2001 anthrax attacks

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The 2001 anthrax attacks in the United States, also known as Amerithrax from its Federal Bureau of Investigation (FBI) case name, occurred over the course of several weeks beginning on September 18, 2001. Letters containing anthrax spores were mailed to several news media offices and two Democratic U.S. Senators, killing five people and infecting 17 others. The primary suspect was not publicly identified until 2008.

In mid-2008, the FBI narrowed its focus to Bruce Edwards Ivins, a scientist who worked at the government's biodefense labs at Fort Detrick in Frederick, Maryland. Ivins had been told about the impending prosecution and apparently committed suicide by overdosing on "Tylenol with Codeine" as reported on August 1, 2008.[1][2]

On August 6, 2008, federal prosecutors declared Ivins to be the sole culprit of the crime.[3] Two days later, Sen. Charles Grassley and Rep. Rush Holt called for hearings into the DOJ and FBI's handling of the investigation[4]

Contents

[edit] Overview

The anthrax attacks came in two waves. The first set of anthrax letters had a Trenton, New Jersey postmark dated September 18, 2001, exactly one week after the September 11, 2001 attacks. Five letters are believed to have been mailed at this time, to ABC News, CBS News, NBC News and the New York Post, all located in New York City; and to the National Enquirer at American Media, Inc. (AMI) in Boca Raton, Florida.[5] Robert Stevens, the first person who died from the mailings, worked at a tabloid called Sun, also published by AMI. Only the New York Post and NBC News letters were actually found;[6] the existence of the other three letters is inferred because individuals at ABC, CBS and AMI became infected with anthrax. Scientists examining the anthrax from the New York Post letter said it appeared as a coarse brown granular material looking like Purina Dog Chow.[7]

Two more anthrax letters, bearing the same Trenton postmark, were dated October 9, three weeks after the first mailing. The letters were addressed to two Democratic Senators, Tom Daschle of South Dakota and Patrick Leahy of Vermont. At the time Daschle was the Senate Majority leader and Leahy was head of the Senate Judiciary Committee. The Daschle letter was opened by an aide on October 15, and the government mail service was shut down. The unopened Leahy letter was discovered in an impounded mail bag on November 16. The Leahy letter had been misdirected to the State Department mail annex in Sterling, Virginia, due to a misread ZIP code; a postal worker there, David Hose, contracted inhalation anthrax.

More potent than the first anthrax letters, the material in the Senate letters was a highly refined dry powder consisting of about one gram of nearly pure spores. Barbara Hatch Rosenberg, a molecular biologist and research professor at the State University of New York, described the material as "weaponized" or "weapons grade" anthrax during a 2002 interview for the Australian Broadcasting Corporation.[8] However, the Washington Post later reported in 2006 that the FBI no longer believes the anthrax was weaponized.

At least 22 people developed anthrax infections, with 11 of the especially life-threatening inhalation variety. Five died of inhalation anthrax: Stevens; two employees of the Brentwood mail facility in Washington, D.C., Thomas Morris Jr. and Joseph Curseen; and two about whom their source of exposure to the bacteria is still unknown: Kathy Nguyen, a Vietnamese immigrant resident in the borough of the Bronx who worked in New York City, and Ottilie Lundgren, a 94-year old widow of a prominent judge from Oxford, Connecticut, who was the last known victim.

The 2001 anthrax attacks have been compared to the Unabomber attacks which took place from 1978 to 1995.[9]

[edit] The letters

The anthrax letters are believed to have been mailed from Princeton, New Jersey.[8] In August 2002, investigators found anthrax spores in a city street mailbox located at 10 Nassau Street near the Princeton University campus. About 600 mailboxes that could have been used to mail the letters were tested for anthrax. The box on Nassau Street was the only one to test positive.

[edit] The notes

The New York Post and NBC News letters contained the following note:

09-11-01
THIS IS NEXT
TAKE PENACILIN NOW
DEATH TO AMERICA
DEATH TO ISRAEL
ALLAH IS GREAT

The second note that was addressed to Senators Daschle and Leahy read:

09-11-01
YOU CAN NOT STOP US.
WE HAVE THIS ANTHRAX.
YOU DIE NOW.
ARE YOU AFRAID?
DEATH TO AMERICA.
DEATH TO ISRAEL.
ALLAH IS GREAT.

[edit] The return address

The letters addressed to Senators Daschle and Leahy have the return address:

4th Grade
Greendale School
Franklin Park NJ 08852

The address is fictitious. Franklin Park, New Jersey, exists, but the ZIP code 08852 is for nearby Monmouth Junction, New Jersey. There is no Greendale School in Franklin Park or Monmouth Junction, New Jersey, though there is a Greenbrook Elementary School in adjacent South Brunswick Township, New Jersey, of which Monmouth Junction is a part.

[edit] The anthrax material

The letters contained at least two grades of anthrax material; the coarse brown material sent in the media letters and the fine powder sent to the two U.S. Senators. In addition, it has been suggested the anthrax material sent to an old Post Office Box address of the National Enquirer and then forwarded to AMI may have been an intermediate grade similar to the anthrax sent to the Senate.[10] The brown granular anthrax sent to media outlets in New York City caused only skin infections, cutaneous anthrax. The anthrax sent to the Senators caused the more dangerous form of infection known as inhalation anthrax, as did the anthrax sent to AMI in Florida.

Although the anthrax preparations were of different grades, all of the material derived from the same bacterial strain. Known as the Ames strain, it was first researched at the United States Army Medical Research Institute of Infectious Diseases (USAMRIID), Fort Detrick, Maryland. The Ames strain was then distributed to at least fifteen bio-research labs within the U.S. and six locations overseas.

DNA sequencing of the anthrax taken from Robert Stevens (the first victim) was conducted at The Institute for Genomic Research beginning in December 2001. Sequencing was finished within a month and the analysis was published in the journal Science in early 2002.[11]

Radiocarbon dating conducted by the Lawrence Livermore National Laboratory in June 2002 established that the anthrax was cultured no more than two years before the mailings. In October 2006 it was reported that water used to process the anthrax spores came from a source in the northeastern United States.[12] Erroneous press reports in 2003 indicated the FBI failed to reverse engineer the type of anthrax found in the letters.[13][14] According to Chemical & Engineering News, December 4, 2006,[12] there was never any attempt to "reverse engineer" the attack anthrax. Instead, the Dugway Proving Grounds "used the Leahy powder as the culture starter to 'produce several different preparations using different media, and different ways of drying and milling the preparation' that the FBI could use for comparison purposes." They "never analyzed the Leahy powder and did no comparative analyses between the preparations made and the Leahy powder."

[edit] Controversy over coatings and additives

Early reports suggested the anthrax sent to the Senate had been "weaponized." On October 29, 2001, Major General John Parker at a White House briefing said that silica had been found in the Daschle anthrax sample. Homeland Security Director Tom Ridge in a White House press conference on November 7, 2001, told reporters that tests indicated silica, not bentonite, had been used as a binding agent in making the anthrax.[15] Later, the FBI claimed a "lone individual" could have weaponized anthrax spores for as little as $2,500, using a makeshift basement laboratory.[16]

In late October, 2001, ABC chief investigative correspondent Brian Ross several times linked the anthrax sample to Saddam Hussein; on October 26, "sources tell ABCNEWS the anthrax in the tainted letter sent to Senate Majority Leader Tom Daschle was laced with bentonite. The potent additive is known to have been used by only one country in producing biochemical weapons — Iraq.... it is a trademark of Iraqi leader Saddam Hussein's biological weapons program...The discovery of bentonite came in an urgent series of tests conducted at Fort Detrick, Maryland, and elsewhere," [17] on October 28, stating that "despite continued White House denials, four well-placed and separate sources have told ABC News that initial tests on the anthrax by the US Army at Fort Detrick, Maryland, have detected trace amounts of the chemical additives bentonite and silica" [18] and several times on October 28 and 29.[19]

A number of press reports appeared suggesting the Senate anthrax had coatings and additives.[20][21][22] Newsweek reported the anthrax sent to Senator Leahy had been coated with a chemical compound previously unknown to bioweapons experts.[23] Two experts on the Soviet anthrax program, Kenneth Alibek and Matthew Meselson, were consultants with the Justice Department and were shown electron micrographs of the anthrax from the Daschle letter. They replied to the Washington Post article "FBI's Theory on Anthrax Is Doubted" (October 28, 2002), reporting that they saw no evidence the anthrax spores had been coated and that more careful investigation of the specimens is necessary.[24]

A week after Meselson and Alibek had their letter published in the Washington Post, the Armed Forces Institute of Pathology (AFIP), one of the military labs that analyzed the Daschle anthrax, published an official newsletter stating that silica was a key aerosol enabling component of the Daschle anthrax.[25] The AFIP lab deputy director, Florabel Mullick, said "This [silica] was a key component. Silica prevents the anthrax from aggregating, making it easier to aerosolize. Significantly, we noted the absence of aluminum with the silica. This combination had previously been found in anthrax produced by Iraq." Unlike naturally occurring anthrax the coated spores were able to reaerosolize. A study published in JAMA on December 11, 2002 showed simulated office activities conducted in the Daschle suite more than three weeks after the initial incident resulted in up to a 65 fold increase in airborne spores over samples collected at the same locations during a semiquiescent state. [26] The spectrum AFIP based their conclusions on actually showed a peak for the element Silicon, an element sometimes naturally occurring in anthrax and not silica (Silicon dioxide) used to weaponise it. A former top military scientist who saw the AFIP scanning electron micrographs of the powder stated; "If the spores had been coated with silica, they would have looked like doughnuts with large sugar particles on them," instead, "the Daschle spores were clean doughnut holes with no sugars."[27]

In February 2005, Stephan P. Velsko of Lawrence Livermore National Labs published a paper titled "Physical and Chemical Analytical Analysis: A key component of Bioforensics".[28] In this paper, Velsko illustrated that different silica coating processes gave rise to weaponized anthrax simulants that look completely different from one another. He suggested that the difference in the look of products could provide evidence of what method the lab that manufactured the 2001 anthrax used, and thus provide clues to the ultimate origin of the material.

In May 2005, Academic Press published the volume "Microbial Forensics" edited by Roger Breeze, Bruce Budowle and Steven Schutzer.[29] Bruce Budowle is with the Federal Bureau of Investigation's (FBI) Forensic Science Laboratory. Although the volume does not directly discuss the silica coatings found in the Senate anthrax of 2001, the contributors to the chapters discuss in detail the forensics of silica coated weaponized bacterial spores. Pictures are shown of silica weaponized bacillus spores that are both mixed with silica and fully coated with silica. Pictures of weaponized Clostridium spores coated with Colloidal, spherical silica are also shown. Again, the aim of these studies is to define the forensic fingerprints of silica weaponization processes.

In July 2005, Dr Michael V Callahan (who is presently with DOD's Defense Advanced Research Projects Agency (DARPA)) gave a briefing before the Subcommittee on Prevention of Nuclear and Biological Attack.[30] Dr Callahan stated "First, the attack illustrated that advanced expertise had readily been exploited by a bioterrorist; the preparation in the Daschle letter contained extraordinarily high concentrations of purified endospores. Second, the spore preparation was coated with an excipient which helped retard electrostatic attraction, thus increasing aerosolization of the agent."

The August 2006 issue of Applied and Environmental Microbiology contained an article written by Dr. Douglas Beecher of the FBI labs in Quantico, VA.[31] The article, titled "Forensic Application of Microbiological Culture Analysis to Identify Mail Intentionally Contaminated with Bacillus anthracis spores ," states "Individuals familiar with the compositions of the powders in the letters have indicated that they were comprised simply of spores purified to different extents." The article also specifically criticizes "a widely circulated misconception" "that the spores were produced using additives and sophisticated engineering supposedly akin to military weapon production." The harm done by this misconception is described this way: "This idea is usually the basis for implying that the powders were inordinately dangerous compared to spores alone. The persistent credence given to this impression fosters erroneous preconceptions, which may misguide research and preparedness efforts and generally detract from the magnitude of hazards posed by simple spore preparations." However, after this article had appeared the editor of Applied and Environmental Microbiology, L. Nicholas Ornston, stated that he was uncomfortable with Beecher's statement in the article since it had no evidence to back it up and contained no citation.[32]

In April 2007 an analysis of the spore preparation was published in the International Journal of Intelligence and Counterintelligence.[33] This analysis by Dr. Dany Shoham and Dr. Stuart Jacobsen pointed out that the sophisticated additives and processing used to create the weapon likely could be used to trace the origin.

In August 2007 Dr. Kay Mereish, UN Chief, Biological Planning and Operations, published a letter in Applied and Environmental Microbiology titled "Unsupported Conclusions on the Bacillus anthracis Spores".[34] This letter, published in the same journal as FBI scientist Douglas Beecher (see paragraph above), points out that the statements made by Dr. Beecher in his article on the lack of additives were not backed up with any data. She suggested that Dr. Beecher publish a paper with analytical data showing the absence of silica or other additives. Such data would include SEM images of the pure spores as well as EDX spectra and EDX images showing the absence of any foreign additives such as silica or the elements silicon and oxygen. Dr. Mereish referenced a 2006 CBRN, Counter-Proliferation and Response meeting in Paris where a presenter announced that an additive was present in the attack anthrax that affected the spore's electrical charges.

Fox News reported in March 2008 that an email written by a scientist at Fort Detrick revealed details of the powder preparation;[35] these details appear to be consistent with a highly specialized powder. The Fox News report said "But in an e-mail obtained by FOX News, scientists at Fort Detrick openly discussed how the anthrax powder they were asked to analyze after the attacks was nearly identical to that made by one of their colleagues. "Then he said he had to look at a lot of samples that the FBI had prepared ... to duplicate the letter material," the e-mail reads. "Then the bombshell. He said that the best duplication of the material was the stuff made by [name redacted]. He said that it was almost exactly the same … his knees got shaky and he sputtered, 'But I told the General we didn't make spore powder!'" The Fox News report added that around 4 persons, all with connections to Fort Detrick, were being looked at as suspects by the FBI.

[edit] Investigation

Authorities traveled to six different continents, interviewed over 9,000 people, conducted 67 searches and issued over 6,000 subpoenas. 17 FBI agents were assigned to the case and 10 postal inspectors investigating the case.[36]

[edit] Attack blamed on Al Qaida and Iraq

Immediately after the anthrax attacks, White House officials repeatedly pressured FBI Director Robert Mueller to prove that they were a second-wave assault by Al Qaeda. During the president's morning intelligence briefings, Mueller was "beaten up" for not producing proof that the killer spores were the handiwork of terrorist mastermind Osama Bin Laden, according to a former aide. "They really wanted to blame somebody in the Middle East," the retired senior FBI official stated. The FBI knew early on that the anthrax used was a weaponized version requiring sophisticated equipment and was unlikely to have been produced in some "cave". At the same time, both President Bush and Vice President Cheney in public statements speculated about the possibility of a link between the anthrax attacks and Al Qaida.[37] The Guardian reported in early October that American scientists have implicated Iraq as the source of the anthrax,[38] and the next day the Wall St. Journal editorialized that Al Qaeda perpetrated the mailings, with Iraq the source of the anthrax.[39] A few days later, John McCain suggested on the David Letterman Show that the anthrax may have come from Iraq,[40] and the next week ABC News did a series of reports stating that three or four (depending on the report) sources had identified bentonite as an ingredient in the anthrax preparations, implicating Iraq.[17][18][19]

Though the sources claiming the supposed inclusion of bentonite were not named, these reports were cited in the press, starting almost immediately,[41][42] and for several years following, even after the invasion of Iraq,[43][44][45] as evidence that Saddam not only possessed "weapons of mass destruction", but had actually used them in attacks on the United States. Ridge's dismissal Nov 7 2001 of bentonite went ignored by most media.

[edit] Anthrax attack bug "identical" to army strain report

On May 9, 2002, New Scientist published an article that reported:

'The DNA sequence of the anthrax sent through the US mail in 2001 has been revealed and confirms suspicions that the bacteria originally came from a US military laboratory. The data released uses codenames for the reference strains against which the attack strain was compared. The two reference strains that appear identical to the attack strain most likely originated at the US Army Medical Research Institute for Infectious Diseases at Fort Detrick (USAMRIID), Maryland. The new work also shows that substantial genetic differences can emerge in two samples of an anthrax culture separated for only three years. This means the attacker's anthrax was not separated from its ancestors at USAMRIID for many generations.' [46]

[edit] A "person of interest"

The Justice Department has named no suspects in the anthrax case. Although Attorney General John Ashcroft labeled Dr. Steven Hatfill a "person of interest" in a press conference, no charges were brought against him. Hatfill, a virologist, vehemently denied he had anything to do with the anthrax (bacteria) mailings and sued the FBI, the Justice Department, John Ashcroft, Alberto Gonzales, and others for violating his constitutional rights and for violating the Privacy Act. On June 27, 2008, the Department of Justice announced it would settle Hatfill's case for $5.8 million. [47]

He has also sued The New York Times and its columnist Nicholas D. Kristof and, separately, Donald Foster, Vanity Fair, Reader's Digest, and Vassar College, for defamation. (The case against The New York Times was initially dismissed,[48] but was reinstated on appeal. Nicholas Kristof has been dropped from the suit.) Hatfill's lawyers believe the Privacy Act was violated and continue to question journalists who have reported on their client.[49]

Others have claimed Dr. Philip Zack, who worked at Ft. Detrick where the anthrax came from, is a person of interest.[50] Dr. Philip Zack had the means, access to weaponized anthrax, exhibited hostile behaviours towards Dr. Ayaad Assaad, his colleague, and was caught on a security video two months after being fired entering without authorization a lab where anthrax samples went missing. The FBI knew of Zack and his unauthorized access to the lab, and Assaad had been questioned by the FBI in connection with the attacks.[51][52][53]

On August 1, 2008 the Associated Press reported that Dr. Bruce E. Ivins, 62, who worked for the past 18 years at the government's biodefense labs at Fort Detrick, had committed suicide. Ivins was a top U.S. biodefense researcher who worked at Ft. Detrick. It was widely reported the FBI was about to lay charges on him, however the evidence is largely circumstantial and the grand jury in Washington reported it was not ready to issue an indictment.[54][55] [56] Rep. Rush Holt, who represents the district where the anthrax letters were mailed, said circumstantial evidence was not enough and asked FBI Director Robert S. Mueller to appear before Congress to provide an account of the investigation.[57] Ivins's death leaves unanswered two puzzles. Scientists familiar with germ warfare said there was no evidence that Dr. Ivins had the skills to turn anthrax into an inhalable powder. According to Dr. Alan Zelicoff who aided the F.B.I. investigation "I don’t think a vaccine specialist could do it...This is aerosol physics, not biology". The other problem is the lack of a motive.[58]

Dr. W. Russell Byrne, a colleague who worked in the bacteriology division of the Fort Detrick research facility, said Ivins was "hounded" by FBI agents who raided his home twice, and he was hospitalized for depression earlier this month. According to Byrne and local police, Ivins was removed from his workplace out of fears that he might harm himself or others. "I think he was just psychologically exhausted by the whole process," Byrne said. "There are people who you just know are ticking bombs," Byrne said. "He was not one of them."[59]

On August 6, 2008, federal prosecutors declared Ivins to be the sole culprit of the crime when Jeffrey Taylor, the U.S. attorney for the District of Columbia laid out the case against Ivins to the public. The main evidence is already in dispute. Taylor stated "The genetically unique parent material of the anthrax spores ... was created and solely maintained by Dr. Ivins." But other experts disagree, including biological warfare and anthrax expert, Dr. Meryl Nass, who stated: "Let me reiterate: No matter how good the microbial forensics may be, they can only, at best, link the anthrax to a particular strain and lab. They cannot link it to any individual." At least 10 scientists had regular access to the laboratory and its anthrax stock, and possibly quite a few more, counting visitors from other institutions, and workers at laboratories in Ohio and New Mexico that had received anthrax samples from the flask.[60]

[edit] Doubts about FBI conclusions

In the days following the FBI's statement that the bureau was confident that biodefense researcher Bruce E. Ivins acted alone doubts as to the conclusions were being raised by people with a broad range of political views and colleagues of Ivins. [61] Among evidence cited was that the FBI unable to find any anthrax spores at Ivins' house or on his other belongings nor place him in the New Jersey mailbox where the anthrax was mailed from, [62] that he was one of 100 people who could have worked with the vial used in the attacks.[61] Richard Spertzel a former bio weapons inspector in Iraq wrote that the Anthrax used could not have come from the lab Ivins worked at.[63] Alternative theories proposed include FBI incompetence, that Syria or Iraq directed the attacks, or that similar to some 9/11 conspiracy theories the U.S. government knew in advance that the attacks would occur.[61] Senator Patrick Leahy a target of the attacks said the FBI has not produced convincing evidence in the case.[64] The Washington Post called for an independent investigation in the case saying that reporters and scientists were poking holes in the case.[65]

[edit] Congressional oversight

In late 2002 Senators Daschle and Leahy called in the FBI to explain the Washington Post story "FBI's Theory On Anthrax Is Doubted", Washington Post, October 28, 2002. This was later on reported in "Anthrax Powder — State of the Art?".[66] The latter article described how Dwight Adams, chief FBI scientist, told Senators Daschle and Leahy that there were no special additives in the senate anthrax and that the silica was "naturally occurring". However, Adams admitted that there was scientific information concerning the nature of the anthrax organism that was deemed by his superiors too sensitive to share with Senators Daschle and Leahy:

Connolly: Earlier you testified that regarding the scientific aspect of the investigation there was information that was simply in your view too sensitive to share to the public about the particular characteristics of the organism sent in the mail. Is that correct?

Adams: In so many words, yes, sir.

Connolly: I don't want to mischaracterize it. If you think I've mischaracterized it in any way then, please, put your own words on it.

Adams: No, that's fine.

Connolly: Did you feel like you had the same restrictions in informing the senate, congress, or their staff in terms of what it is you would reveal to them about the particular characteristics of the organism that was sent?

Adams: As I've already stated there was specific information that I did not feel appropriate to share with either the media or to the Hill because it was too sensitive of the information to do so.[67]

On October 23, 2006 Senator Charles Grassley of Iowa sent a six-page letter to Attorney General Alberto Gonzales requesting a briefing on the anthrax investigation. By December 2006, a total of 33 members of Congress have demanded that the Attorney General update them on the investigation. [68]

The FBI's Assistant Director for Congressional Affairs said, "After sensitive information about the investigation citing congressional sources was reported in the media, the Department of Justice and the FBI agreed that no additional briefings to Congress would be provided." [69]

[edit] Aftermath

[edit] Contamination and cleanup

Dozens of buildings were contaminated with anthrax as a result of the mailings. AMI moved to a different building. The decontamination of the Brentwood postal facility took 26 months and cost US$130 million. The Hamilton, New Jersey postal facility remained closed until March 2005; its cleanup cost $65 million. The United States Environmental Protection Agency spent $41.7 million to clean up government buildings in Washington, D.C. One FBI document said the total damage exceeded $1 billion.[70]

The principal means of decontamination is fumigation with chlorine dioxide gas.

[edit] Private consultants

Blasland, Bouck, & Lee (now Arcadis-BBL) was contracted by both CBS and NBC to manage their Anthrax situations. Jay D. Keough CIH, Greg Ertel MS, CIH, CSP, and Jim Poesl MS, CIE were the site personnel.

[edit] Political effects

The anthrax attacks, as well as the September 11, 2001 attacks, have spurred significant increases in U.S. government funding for biological warfare research and preparedness. For example, biowarfare-related funding at the National Institute of Allergy and Infectious Diseases (NIAID) increased by $1.5 billion in 2003. In 2004, Congress passed the Project Bioshield Act, which provides $5.6 billion over ten years for the purchase of new vaccines and drugs.[71]

A theory that Iraq was behind the attacks, based upon the evidence that the powder was weaponized and some reports of alleged meetings between 9/11 conspirators and Iraqi officials, may have been a contributing prevarication used by the United States government to justify war with that country.[72]

[edit] Health

Years after the attack, several anthrax victims reported lingering health problems including fatigue, shortness of breath and memory loss. The cause of the reported symptoms is unknown.[73]

A postal inspector, William Paliscak, became severely ill and disabled after removing an anthrax-contaminated air filter from the Brentwood mail facility on October 19, 2001. Although his doctors, Tyler Cymet and Gary Kerkvliet, believe that the illness was caused by anthrax exposure, blood tests did not find anthrax bacteria or antibodies, and therefore the CDC does not recognize it as a case of inhalation anthrax.[74]

[edit] Notes

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  17. ^ a b "Troubling Anthrax Additive Found ", Brian Ross, Christopher Isham, Chris Vlasto and Gary Matsumoto, ABC.com, October 26, 2001
  18. ^ a b "Anthrax Investigation / Bentonite / Cases", Television News Archive, Vanderbilt University, October 28, 2001
  19. ^ a b "Response from ABC News re: the Saddam-anthrax reports", Glenn Greenwald, Salon.com, april 11, 2007
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  27. ^ Anthrax Sleuthing Chemical & Engineering News December 4, 2006
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  37. ^ New York Daily News, August 2, 2008 "FBI was told to blame Anthrax scare on Al Qaeda by White House officials" http://www.nydailynews.com/news/us_world/2008/08/02/2008-08-02_fbi_was_told_to_blame_anthrax_scare_on_a.html
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  41. ^ "Mylroie: Saddam Is Behind the Terrorist Attacks", Jarret Wollstein, Newsmax.com, November 8, 2001
  42. ^ "Mylroie: Evidence Shows Saddam Is Behind Anthrax Attacks", Jarret Wollstein, Newsmax.com, November 9, 2001
  43. ^ "Our Forgotten Panic", Richard Cohen, Washington Post, July 22, 2004
  44. ^ "Remember the anthrax attacks?", Joseph Farah, Worldnet Daily, September 11, 2006
  45. ^ "Anthrax attacks: 5 years later", Michelle Malkin, September 18, 2006
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  51. ^ Before the anthrax letters were reported in the media, but after they had been posted, a letter postmarked September 21 and addressed to the "Town of Quantico police" was received that accused Dr. Ayaad Assaad of being a terrorist who was planning a biological attack. As a result Assaad was questioned on October 2, 2001 by the FBI. The letter was analyzed by Don Foster, an expert in the field of textual analysis who found the writing to be a perfect match to a female officer at Ft. Detrick. The Amerithrax Task Force declared the letter a hoax and took no further action on it.[1]
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  55. ^ Anthrax Evidence Called Mostly Circumstantial New York Times August 4, 2008
  56. ^ Dr. Ivins's failure to report a release of anthrax spores in his office in 2001 is critical evidence in the FBI case against him. Colonel Arthur Anderson (USAMRIID), the appropriate person for Ivins to have reported the release to, disputes the allegation that Ivins told no one, claiming Dr. Ivins told him about the lapse in safety shortly after it occurred (protocol did require Ivins to tell others as well but Anderson believes telling him indicated good faith). Further crucial evidence is reportedly a series of emails sent from Princeton, New Jersey, close to where the Anthrax letters were mailed from. However, the FBI has been unable to place Ivins in Princeton on that day.[2] It was latter revealed that the "series of emails" claim was incorrect and the connection was Ivins frequent visits to the Princeton Kappa Kappa Gamma chapter during his college days which is located 100 yards from the Anthrax mailbox (an explanation for why the mailings were made Template:Convert from where the Anthrax was stolen).[3]
  57. ^ Doubts about anthrax story Baltimore Sun August 5, 2008
  58. ^ Scientist’s Suicide Linked to Anthrax Inquiry New York Times August 2, 2008
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  61. ^ a b c The Anthrax Truth Movement Salon Magazine August 7, 2008
  62. ^ The FBI's selective release of documents in the anthrax case Salon Magazine
  63. ^ Bruce Ivins Wasn't the Anthrax Culprit Richard Spertzel for The wall Street Journal August 5, 2008
  64. ^ Leahy waits for anthrax answers Burlington Free Press August 9, 2008
  65. ^ Holes in the Anthrax Case? Washington Post Editorial August 9, 2008
  66. ^ Matsumoto, Gary (2003). "Anthrax Powder — State of the Art?". Science 302: 1492. doi:10.1126/science.302.5650.1492. PMID 14645823. Retrieved on 2008-04-06.
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  73. ^ "Anthrax survivors find life a struggle", The Baltimore Sun, September 18, 2003
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[edit] See also

[edit] External link


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