(1:00 a.m.) April 19, 1995: Gas Station Attendant Sees Oklahoma City Bomber Refuel Truck

A gas station attendant, Fred Skrdla, sees a large yellow Ryder truck drive into his station, the Cimarron Travel Plaza truck stop, outside of Billings, Oklahoma. Billings is about 80 miles north of Oklahoma City. Skrdla will later tell investigators that he sees a man, presumably Oklahoma City bomber Timothy McVeigh (see April 15, 1995), buy gasoline sometime between 1:00 and 3:00 a.m. The man pays in cash, Skrdla remembers. Skrdla will say he is busy at the time and does not recall if the man has a companion. When he later sees composite drawings of “John Doe No. 1” and “John Doe No. 2” (see April 20, 1995), he will recognize one of them as the man who bought the gasoline. When he later sees television coverage of McVeigh being “perp walked” out of the Noble County Courthouse in Perry, Oklahoma (see April 21, 1995), he is sure that the man he saw paying for the gasoline was McVeigh. [New York Times, 1/13/1997; Serrano, 1998, pp. 151]