Heroic security guard wrongly accused of planting bomb at 1996 Olympics

The bomb damaged nearby buildings and killed a woman (Photo: Boston Globe)

On a warm July evening in Atlanta, Georgia, crowds of people gathered in Centennial Olympic Park on the eighth day of the 1996 Summer Olympics.

Richard Jewell, 33, had been working as a security guard in the area for more than seven hours when he noticed something strange.

A green military-style bag had been left unattended and unclaimed. Jewell raised the alarm and minutes later, 911 received a call from a payphone near the park.

“There’s a bomb in Centennial Park. You have 30 minutes.”

Jewell began moving people away from the park, but at 1:20 a.m., the 40-pound pipe bomb exploded, killing one woman and injuring more than 100 others.

That day, the security guard, who didn’t expect the situation to escalate, saved many lives by spotting the bag and evacuating them. But while Jewell was hailed as a hero after the attack, the narrative has slowly changed.

Within days, Jewell – a low-key security guard who lived with his mother – became a suspect in the 1996 Atlanta Olympic bombings.

Who was Richard Jewell?

Jewell was just 33 when the bomb went off – he helped move the crowd before it exploded (Photo: Getty)

Jewell was working as a security guard for AT&T when he spotted the mysterious bag (Photo: FBI)

Jewell was born in Danville, Virginia, to a father who worked for Chevrolet and a mother who worked in insurance. He moved to Atlanta with his mother and stepfather when he was young.

He worked various jobs before joining the Habersham County Sheriff’s Office in Georgia as a jailer in 1990. He was charged with impersonating a police officer after arresting a couple while working as a security guard.

Jewell, described as an “overzealous” employee, eventually resigned and worked briefly as a campus police officer before returning to Atlanta and getting a job as a security guard before the 1996 Olympics.

While working at that job, he spotted the backpack that turned out to be a massive pipe bomb, which exploded in the park, killing one woman and injuring more than 100 others.

Jewell’s efforts to keep crowds away from the area saved countless lives on July 27, 1996, and he was praised for his efforts. But that all changed with a headline in the Atlanta Journal three days later.

How did he become a suspect?

The Atlanta Journal headline sparked a media storm (Photo: Getty)

In the days following the bombing, Jewell had not been considered a suspect by the FBI. On July 28, they received a call from the president of Piedmont College, where Jewell had briefly worked as a campus security guard. He told the FBI that Jewell might have been involved in planting the bomb.

On July 30, three days after the bomb went off, the Atlanta Journal published an article headlined “FBI suspects ‘hero’ guard planted bomb.”

The newspaper did not cite sources for the story, but it sparked a media firestorm: Camera crews and reporters camped outside Jewell’s home in the days after the allegation broke.

Why did they think a security guard planted the bomb to become a hero? Less than ten years earlier, a volunteer firefighter in California had started fires to put them out, in order to become a “hero.”

On July 29, the FBI was notified that “Jewell fit the profile of someone who could cause an incident and become a hero.” He was now considered a suspect, but not the only one.

But the idea that a man who helped save lives in the attack was actually the one who launched it was juicy news — and most news outlets picked up on it.

For Jewell, it was the beginning of his “88 days of hell.” He couldn’t leave his apartment without being mobbed by reporters and cameras.

When was his name cleared?

Jewell wiped away tears when told he was not a suspect (Photo: Getty)

Three months after a damning headline claimed Jewell planted the bomb in Atlanta, his name has been cleared.

The Justice Department wrote to Jewell’s attorney that he was not the man they believed was behind the attack.

Jewell’s name was cleared, but his reputation was never the same, despite being the real hero of the Olympic bombings.

He won numerous lawsuits against NBC, CNN and the New York Post. He then took small jobs in Georgia law enforcement.

Months after his name was cleared, Jewell told the New York Times: “I’m a lot more cynical than I used to be. I’m not as confident as I used to be. And I don’t think I’m as outgoing as I used to be.”

Jewell married his wife Dana in 1998 and remained with her until her death from heart failure and the side effects of diabetes.

Although he was one of the heroes of the tragic 1996 Olympics attacks, he was not the man who planted the bomb that killed a woman and injured hundreds.

The man was only arrested in 2003, after he detonated bombs in two other locations.

Who was really behind the 1996 Olympics bombing?

Rudolph began his campaign of terror with the 1996 Atlanta bombing (Photo: Getty)

Eric Robert Rudolph was the lone wolf behind the deadly Atlanta bombing of July 27, 1996.

He was first identified as a suspect in February 1998. Eventually, bombings of an abortion clinic north of Atlanta and a gay nightclub were linked to Rudolph — as were the Olympic bombing and another in Alabama.

It was during the Centennial Olympic Park bombing that Rudolph detonated one of his first and largest explosives. He was also the one who called the police to warn them of the bomb just minutes before it went off.

He was placed on the Ten Most Wanted list in May 1998, but was on the run for five years until he was found rummaging through a dumpster in Murphy, North Carolina, in 2003.

Rudolph pleaded guilty to the charges and is serving multiple life sentences without the possibility of parole.

Have other Olympic Games been the scene of terrorist attacks?

Damage from a pipe bomb in Atlanta injured more than 100 people and killed one woman (Photo: Getty)

The Atlanta attack, while shocking and tragic, was not the deadliest attack during the Olympics.

In 1972, the deadliest terrorist attack at the Olympics occurred in Munich, when 11 Israeli athletes and coaches were killed by members of the Palestinian group Black September.

Dubbed the “Munich Massacre,” the group infiltrated the Olympic Village where the athletes were staying before entering the building and taking the Israeli team hostage.

While the situation continued, the games did not stop.

West German police eventually intervened and killed five of the eight terrorists, but all of the hostages were killed in the operation.

Since then, minutes of silence have been observed at some Olympic ceremonies in memory of deceased athletes who were due to compete in 1972.

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