As it turns out, the FBI’s interest in Dr. Hatfill stemmed significantly from his work on a mock-up of an anthrax lab for the purpose of training Special Operations personnel. F.B.I. agents pulled the lab over as it was being hauled to Ft. Bragg to check it again even though they had spent two weeks examining it. The Pentagon was allowed to keep and use the trailer in preparation for the war with Iraq. Training sessions were by Dr. Hatfill sometimes and other times by Dr. Patrick. Dr. Hatfill responds to an interrogatory response in his civil rights litigation: “William C. Patrick III, once a very close friend and colleague of Dr. Hatfill has broken off communication with him for fear of being associated with Dr. Hatfill and the Anthrax attacks.” Col. Bill Darley, spokesman for the United States Special Operations Command in Tampa, Fla., told the New York Times: “We are not growing anthrax or botulinum toxin. None of this equipment is functional. It looks like — it is — the real stuff, but it’s nonfunctional.” The nonfunctional mock-up was built on an 18-wheel trailer and outfitted with specialized, commercially available, lab equipment.
“No way in the wildest dream could it have been used to make anything,” William C. Patrick III is quoted as saying. Dr. Hatfill planned the design and supervised its construction at a shop in Frederick, about a mile from his apartment. For some training sessions, he reportedly used the anthrax simulant called Bacillus globigii, which would commonly be used for such purposes. The mock-up was known as “the can.”
So in the Fall of 2002, while the FBI was investigating him, Hatfill trained Defense Intelligence Agency employees on ways to search for biological weapons, worked with Army’s Delta Force, and sat in on a State Department meeting on embassy security in postwar Afghanistan. He received letters of commendation for his work from officials at the DIA and the State Department. In Iraq, DIA and CIA agents worked with the 75th Exploitation Task Force in the search for biological weapons.
“If the facts were known, most Americans would be deeply grateful to Dr. Hatfill for his service to our nation,” spokesman Pat Clawson is quoted as saying. “Steve Hatfill knows nothing about the anthrax attacks. He is a loyal American and patriot who loves his country. At the DIA’s request, he did this work even though he had been terminated by Science Applications International Corp. (SAIC) at the considerable frustration of FBI agents who thought he was responsible for the anthrax mailings.
It might be very difficult to find someone who fit a “bioevangelist” theory better than Dr. Hatfill. Even a Dr. Berry theory always seemed a Hatfill-lite. Absent Al-Timimi sharing the same fax number and maildrop as the leading anthrax scientist and the former deputy of USAMRIID — who had working pursuant to the biggest biodefense award in history using Delta Ames under a contract with USAMRIID — a Hatfill Theory might be expected to go the distance and cross the goal line. But all those who, upon being apprised of the facts of Al-Timimi and his connections to this AQ sheik or this jihad recruiter or this EIJ founder or this “911 imam” etc., have not changed their mind, are suffering from cognitive rigidity. They might start by doing some background reading on the militants, for example, by reading Berger or Wright or Scheuer. For work more narrowly on this issue of infiltration, there is Lance’s TRIPLE X. For those whose mind is not open to considering the alternative hypothesis — like Ed who hasn’t gone his keen observation that the hijackers were all dead — let’s hope you don’t work for the Amerithrax Task Force.
http://www.dailypress.com/news/local/virginia/dp-dc—terror-paintball0516may16,0,6552723.story
ALEXANDRIA, Va. - A federal judge Friday said the government is abusing its discretion to classify documents in the case of a U.S.-born Islamic scholar from Virginia who was convicted of soliciting treason.
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In a recently unsealed defense motion, al-Timimi’s lawyer, Jonathan Turley, said it is obvious that the government was running wiretaps on al-Timimi after Sept. 11 because he was long suspected by the U.S. government of having ties to al-Qaida and Osama bin Laden. Despite that, Turley says the government is claiming it has no relevant wiretap recordings from any time between Sept. 11, 2001, and Feb. 1, 2003.
The evidence that Dr. al-Timimi was subject to undisclosed surveillance is obvious,” Turley wrote, citing the fact that al-Timimi was interviewed by the FBI in 1994 in its investigation of the first World Trade Center bombing, as well as the fact that al-Timimi was explicitly mentioned in the notorious Presidential Daily Briefing of August 2001 titled “Bin Laden Determined to Strike in US.”
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Turley is mostly operating in the dark about what the government has in its possession, though, because the government has been communicating in secret with the judge about what evidence exists. Turley has been excluded even though he holds top security clearances.
At Friday’s hearing, U.S. District Judge Leonie Brinkema said Turley has been unfairly excluded from information he should have, and that the government is improperly marking some evidence and legal motions as classified.
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She said she will have a meeting with prosecutors and intelligence agencies to hammer out what information can be disclosed to the defense and what might be able to made public”
“Some of the material claimed to be classified cannot be claimed as classified under any rational system,” Brinkema said.
Turley said he appreciated Brinkema’s efforts to grant him access to information, but he bristled at her suggestion that he might only receive redacted versions of some documents.
“I’ve had (top-level security clearances) since the Reagan administration,” he told Brinkema.
Comment:
Under one way of thinking, it is not rational to classify it given that it is disclosed here:
Sheiks and Bioweaponeers
http://www.anthraxandalqaeda.com
Most intelligence information is open source. But the government deems that even where information is already out there, it is the government corroboration that makes the difference. Fair enough — except don’t think for a minute the bad guys are fooled. It’s only the public that is being misdirected.