ROANOKE TIMES
Copyright (c) 1995, Roanoke Times
DATE: Thursday, December 14, 1995 TAG: 9512140060
SECTION: NATIONAL/INTERNATIONAL PAGE: A1 EDITION: METRO
DATELINE: VAL VERDE, CALIF.
SOURCE: Associated Press
note: below
BAGS OF EVIDENCE were confiscated Wednesday from the home of a man who has been questioned about the October derailment of Amtrak's Sunset Limited.
FBI agents hunting for the Arizona Amtrak saboteur raided the mountain home of a railroad contractor Wednesday and took him away for questioning, along with bags of evidence.
John Ernest Olin, 32, has been questioned several times previously, said his lawyer, Allan Sarkin.
A private contractor who worked for the railroads, he rented the house about 40 miles northwest of Los Angeles where he lives with his girlfriend and her child.
``He's a suspect, as is anybody who worked on the railroads,'' Sarkin said outside the house. A railroad crossing sign adorned the front gate, and a pickup truck in the driveway bore Arizona plates.
FBI agent Charles Middleton said Olin was kept away during the seven-hour search and wasn't formally questioned.
``We are just maintaining a friendly dialogue. There are no charges being brought,'' Middleton said. ``He's free to do anything he wants.''
Asked if he derailed the train, Olin angrily responded: ``No, I didn't do it. ... I've never been in that area in my life.''
The search warrant was believed to be the first issued since Amtrak's Sunset Limited hurtled into a dry gulch before dawn Oct. 9 in the desert near Hyder, Ariz., about 55 miles southwest of Phoenix. One person was killed and 78 were injured.
The warrant says authorities sought to seize any documents ``revealing the existence of a plan to derail a train between Phoenix, Arizona, and the Arizona-California border on Oct. 9, 1995, and/or the identities of individuals involved in the development or execution of the above plan.''
The was no immediate explanation about the discrepancy in dates.
The saboteur had removed a metal bar holding rail sections together, pulled 29 spikes from a stretch of Southern Pacific-owned rail and rewired a safety mechanism that would have warned the crew of a broken track.
At the scene, authorities found copies of a note signed ``Sons of the Gestapo'' that included references to the federal standoffs at Waco, Texas, and Ruby Ridge, Idaho. Both are rallying cries for anti-government extremists, but investigators have said the letters could be a red herring planted by someone with a grudge.
The warrant sought ``crowbars, pry bars, lift jacks or other tools usable to remove railroad spikes or manipulate rail,'' computer records relating to communications between Olin and Southern Pacific Railway or Amtrak, and all documents ``setting forth the manner by which a train derailment may be accomplished,'' among other items.
An object that appeared to be a crowbar was among items agents took from the house.
In the driveway, FBI agents examined a white Ford pickup with Arizona plates and a sign painted on the side reading ``ECCP - Railroads Recycle.''
Calls to Environmental Care and Cleanup Project Inc., a Val Verde recycling business, were not immediately returned.
Olin started a division of ECCP Inc. in Holbrook, Ariz., about 200 miles northeast of the derailment site, in the fall of 1994. Newspaper advertisements called ECCP a metal recycler.
After opening the business, Olin spent $4,000 on concrete to build an unloading pad next to Southern Pacific tracks, but ``he had it poured in the wrong spot, and they made him rip it up and didn't give him his contract, so he was slightly ticked off,'' said Cindy VanHemert, who works at the nearby Cholla Ready-Mix.
Sarkin refused to discuss the dispute.
Court records show a John Ernest Olin with the same birth date as the Val Verde resident was arrested for investigation of several serious crimes in Los Angeles County, including murder, robbery and burglary.
Olin was sentenced to six months in jail in 1986 for a home burglary; prosecutors refused to file charges on a 1988 robbery arrest; and a murder charge was dismissed at a 1990 preliminary hearing, court records show.
Sarkin declined to discuss the arrest records.
LENGTH: Medium: 80 lines ILLUSTRATION: PHOTO: (headshot) Olin.by CNB