You keep pointing at things that are perfectly normal for scientists, and reading all kinds of sinister motives into them. Furthermore, every single piece of "evidence" is completely circumstantial and/or coincidental. There is absolutely no "smoking gun" that would have tied him (or anyone else) to the anthrax letters. However, there are plenty of reasonable explanations for his activities, which I'm sure his lawyer would have made very good use of to plant that "reasonable doubt" in the jurors' heads had poor Ivins not been so stressed by the FBI's relentless hounding that he killed himself.
With the kind of evidence that supposedly damns Ivins, I'm surprised you haven't had an arrest warrant issued for exDemMom yet, because I am just as guilty of working odd hours, having periods of intense lab activity, and working with things that can kill people.
Having worked in a lab, I am in complete agreement with you.
Ed, who has never set foot in the lab, relies solely on Internet publications as “proof” of Ivin’s guilt.
Notice he has not responded to my “hearsay” post above.
You'll probably rationalize and dream up some explanation for it, but there is a "smoking gun" that points to Ivins and no one else: the hidden message in the letters to Brokaw and the New York Post. Ivins was observed throwing away the code books used to encode the hidden message.
Plus, it's clear he tried to mislead the investigation on several occasions. I've recently been discussing the two occasions where he supplied improperly prepared slants to the FBI's repository (FBIR).
The first time he supplied the slants of material in flask RMR-1029, in February of 2002, he violated protocols and used homemade slants instead of Remel slants, he used the wrong media, and he violated chain of custody rules when turning the slants over to FBIR.
He was enraged when he was told that his homemade slants were not acceptable, and the slants were rejected.
Then, instead of being extra careful on supplying replacement slants in April of 2002, he provided FALSE samples that were the polar opposite of what was in flask RMR-1029. When questioned, he claimed he couldn't even remember who prepared the slants, how they were prepared, or if protocols were again violated by not getting a representative sample.
Ivins helped draw up the protocols that would be used, yet he claimed that he didn't know what the protocols were. He claimed everything was just a mistake.
Yes, scientists make mistakes. But these where clearly DELIBERATE actions by an experienced scientist who did not want to provide evidence to the FBI that could be used against him.