strike again, just waiting for the
right time.
Speaker 9 (24:39):
Holy crap, what am I going to do? That was
my initial thought.
Speaker 1 (24:43):
With an appointment set for the following day at the
clinic that was just bombed, Leah's seventeen year old mind
was racing.
Speaker 8 (24:50):
This is like, maybe I'm not supposed to just make
another appointment. Maybe I need to tell my mom. Like
That's where I think it became an actual reality. I
was actually pregnant. I was actually about to just go
have an abortion without even saying anything. I think in
the back of my mind I thought that by saying
something to my mom, deep down, it meant I was
(25:11):
going to have to keep the baby, because I knew
if I told her, she wouldn't allow me to have
an abortion.
Speaker 9 (25:17):
That's what I thought.
Speaker 8 (25:20):
My stepdad was out of town, so I thought it
was a good opportunity. We were talking one night and
she it was the worst. It was the worst setup
ever because she said to me how proud she is
of me and all my accomplishments and how well I'm
doing in school and this and that, and I'm thinking, oh,
(25:41):
dear god, ladies, stop talking because I'm about to drop
the biggest bomb on you. And so I kind of
turned it around and I said, Mom, how do you
always know the right thing to do? And she said, well,
what do you mean? I said, well, it just seems
like you have all the answers. How do you know?
How do you know what the right decision is? And
(26:03):
I don't know how. But she looked at me and
she said, are you pregnant? And the relief I felt
because I didn't have to say it, but I said yes.
Speaker 9 (26:17):
She said, well, we'll deal with it, but you're having
an abortion. That was the first thing she said. And
I was like what.
Speaker 8 (26:27):
I thought, maybe I mishard her and I thought, she
said you're not and she said, yes, you are having
an abortion.
Speaker 9 (26:34):
This will ruin your life.
Speaker 8 (26:37):
I mean, I can hear it. I can hear her
saying it, this will ruin your life. I mean that
is how she's her cadence. That just exactly how she
would say it. And the following day she called the
pediatrician to get a referral to an obstetrician and she
went in with me. And I was not the typical
(26:59):
patient in the way room. I mean I was very young, obviously,
I certainly was the only one there with my mommy,
you know, And at that appointment when they did an ultrasound,
I remember sitting laying there in the room and deciding
that I was keeping the baby. And if there is
(27:24):
one thing about me that hasn't changed, when I decide something,
I'm pretty firm.
Speaker 1 (27:31):
Have you ever talked with mom about this?
Speaker 9 (27:34):
No? Not, well, not until we started talking about it.
Speaker 1 (27:39):
And you never considered having an abortion after that moment.
Speaker 8 (27:42):
No. I was a very headstrong person, and once my
mind was made up on something, it was made up.
And I mean I knew from the second sitting in
that doctor's office that I just knew it wasn't something
that I could do, wasn't a choice that I could make.
Speaker 9 (28:06):
I knew I was keeping you.
Speaker 1 (28:11):
So yeah, that's my mom. The circumstances that led to
my birth, they're pretty complicated. I'm not okay with any
of the bomber's actions. That part isn't complicated to me.
But in a fucked up kind of way, you could
say that bomb saved my life. There's a Jason isbel
(28:36):
song I always come back to. It's called Children of Children,
and there's a line in there that says, all the
years you took from her just by being born. My
mom's my best friend, So for her, I wish she
could have had those years back. But I also wish,
in this ridiculous alternative multiverse way, that I could have
(28:58):
been around to see what her life would have become
and what she would have done if she had the abortion.
None of this is logical, it's emotional. I'm glad that
I'm here, but I wonder for her what her life
could have become without a baby at seventeen. I wish
she'd had a chance to find out what she could do.
(29:19):
So obviously, this particular bomb that exploded my mom's life
has marked me, and over the years, I've become obsessed
with a paradox, this bomber, with this demented sense of
righteousness is responsible for the birth of a child me,
but also for the death of a mother, Alice Hawthorne
(29:40):
at the Olympics. This story has me holding two contradictory
truths at once. My life was saved and so many
others were destroyed. I'm going to take you through all
of it. I'm going to tell you about the ripples.
But back in ninety seven, all around Atlanta people were scared,
(30:03):
and the terror, the violence, all that was still far
from over. Once again, a bomb in the night.
Speaker 3 (30:14):
It happened outside a lesbian club called The Other Side.
Speaker 1 (30:17):
Because there's nails everywhere, and that's I bled on the
dance floor and.
Speaker 10 (30:21):
All we will be searching out the possibility that we
have a cereal bomber.
Speaker 7 (30:26):
At latimay Er Bill Campbell.
Speaker 4 (30:28):
We clearly believe that we are dealing with a deranged killer,
but one who is very clever as well.
Speaker 1 (30:49):
Flashpoint is a production of Tenderfoot TV in association with iHeartMedia.
I'm Your Host, Cola Cassio, Donald Albright and Payne Lindsay
executive producers on behalf of Tenderfoot TV. Flashpoint was created, written,
and executive produced by Doug Mattica and myself on behalf
of seven nine ninety seven. Lead producer is Alex Espastad,
(31:14):
along with producers Jamie Albright and Meredith Stadman. Our Associate
producer is witt Lukassio. Editing by Alex Espastad with additional
editing by Liam Luxon and Sidney Evans. Supervising producer is
Tracy Kaplan. Artwork by Station sixteen, original music by Jay
(31:35):
Ragsdale mixed by Dayton Cole. Thank you to Orrin Rosenbaum
and the team at Uta Beck Median Marketing and the
Nord Group. Special thanks to Angela q, Tyleie Revied, Mattica
and Tim Livingston. For more podcasts like Flashpoint, search Tenderfoot
TV on your favorite podcast stat or visit us at
(31:58):
tenderfoot dot tv. Thanks for listening. Thanks for listening to
this episode of Flashpoint. This series is released weekly absolutely free,
(32:19):
but for ad free listening, early access and exclusive bonuses,
you can subscribe to Tenderfoot Plus on Apple Podcasts or
at tenderfootplus dot com
Host
Cole Locascio
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