For Immediate Release
August 25, 1999

Washington D.C.
FBI National Press Office

The FBI today issued the following statement:

In response to recent inquires about events at Waco, Texas, the FBI conducted a further search of our files and has come across information that suggests pyrotechnic devices may have been used in the early morning of April 19, 1993.

A preliminary review of this information indicates that the FBI may have used a very limited number of military type CS gas canisters on the morning of April 19, 1993, in an attempt to penetrate the roof of an underground bunker away from the main Branch Davidian compound. Unlike civilian CS gas that was used by the FBI in far greater quantities that day, the military CS gas canisters may have contained a substance that is designed to disperse the gas using a pyrotechnic mixture.

We continue to believe that law enforcement did not cause the fire.

Nonetheless, Attorney General Reno and FBI Director Louis J. Freeh have ordered a full review of the facts and circumstances surrounding the use of the military CS gas canisters on that day.

Although some questions about the use of the military CS gas rounds remain unanswered at this time, all available indications are that those rounds were not directed at the main wooden compound, they did not land near the wooden compound, and they were discharged several hours before the fire started.