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Senator: "There Are No More Excuses for Avoiding an Independent Review and Assessment of How the FBI Handled its Investigation in the Anthrax Case"
I wrote a lengthy article yesterday showing that the science attempting to link Bruce Ivins with the anthrax attacks was incredibly weak.
Now I will address some of the other holes in the FBI's case against Ivins.
As I noted in August 2008:
The FBI cannot match Ivins and the handwriting in the anthrax letters. As summarized by World Net Daily:
"Casting
further doubt on the FBI's anthrax case, accused government scientist
Bruce Ivins passed two polygraph tests and a handwriting analysis
comparing samples of his handwriting to writing contained in the anthrax
letters, U.S. officials familiar with the investigation say.***
Officials
confirm that FBI handwriting analysts were unable to conclusively
match samples of Ivins' handwriting with the writing on the anthrax
envelopes and letters".The WND article points out other problems with the FBI's case:
Investigators also failed to uncover other critical evidence linking Ivins directly to the letters. For instance:
*
No textile fibers were found in his office, residence or vehicles
matching fibers found on the scotch tape used to seal the envelopes;* No pens were found matching the ink used to address the envelopes;
* Samples of his hair failed to match hair follicles found inside the Princeton, N.J., mailbox used to mail the letters.
Also,
no souvenirs of the crime, such as newspaper clippings, were found in
his possession as commonly seen in serial murder cases.What's
more, the FBI could not place Ivins at the crime scene with evidence,
such as gas station or other receipts, at the time the letters were
mailed in September and October 2001.***
Lab records
reviewed by WND show the number of late nights Ivins put in at the lab
first spiked in August 2001, weeks before the 9/11 attacks."
The Frederick News Post (an excellent paper located near the army base at Fort Detrick, where Ivins worked) writes today:
FBI officers never found fingerprints on the letters or traces of the anthrax in Ivins' car or home.
Glenn Greenwald notes that the FBI's original timeline as to when Ivins deposited letters in the mailbox is impossible.
And anthrax expert Dr. Meryl Nass points out:
Drs.
Perry Mikesell, Ayaad Assaad and Stephen Hatfill were 3 earlier
suspects. All had circumstantial evidence linking them to the case. In
Hatfill's case, especially, are hints he could have been "set up."
Greendale, the return address on the letters, was a suburb of Harare,
Zimbabwe where Hatfill attended medical school. Hatfill wrote an
unpublished book about a biowarfare attack that bears some resemblance
to the anthrax case. So the fact that abundant circumstantial evidence
links Ivins to the case might be a reflection that he too was "set up"
as a potential suspect, before the letters were sent.
***
FBI
fails to provide any discussion of why no autopsy was performed, nor
why, with Ivins under 24/7 surveillance from the house next door, with
even his garbage being combed through, the FBI failed to notice that
he overdosed and went into a coma. Nor is there any discussion of why
the FBI didn't immediately identify tylenol as the overdose substance,
and notify the hospital, so that a well-known antidote for tylenol
toxicity could be given (N-acetyl cysteine, or alternatively
glutathione). These omissions support the suggestion that Ivins'
suicide was a convenience for the FBI. It enabled them to conclude the
anthrax case, in the absence of evidence that would satisfy the
courts.
***
The FBI's alleged motive is bogus. In 2001,
Bioport's anthrax vaccine could not be (legally) relicensed due to
potency failures, and its impending demise provided room for Ivins'
newer anthrax vaccines to fill the gap. Ivins had nothing to do with
developing Bioport's vaccine, although in addition to his duties
working on newer vaccines, he was charged with assisting Bioport to
get through licensure.
***
The FBI report claims the
anthrax letters envelopes were sold in Frederick, Md. Later it admits
that millions of indistinguishable envelopes were made, with sales in
Maryland and Virginia.
***
FBI emphasizes Ivins'
access to a photocopy machine, but fails to mention it was not the
machine from which the notes that accompanied the spores were printed.***
FBI
asserts that Bioport and USAMRIID were nearly out of anthrax vaccine,
to the point researchers might not have enough to vaccinate
themselves. FBI further asserts this would end all anthrax research,
derailing Ivins' career. In fact, USAMRIID has developed many dozens
of vaccines (including those for anthrax) that were never licensed,
but have been used by researchers to vaccinate themselves. There would
be no vaccine shortage for researchers.***
Ivins
certainly had mental problems. But that does not explain why the FBI
accompanied Ivins' therapist, Ms. Duley (herself under charges for
multiple DUIs) and assisted her to apply for a peace order against him.
Nor does it explain why Duley then went into hiding, never to be heard
from again.***
FBI obtained a voluntary collection of
anthrax samples. Is that the way to conduct a multiple murder
investigation: ask the scientists to supply you with the evidence to
convict them? There is no report that spores were seized from anyone
but Ivins, about 6 years after the attacks. This is a huge hole in the
FBI's "scientific" methodology.
***
FBI claims it
investigated Bioport and others who had a financial motive for the
letters attack, and ruled them out. However, FBI provides not a shred
of evidence from such an investigation.FBI gave this report its best
shot. The report sounds good. It includes some new evidence. It
certainly makes Ivins out to be a crazed, scary and pathetic figure. If
you haven't followed this story intently, you may be convinced of his
guilt.
As Dr. Nass wrote today:
The FBI responded that their case was based on a totality of the evidence, not just the science. But
when the rest of the FBI's evidence is examined, one finds only
smoke. There has been no physical evidence tying Ivins to the case.
The totality of the FBI case against Ivins rests on colorful and
sometimes exaggerated personal quirks and odd habits. The FBI has
presented no convincing evidence that Ivins had the means, a motive, or
the oppportunity to commit the letters crime.
And see this.
Ivins' attorney is correct when he states:
This
shows what we've been saying all along: that it was all supposition
based on conjecture based on guesswork, without any proof whatsoever.
No wonder Congressman Holt - a physicist who represents the New Jersey district from which the anthrax letters were mailed - re-introduced his legislation to create an anthrax Commission, complete with subpoena power, with a mandate to review the entire matter.
No wonder Senator Grassley said yesterday:
There
are no more excuses for avoiding an independent review and assessment
of how the FBI handled its investigation in the anthrax case.
But why is this newsworthy? Why should we care.
Well, as Glenn Greenwald writes today:
It is hard to overstate the political significance of the anthrax attacks. For reasons I've described at length,
that event played at least as much of a role as the 9/11 attacks in
elevating the Terrorism fear levels which, through today, sustain
endless wars, massive defense and homeland security budgets, and
relentless civil liberties erosions. The pithy version of the vital
role played by anthrax was supplied by Atrios here and here;
in essence, it was anthrax that convinced large numbers of Americans
that Terrorism was something that could show up without warning at
their doorstep -- though something as innocuous as their mailbox -- in
the form of James-Bond-like attacks featuring invisible, lethal
powder. Moreover, anthrax was exploited in the aftermath of 9/11 to
ratchet up the fear levels toward Saddam Hussein, as ABC News' Brian Ross spent a full week screeching to the country -- falsely --
that bentonite had been found in the anthrax and that this agent was
the telltale sign of Iraq's chemical weapons program, while George
Bush throughout 2002 routinely featured "anthrax" as one of Saddam's scary weapons.That
there's so much lingering doubt about who was responsible for this
indescribably consequential attack is astonishing, and it ought to be
unacceptable. Other than a desire to avoid finding out who the culprit
was (and/or to avoid having the FBI's case against Ivins subjected to
scrutiny), there's no rational reason to oppose an independent,
comprehensive investigation into this matter.
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Maybe you should ask Rumsfeld how much he made out of selling anthrax plant to Saddam on behalf of Bechtel Inc.
Somebody seriously needs to go over video from Holy Cross Hosp in Ft. Laud when Atta goes to ER w/burns. Close to Boca AMI building, 30 min drive. COVERUP!
Link, please...
there won't be links George, the story has been scrubbed clean.
true dat...cover up for sure. The anthrax was in the mail room but it didn't arrive by mail.
The way it was reported on page 5 of the local propaganda sheet (1st paragraph):
"Hagerstown, MD. - Federal investigators overstated the scientific case against the late Army researcher blamed for the 2001 anthrax attacks that killed five people, but the evidence is also consistent with the government's finding that Bruce Ivins was behind the mailings, a panel of scientists said Tuesday."
Bruce is probably hanging out with Elvis, Bigfoot, Hoffa and other nameless folks in a concrete slab somewhere.
Anthrax what?
He was just a patsy and it was one of many staged false flag attacks by our government.
You'll have to look into the EARLIEST news reports on that incident (the Enquirer location) to get close to the truth. Of course, good luck in finding them ;).
Please link or re-post. Thanks.
I'm a few miles from the building and the earliest reports were that they had a teen in custody, they made it sound like he was caught red-handed but those reports disappeared just as quickly as they appeared. You might want to dig around the Miami Herald but I doubt you'll find anything still on the web.
I'm also wondering why the Enquirer itself has not followed this a bit better, they had people killed. I had the news that something happened from a local hospital source so was glued to the reporting, I kinda shook my head when things started disappearing but I do know they had someone in custody within hours.
Google scrub in action. Or Google inaction.
Considering there are only three labs that make anthrax and two of them are US labs, the other is in Russia. I often wonder what happened to the old bat that was sending the anthrax letters during the 9/11 horseshit. Never heard about that again.
Imagine that, top science guy of a govie lab sending out poison pills. Then nothing. Was never discussed ever again. Ever.