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The Waco Standoff is a sad reminder of how one man can cause so much destruction. The mission was supposed to go over smoothly without any problems. Instead, it turned into a fifty- two day ordeal with no compromise. This ordeal ended with the deaths of many innocent men, women, and children.

Vernon Wayne Howell was brought into the world in nineteen fifty-nine as an illegitimate child. He grew up near the suburbs of Dallas. Vernon was raised in the Adventist Church where his grandmother took him, which may explain why his strongest subject was religion. He would spend hours reading the Bible. His high school classmates complained that Vernon lectured too much about the Bible (Reavis 23-24).

In nineteen eighty-one the Seventh-day Adventist banished Vernon from the church. He left for Waco where he began preaching sermons to the Branch Davidians cult. He claimed he was the seventh angel of the Book of Revelation in the Bible. The cult members accepted him and proclaimed him as the leader of the church (Streissguth139-14). George Roden, the son of Benjamin and Lois Roden, became Vernon’s main rival and kept him from becoming the leader of the B

Both agencies and the press watched seventy-eight Branch Davidians die a painful death. Koresh and several other members of the cult died of gunshot wounds. Eleven people escaped the fire, but seventeen children died in the fire. The fire caused many religious organizations to claim the Branch Davidians were victimized by the government. Janet Reno, of the Department of Justice, testified and claimed responsibility for the attack in April. Few people believed the government had no right to raid the religious compound

The second raid ended at nine A.M. Around noon, Koresh ordered some of the cult members to pour lamp fuel out and light it. Within minutes, the whole compound was in flames. The fire ended the fifty-one day standoff (Streissguth 150). They were video taped as they spread fuel to the fire (Reno 2).

ranch Davidians. Venon was again banished from this church. Forty of the members stayed loyal to him (Reavis 24).

On March twenty ninth, the Federal Bureau of Investigation allowed lawyers to enter the compound to meet their clients. Dick De Guerin, Koresh’s lawyer, expressed that surrender was coming. On April fourteenth, Koresh promised to surrender when he finished a manuscript on the biblical seven seals (19). Koresh let the lawyers believe he only needed a few more days to complete the seven seals. The Federal Bureau of Investigation sho

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