Cyndi Steele speaks at press conference

COEUR d'ALENE - Cyndi Steele spoke to the media on Monday at the Silver Lake Motel conference room, her first public appearance since a pipe bomb was discovered beneath her vehicle on June 15.

She said she believes her husband, attorney Edgar J. Steele, accused of murder-for-hire and awaiting trial, is innocent.

"The FBI says that my husband hired Larry Fairfax to kill me and my mother," Steele said. "That is not true. We have been married for 25 years. Ed loves me, I love him."

Fairfax, 49, admitted to manufacturing the pipe bomb and installing it under Steele's vehicle. He also confessed to federal interrogators that Edgar Steele hired him to murder Cyndi Steele and her mother.

Fairfax signed a plea agreement in August.

Cyndi Steele said she came forward Monday because she "was concerned for everyone's safety." She said authorities had failed to arrest and charge Fairfax's accomplices, and that the FBI was not doing its job.

"What (Fairfax) did in attaching the bomb was so horrible and dangerous, that he should not get off with a mere 18-month sentence," Steele said.

Wesley Hoyt, Steele's attorney, played a phone message that had been left at his office. An unidentified caller gave out the name and address of one of Fairfax's accomplices.

Hoyt said the FBI had been contacted.

Steele said the bureau has repeatedly told her she has "nothing to worry about."

Steele claimed in a prepared statement that Fairfax - a handyman who had often worked on her property - stole $45,000 worth of silver coins from the Steeles, thus giving him a motive to "scheme up the murder-for-hire-plot."

Steele is currently gathering proof of the theft, she said.

"My husband is innocent," Steele said. "And the only reason the FBI put him in jail was to silence him."

Steele and Hoyt maintain that Edgar Steele was charged by the federal government because of his outspoken views and his willingness to defend those who are not "politically correct."

Edgar Steele has written about race relations and has defended hate groups in the past. Cyndi Steele said his latest case involved human trafficking.

"People who are politically incorrect often get prosecuted by the federal government, but the media will not acknowledge it," Hoyt said.

According to court documents and testimony, Fairfax - who was reportedly working as a federal informant at the time - recorded Edgar Steele plotting to kill his wife and mother-in-law.

Cyndi Steele has heard the recordings yet finds them dubious. She said they do not prove her husband's guilt.

"In regards to those tapes, they are unreliable," Steele said. "I'm not a technological person. Tapes can be manufactured, is what I'm told. I think (the FBI was) too quick to believe Mr. Fairfax. I have to believe what I see as truth, and it is important for me because it's my life at stake."

Edgar Steele was indicted by a grand jury in U.S. District Court on June 15. He pleaded not guilty to "use of interstate commerce facilities in the commission for murder-for-hire," and later entered not guilty pleas for three additional charges: Use of explosive material to commit a federal felony, possession of a destructive device in relation to a crime of violence, and tampering with a victim.

His trial is scheduled to begin in November.