Scientist Steven Hatfill cleared in anthrax scare

WASHINGTON, Aug. 8 (UPI) -- The U.S. Justice Department said Friday that Steven Hatfill was not involved in anthrax mailings for which he was listed six years ago as a person of interest.

The Justice Department agreed in June to pay $4.6 million to settle Hatfill's lawsuit against the government, but until Friday the government had not exonerated him, The New York Times (NYSE:NYT) reported.

"We have concluded, based on laboratory access records, witness accounts and other information, that Dr. Hatfill did not have access to the particular anthrax used in the attacks, and that he was not involved in the anthrax mailings," Jeffrey Taylor, the United States attorney for the District of Columbia, said in a letter to Hatfill's lawyer.

Officials say they believe the anthrax mailings were committed by military scientist Bruce Ivins, who died recently after taking an overdose of painkillers.

Sen. Charles Grassley, R-Iowa, who sits on the Senate Judiciary Committee, said lawmakers needed to conduct hearings to determine what went wrong in the investigation.

"We've had a seven-year investigation and $15 million spent on it and one of the 'people of interest' bought off for $5.8 million over what was obviously an FBI screw-up," Grassley said. "We need answers."

The FBI purchased an annuity that will be worth $5.8 million to Hatfill and his lawyers, the Times said.

The Catherine Herridge video can be viewed at http://www.foxnews.com/video/index.html?CMP=KNC-YahooPI

You have to search for “anthrax” - then click on the August 1 video titled “Anthrax suspect commits suicide, Suspect dies as FBI close in.
Note the transcript is slightly different than the one written up here:
http://www.foxnews.com/story/0,2933,397325,00.html

She holds up the printout of the email, and then says:

In the email Ivins circulated to colleagues it claims that the anthrax in the letters was from Fort Detrick, that is was virtually identical to powder that had been made by one of the scientists there.

Friends of Ivins have told me today that they believe that he really wanted to shed light on the possibility or what seems to be almost a foregone conclusion now that it was an army insider that was responsible for those attacks. Others would suggest that this was really Ivins’s way of deflecting suspicion away from him.

The big issue here, is the fact that a powder was made in Detrick - not just a wet preparation. Also it seems Ivins did not write the original email, but rather he circulated it.

So was Ivins trying to solve the crime? Or was he part of it?

For completeness, here’s the original email discussion from March 28, 2008, along with the best translation of the fuzzy image.

http://www.foxnews.com/story/0,2933,342852,00.html

In December 2001, an Army commander tried to dispel the possibility of a connection to Fort Detrick by taking the media on a rare tour of the base. The commander said the Army used only liquid anthrax, not powder, for its experiments.

“I would say that it does not come from our stocks, because we do not use that dry material,” Maj. Gen. John Parker said. The letters that were mailed to the media and Sens. Tom Daschle and Patrick Leahy all contained powdered anthrax.

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!’”

Sent: Tuesday June 27 2006 7:38 AM

Subject: PDF images

(1) xxxxxx was giving his opinion on xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx ?

(2) ? examine all of the letter spore powder samples. He said like XXXX

(3) ??????. Then he said he had to look at a lot of samples that the FBI had

(4) letter material. Then the bombshell, He said that the best duplication

(5) was if ???? ??????? ?????? ??????? exactly about looking at ?

(6) xxxxxx coming on and ????? ??????? xxx ??? him if this powder

(7) his knees got shaky and he sputtered “But I told the General we didn’t

(8) investigators that xxxxxxx was involved in some way in the letter incident

(9) was finding it was actually funny. The sentences were quite ????? ??

(10) words and phrases xxx said that xxxx was the worst Commander

(11) just believe that I had heard xx had made Ames spore powder just

(12)?? heard that xxxxxxx either knew about it or was behind it and that

(13) ???

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