The anthrax case and the suicide
The Los Angeles Times broke the story this morning of Bruce Ivins, who worked at Fort Detrick for 18 years and had been informed of an FBI investigation and impending DOJ prosecution against him in the still-unsolved 2001 anthrax attacks. He committed suicide Tuesday just as the feds were closing in:
Ivins, whose name had not been disclosed publicly as a suspect in the case, played a central role in research to improve anthrax vaccines by preparing anthrax formulations used in experiments on animals.
Regarded as a skilled microbiologist, Ivins also helped the FBI analyze the powdery material recovered from one of the anthrax-tainted envelopes sent to a U.S. senator’s office in Washington.
Ivins died Tuesday at Frederick Memorial Hospital after ingesting a massive dose of prescription Tylenol mixed with codeine, said a friend and colleague, who declined to be identified out of concern that he would be harassed by the FBI.
The death — without any mention of suicide — was announced to Ivins’ colleagues at the U.S. Army Medical Research Institute of Infectious Diseases, or USAMRIID, through a staffwide e-mail.
“People here are pretty shook up about it,” said Caree Vander Linden, a spokeswoman for USAMRIID, who said she was not at liberty to discuss details surrounding the death.
The anthrax mailings killed five people, crippled national mail service, shut down a Senate office building and spread fear of further terrorism after the Sept. 11 attacks.
The extraordinary turn of events followed the government’s payment in June of a settlement valued at $5.82 million to a former government scientist, Steven J. Hatfill, who was long targeted as the FBI’s chief suspect despite a lack of any evidence that he had ever possessed anthrax.
The payout to Hatfill, a highly unusual development that all but exonerated him in the mailings, was an essential step to clear the way for prosecuting Ivins, according to lawyers familiar with the matter.
Federal investigators moved away from Hatfill — for years the only publicly identified “person of interest” — and ultimately concluded that Ivins was the culprit after FBI Director Robert S. Mueller III changed leadership of the investigation in late 2006.
The FBI’s new top investigators — Vincent B. Lisi and Edward W. Montooth — instructed agents to reexamine leads or potential suspects that may have received insufficient attention. Moreover, significant progress was made in analyzing genetic properties of the anthrax powder recovered from letters addressed to two senators.
The renewed efforts led the FBI back to USAMRIID, where agents first questioned scientists in December 2001, a few weeks after the fatal mailings.
There still have been no media mea culpas in the public lynching of Steven Hatfill.
There is still no resolution on the anthrax attacks–resolution the public deserves to have and the victims’ families needs to know.
Reminder of those killed:
* Bob Stevens, 63, picture editor of the Sun newspaper, died on 5 October in Boca Raton, Florida. Anthrax spores were found on his computer keyboard
* Thomas Morris Jr, 55, Washington, worked at the Brentwood office which handled an anthrax-laced letter sent to Senator Tom Daschle
* Joseph Curseen, 47, worked at the same office
* Kathy Nguyen, 61, worked in a New York hospital
* Ottilie Lundgren, 94, lived in a rural community in Connecticut. Her case and that of Ms Nguyen are the only ones that have not been traced to tainted mail
And a reminder of the spirited response of then-NYPost editorial assistant Johanna Huden, one of the infected anthrax survivors:
Ivins’ suicide should not end the search for answers.
***
Previous anthrax blogging here.
Tribute to Joseph Curseen: They called him “Little Joe”
See what others have said
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Terorism and the State Department:
Steve Emerson went before Brad Sherman’s panel and exposed SD complicity :
http://www.investigativeproject.com/
and more:
http://ibloga.blogspot.com/search/label/Always%20On%20Watch
When are we going to WAKE UP!!?
Seven years and still no end to this case, and democrats want to treat terrorism like a criminal matter for the courts. Is this what we will be getting, Ms Nancy Botoxi? I prefer Guantanamo and dead terrorist.
The coincidence of this and the 9/11 attack are still mystifying and I would like to see an explanation. Did he know it was coming, or was it just a pure coincidence. Especially when you think Atta was in Florida, then drove right up the coast past Stevens on his way to Maine.
Is the FBI claiming that Ivins acted alone? If so, what was his motive for doing this?
Ivins certainly had the access and opportunity to obtain the anthrax, but how in the hell did he get it our of the facility? Says a lot about security.
The whole anthrax thing still concerns me. What else got out and who else was involved? This should be far from over.
If Ivins was behind the anthrax attacks, I wonder if we’ll find a right-wing kind of motive for the crime, as that guy who used a shotgun on the Unitarians hated “gays and liberals”. Didn’t the anthrax letters go to NBC and Democrats? If we do find such a motive, can we then call it right-wing domestic terrorism or do we call it the act of an individual?
These cases seem like individual acts to me, as there’s no group that claims sympathy for the acts or with the people who performed the acts. While in the middle east you have a sizeable percentage of the population who supports Al Qaeda, and you have Al Qaeda itself as the umbrella organization for the acts, there’s no such thing for Tim McVeigh, Eric Rudolph, the Unitarian shootings, or the anthrax poisonings.
If you took a poll of conservatives who supported these acts, 95% would say they were opposed, with the other 5% hitting the wrong button or not understanding the question.
The anthrax attacks affected me much more than 9/11. I was working at a job in DC where I was handling mail every day. Suffice to say that when the DC postal workers died, things got a little frightening.
I always thought the anthrax attacks had as much to do with our foolish rush to war in Iraq. Plenty of people were misled to believe that Iraq had something to do with the air attacks, but to those who knew better, the specter of an evil government having anthrax was truly scary. We now knew the damage that chemicals weapons could bring.
So, if Bruce Ivins was indeed the man responsible for these attacks, he has more than just his direct victims on his conscience. He has thousands of American servicemen and tens of thousands of Iraqi civilians. That’s quite the load to bear.
rush to war in Iraq: 1992-203, 11 years plus 14 un resolutions, thats a real rush there.
Paul-Cincy: aside from trying to blame conservatives for everything do you have a point?
We have enough wackos in the world wanting to kill us without our own citizens helping. I find it despicable. What did he hope to gain by killing innocent people and wasting taxpayer money on the clean-up?
unrelated but this link shows obamas plan form income redistrobution. Classic marxist ideals. Take $1000 from the oil companies for each us family and give it to us families.
Well, SonODY, now you know why they have Rusty using his mind to it’s best in the mailroom.
This could all be a setup too, he may just be the fall guy. They’ll just be like “the guy who did it killed himself, we’re done, case closed”. Still the authorities could be covering up for some other insiders.
sonofdy said:
Yes, about how we should understand these acts. In my city, an abortion clinic, the Margaret Saenger Center, was firebombed and destroyed by someone against abortion. I get POed when Muslims don’t strongly denounce other Muslims who fly planes into buildings and then say they did it for Islam. I want them to say, no, that’s NOT Islam. If any of the 5 cases I mention did it in the name of conservatism, I reject that claim, and show evidence and analysis to reject it. These acts have no sympathy among conservatives, as far as I can tell, with no group, no matter how small, condoning them. But I thought I made that clear in my original post.
Yes, until a rational, cohesive narrative is laid out by the gov’t, I consider this case still open. This affair has been an embarrassment to the FBI for a long time now and there is nothing more that they’d like to do than close it by pinning it on a dead guy. We need proof.
Paul-Cincy: okay got it. mea culpa
They have already stolen all the Social Security money so they have to find a new source of cash to buy votes with.
You’re only debating yourself on that topic, Paul. As sonofdy said, it’s pointless.
There’s always Obama’s Global Tax plan for him to fall back on, ye citizens of the world.
No, it’s not pointless. The point is that, as Paul-Cincy wrote, we should understand these acts.
Through understanding why these acts were committed, we can better prevent them in the future.
The fact that domestic terrorist in this country tend to have same mindset is significant.
I’m not sure why the FBI continues to investigate this. Isn’t it clear that the real masterminds behind this are Chimpy W. McBu$hitlerburton and Dick Cheney’s weather machine?
I guess that’s admitting to the fact that NBC is indeed liberal. Wow, finally!
Everyone who’s commented on my post has totally missed my point, which is this is NOT domestic terrorism if there’s no organization behind it nor any sympathies within the general public. It’s one deranged guy. It’s like Ted Kaczynski bombing based on his left-wing neo-Luddite manifesto. Even Al Gore doesn’t support the Unabomber.
Ah, well, I disagree on two counts.
Firstly, I think that there ‘sympathies within the general public’, which doesn’t mean that every who shares their views share the acts that they committed. I view general sympathy as simple as “I don’t agree with what he did, but I understand”. For example, regarding the clinic bombing you mentioned, I strongly feel that a significant amount of people would by sympathetic to it, with subset of those people actively supporting the actions that the person took.
I don’t think its necessary for an organization to be behind terrorism, as the purpose of terrorism is not to prop up an organization but an ideal. If there is a share ideal, regardless of a organization, terrorism exists.
The idea that the “Gubmint” can protect us is pure folly!
The fact that the Supremes voted 5-4 to affirm the 2nd amendment only reinforces the fact. They don’t even want us to be able to protect ourselves.
Drawing any conclusions about Ivins acting alone is quite premature. I would certainly want to know what his economic situation was prior to 9/11 and whether there was any infusion of cash into his bank account. Guys like this often act for money. There are a lot of questions unanswered here.
I think I follow you.
One guy does something and the media checks his background.
If he’s a conservative then he must be a member of the vast right wing conspiracy.
Only problem is that those of us in the real VRWC never heard of him, and we detest what he did and if we had known about it we would have risked our lives to stop him before hand.
But still he did read Ann Coulter’s book and she is well known as a hate monger with mind control powers, that’s why we wear our tinfoil hats.
I would point out something else. Sending the Anthrax letters to liberals might in some way be a distorted attempt to gain sympathy for liberal causes. To assume that the letters were sent to liberal individuals and networks by someone who is of a conservative leaning is a partisan view of things. This could very well have nothing to do with Republicans or Democrats, or, for that matter liberals or conservatives. (I find it interesting that the left sees no linkage between 9/11 and these Anthrax letters, and is also of the opinion that there is no connection between 9/11 and Iraq. Isn’t it conceivable, in the great world of geo-politicals and conspiracy, that Ivins was paid by Saddam Hussein to get the Anthrax and give it to an operative in the USA, and that operative just happened to be a member of al queda and tied to the 9/11 attacks?)
We CAN stop you.
We have the drugs and medical technology.
No, YOU die now.
Be afraid.
Long live the USA.
Death to Radical Islam.
(and being the good Christian that I am, I cannot say what Allah is great at sucking)
No, all domestic terrorists in this country don’t have the same mindset. There are plenty of eco-terrorists out there… ELF, etc, not to mention Obama’s dear friends William Ayers and Bernadine Dohrn (although they were not eco-terrorists). They don’t have the “same mindset” as whackjobs like McVeigh, Nichols, et al. I don’t know if you were purposefully trying to pin all domestic terrorism on those with a conservative nature (granted — extreme right wing), but that’s just plain false. There are plenty of domestic terrorists out there with a left wing bent as well.
Jim C
And what proof do you have that there’s a significant number of people out there that would support the bombing of an abortion clinic resulting in the murder of civilians?
I despise abortion. I believe with all my heart that it is an act of murder. In addition to that, Roe V. Wade was bad law. But, there’s no way that I or anyone I know or associate with would support the bombing of an abortion clinic, and murder of civilians who work there. So, I’d like to see your evidence that a significant number of people would be sympathetic to (or support) that kind of an act.
Jim C
Yes, when the perpetrator dies, it’s over – let’s not make this a Troofer site.
This is not over. This is the beginning of the story, not the end.
There are far to many unanswered questions, especially since the case was bungled from the start. If some people can’t handle the fact that this is not over, one word: tough.
I should have said “similar” mindsets. I was thinking about extreme right-wingers and extreme left wingers. The extreme left-wingers tend to think like the other terroristic extreme left-wingers, and the extreme right-wingers tend to think like the other terroristic extreme right-wingers.
I think whatever number that is diminishes ‘significantly’ when you add that qualifier in there, but that qualifier wasn’t in my original comment.
Would you personally be sympathetic to someone who blew up an empty abortion clinic?
I can’t point to a poll, but from the strong feelings that people have on the subject, I don’t think it’s crazy to think that people would be sympathetic to a bomber’s plight in the scenario.
Regarding actually murdering one of maiming one of the technicians that works in a clinic, I remember comments saying the usual “That’s awful”, but sometimes they were followed by “…but the person brought it upon themselves” or something to that nature.
For you conspiracy theorists, here you go. The perpetrator of these attacks wanted us to invade Iraq.
Oh fer gawd’s sake. Given 12 years of Hussein’s WMD violations and support for terrorist cells, we didn’t require your (and Salon’s) lame connection between 9/11, the anthrax attacks, and looney conspiracy theories.
Lame theories? Someone claimed there was an Iraqi ingredient in the anthrax when there wasn’t. And that claim came from the office of the alleged terrorist.
That isn’t lame. That is very much real.