Book details toll exacted by FBI years
New book "Facing Down Evil" tells the story of former FBI agent turned MSNBC talking head Clint Van Zandt's work with David Koresh, Timothy McVeigh and the Unabomber
Date published: 9/15/2006
By MICHAEL ZITZ
From time to time, people ask Clint Van Zandt if he's seen a new movie about the investigation of a particularly heinous crime.
"No," he'll say. "I spent my whole life doing that. I'm not gonna pay to see that."
For years, Van Zandt, now a news analyst for MSNBC, was part of the FBI's Behavioral Science Unit at Quantico upon which the film "Silence of the Lambs" is based.
Besides, he says, movies aren't true to life. Spotsylvania County resident Van Zandt knows the real stories firsthand.
His new book, "Facing Down Evil: Life on the Edge as an FBI Hostage Negotiator," written with Daniel Paisner and published this month, describes the reality of dealing with major crimes and crises situations.
Van Zandt directly negotiated with Branch Davidian leader David Koresh in Waco, Texas, but was unable to achieve a peaceable resolution.
A devout Christian, he had long discussions with Koresh about the Bible, trying to get through to the religious cult leader as pressure increased to "go tactical."
Finally, things did, with the FBI crashing down the walls of the compound. And 85 people--many women and children--died in a fire set by their own leaders.
He said he's been interviewed about Waco hundreds of times, "and every time it brings it back to me. I'll lie in bed that night and think of those children who died.
"I wish I'd been a stronger voice."
"Even though the Branch Davidians set that fire, we, the FBI, poured some of the emotional fuel on that fire," he said.
He listened while "Koresh told me why he had the right to have sex with prepubescent children. He called me Brother Clint. I said I didn't see in the Bible where Christ would sacrifice his sheep--that 'He went out looking for lost sheep, and you're sacrificing your entire flock.' "
Van Zandt is a former U.S. Army intelligence agent and Vietnam War vet who retired from the FBI after 25 years of service both as the FBI's Chief Hostage Negotiator and a supervisor in the bureau's Behavioral Sciences Unit. When he retired, he started Van Zandt Associations Inc., an international threat-and risk-assessment group that does consulting work.
He's made over 3,000 appearances on television, most as a crime news analyst for MSNBC. About 20 times a month, he travels from his home to a studio in Washington to do live "talking head" segments for MSNBC news and talk shows.
To reach MICHAEL ZITZ: 540/374-5408
Email: mikez@freelancestar.com
Van Zandt's identification of "Unabomber" Ted Kaczynski, which led directly to Van Zandt's becoming a TV news analyst when Kaczynski's brother held a press conference and credited him with being the key player in solving the case. Over 17 years, Ted Kaczynski injured, maimed, or killed 27 people in 16 bombings.
The frenzy of publicity over the resolution of the case led to a Van Zandt appearance on Larry King's CNN talk show and an offer to work for MSNBC.
His children went with him to the studio for that pivotal first national TV interview and it didn't go well, he said. When King asked him what one should do if one believes a bomb has arrived in the mail, a squirming Van Zandt joked as his children made faces off-camera, "Let your kids open it."
Despite that, he was impressive enough to get offers to do analysis for a living.
Profiling Timothy McVeigh, the Oklahoma City bomber. Van Zandt was the first to connect the dots with the anniversary of Waco, even as the FBI mistakenly focused on Middle Eastern terrorists.
An 18-hour stalemate at a Sperryville farmhouse in which a young woman and her young son were held at gunpoint by the boy's biological father. Van Zandt felt he had no choice but to draw the hostage-taker out of the house to be taken down by a sniper.
The gunman emerged with a knife at the woman's throat and the boy sitting on his shoulders.
"You stand there and you make a very analytical decision," he said in an interview with The Free Lance-Star.
"You say, 'It's my opinion as a negotiator that if we don't take some tactical action, he will kill this woman and his child.' When I said that, I signed that guy's death warrant. It's one thing when you fire in self defense. It's another thing when [work] as a negotiator brings about the death of a human being."
A 1991 prison riot in Talladega, Fla., involving Cuban detainees from the Mariel Boatlift. Van Zandt was nearly within arms-length of an inmate holding a knife to a female hostage's throat. The woman silently moved her lips, begging him for help, saying she had children.
The book also contains a chapter on what to do if you fear your own child may have been abducted.
And Van Zandt has done a DVD advising parents on how to protect their children from predators.
After experiencing the kind of horror he did at Waco, he said he sometimes returned home to Spotsylvania suffering from post-traumatic stress syndrome.
"I'd literally see my own kids as I came through the door and start crying," he said in an interview. "I realized it could have been one of my own kids."
He said his career was worth it, but that he definitely lost parts of the man he had been.
"You're like a piece of wood and there's a master carver at work. You're becoming this wood figure that's worthy of having," he said in an interview. "And yet, pieces of you emotionally and physically are coming off. And it makes you a little bit different." |
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Date published: 9/15/2006
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