DENVER (AP) — Convicted Oklahoma City bomber Timothy McVeigh has reportedly authorized his attorneys to draft a request to block his execution, but will make the final decision before anything is filed in federal court.

The request would be based on about 4,000 documents the FBI turned over to McVeigh's attorneys earlier this month, just days before he originally was scheduled to be executed.

Nathan Chambers, McVeigh's Denver-based attorney, did not return messages from The Associated Press seeking comment on the reports, carried Tuesday by ABC, CBS, CNN and NBC.

Dianne Mullen, legal assistant to McVeigh attorney Rob Nigh, said Nigh was in a meeting Tuesday afternoon at his Tulsa office and would have no comment until later this week. "He's working away," she said.

ABC and NBC reported that McVeigh's lawyers were prepared to file documents in court as early as Thursday. CBS reported that the attorneys now believe they have enough grounds to appeal McVeigh's death sentence and would make their case to their client Thursday, with the final decision up to him.

McVeigh was convicted and sentenced to die for the April 19, 1995, bombing of the Oklahoma City federal building, which killed 168 people and injured hundreds more.

He told a federal judge in December that he would not appeal his death sentence.

In early May, the FBI gave McVeigh's attorneys thousands of documents from the bombing case that it said inadvertently had not been turned over to the defense. Attorney General John Ashcroft then postponed McVeigh's execution from May 16 to June 11.

Last week, Ashcroft said all the documents had now been turned over to McVeigh's attorneys and that he would not further postpone the execution.