THE TENNESSEAN V.92,N.182 JUNE 30, 1996
SPECIAL REPORT
OKLAHOMA CITY PROBE MAY TOUCH TENNESSEE
 Two men are charged in the Oklahoma City bombing that killed
168: Timothy McVeigh and Terry Nichols.
 But many people, including federal grand jurors, believe others
were involved, based on eyewitness accounts. The grandparents of
two children killed in the blast believe a German citizen with
Tennessee ties, Andreas Strassmeir, may be able to shed light on
a wider conspiracy. He says he knows nothing. Here's what
witnesses say:
By Laura Frank
Staff Writer
 Two weeks before a truck bomb crumbled the Murrah Federal
Building in Oklahoma City, bombing suspect Timothy McVeigh
telephoned a remote religious compound near Oklahoma-Arkansas
border.
 Records of the call, which have been widely leaked to the media
and were obtained by The Tennessean, show it lasted 1 minute and
56 seconds. No one disputes this.
 People at the religious compound, known as Elohim City, say the
call was for "Andy"- Andy Strassmeir.
 They say, too, he was not there and never took the call.
 But many people wonder why McVeigh wanted to talk to Strassmeir
in those last few days before the bombing.
 McVeigh simply is not saying.
 And Strassmeir, a former German army officer and the son of a
prominent German politician, says he simply does not know.
 Strassmeir, who obtained a Tennessee driver's license in 1992
claiming a Knoxville address, returned to Germany three months
after the bombing.
 At least three eyewitnesses say they saw Strassmeir in the tiny
Kansas town where prosecutors allege McVeigh and Terry Nichols
bought and stockpiled the ingredients of a bomb, and where
McVeigh is charged with renting a truck and filling it with the
explosive combination f ammonium nitrate and diesel fuel.
 Strassmeir says he met McVeigh only once, casually in October
1994, at a gun show in Tulsa.
 "I don't know this McVeigh guy,"Strassmeir said in a telephone
interview from Berlin. "We met at a gun show once and talked for
five minutes."
 Moreover, Strassmeir told The Tennessean he has never been to
Kansas, claims to have an alibi for the weeks before the bombing
and says he knows nothing about the fertilizer-and-fuel bomb that
killed 168 people and injured more than 500 on April 19, 1995.
 Glenn and Kathy Wilburn, whose two grandsons were killed in the
blast, have deep doubts about Strassmeir's statements.
 The image of the bloodied and broken bodies of their 2- and 3-
year-old grandsons is seared in the Wilburns' minds. But they are
haunted by the accounts of witnesses who say a man they have
identified as Strassmeir appeared in central Kansas about the
same time as McVeigh and Nichols.
 The Wilburns believe Strassmeir's relationship with McVeigh goes
deeper than Strassmeir is admitting and that Strassmeir may be
privy to more information about the bombing than he is letting
on.
 They have no documentary evidence, like credit card receipts or
photographs, to support their claim. But they cite statements by
witnesses who describe a tall, thin, German man who, at least one
witness claims, was a frequent face in the tiny towns that
surround Fort Riley, Kan.
 The Tennessean talked to some of those witnesses:
 Catina Lawson, 23, who lived in Herington, Kan., during 1992,
says she attended numerous parties in central Kansas that summer
where she remembers seeing both McVeigh and Strassmeir.
 That was the summer of her high school graduation and a time of
newfound freedom, Catina recalls. There were lots of parties, at
lakes and in pastures and at homes around Fort Riley, the Army
base where McVeigh had been stationed.
 Oftentimes, the local young women and the soldiers would get
together to have some fun.
 Lawson says she distinctly remembers McVeigh, thinking him to be
"kind of cute" and assuming him to be a soldier.
 She cannot, however, recall specific times or places she met the
German man she knew as Andy.
 "He was just someone you'd see every once in a while," Lawson
said in a recent interview in Wheatland, Wyo., where she now
lives.
 Lawson says she is bothered that she can't remember the places
or dates, but says she remembers details about Strassmeir that
support her claim.
 He liked to wear all black, she recalled. He was tall, skinny
and pale, with crooked teeth and sunken eyes surrounded by dark
circles.
 "And he had this accent," Lawson recalls. "I remember thinking
he was rude, Every time you talked to him, he wanted to argue
with you."
 Lawson says she cannot remember what they argued about.
 Digging into what she says are sometimes hazy memories of those
parties, Lawson cannot recall seeing McVeigh and Strassmeir
talking to each other.
 But when shown a photograph of Strassmeir, she instantly
recognizes it, saying "that's Andy. I'm positive."
 Larry and Cathy Wild are anything but reckless teen-agers
engaged in the frolics of youth. He's a retired high school
coach, she a housewife.
 Yet, both say they saw and talked to Andy Strassmeir at a lake
north of Herington the week before the Oklahoma City bombing.
 "I said,'Your dialect is really different. Are you a soldier?'"
Larry Wild recalled. "He said, 'No.' I said, 'Do you work for the
government?' He just kind of laughed."
 Based on statements from these witnesses, and others the
Wilburns have talked with, they believe Strassmeir has not been
entirely forthcoming about his knowledge of McVeigh, and possibly
the bombing.
 The Wilburns would like to take his statement under oath. They
might get their chance.
 Their daughter, Edye Smith, has filed a $30 million lawsuit
against McVeigh and "unknown others" for the deaths of her two
sons. As part of that, McVeigh's lawyer wants to question
Strassmeir.
 Strassmeir and his attorney suggest an alternative theory for
how and why eyewitnesses claim he was in Kansas: McVeigh's
defense team has sent an investigator around central Kansas with
a photo of Strassmeir suggesting to people that they might have
seen him.
 Their goal, according to Strassmeir: To cloud the credibility of
the witnesses, who also claim they saw McVeigh. Using this
strategy, he believes, McVeigh's lawyers hope to spare him from
the death penalty.
 The Wilds and Lawson say they have been shown photos by
McVeigh's defense team but were not led to identify Strassmeir.
And, they note, the FBI showed them pictures of Strassmeir first.
WHO IS ANDY STRASSMEIR?
 Strassmeir says he first came to the United States in 1988 to
attend the 125th anniversary of the Battle of Gettysburg. He
traveled between countries for a few years, then returned to the
United States in 1991 hoping to stay, adds his lawyer, Kirk Lyons
of Black Mountain, N.C.
 Vincent Petruskie, a retired Air Force colonel and father of an
acquaintance and fellow Civil War buff, tried to help him get a
job with the Drug Enforcement Agency or Immigration and
Naturalization Service, Strassmeir says. But no job was offered.
 in August 1992, Strassmeir got a Tennessee driver's license and
registered his 1983 Chevrolet by claiming a residence at 7613
Thorngrove Pike on the eastern edge of Knoxville.
 Strassmeir says he lived there "a short time." His lawyer says
Strassmeir might have spent the night there a few times, but used
the address mainly to circumvent stricter auto insurance
requirements of other states where Strassmeir stayed.
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