Posted on 09/30/2003 4:28:21 AM PDT by TrebleRebel
The new director of the FBI's Washington field office said yesterday it was unfortunate that former military scientist Steven J. Hatfill was named a "person of interest" in the investigation of the 2001 anthrax attacks, adding that he generally finds the phrase to be vague and unhelpful.
Michael A. Mason, an 18-year FBI veteran who took over the 700-agent office this month, said he regretted that the investigation had been "beset by leaks" about Hatfill being under the FBI's scrutiny. He said Attorney General John D. Ashcroft was responding to such leaks when he told reporters that Hatfill was a "person of interest" in the probe.
Mason, 45, said he objects to that phrase in all cases and prefers to identify people only when they are formal suspects and the FBI has enough evidence to charge them with a crime. Naming someone as a person of interest does not help an investigation, he said, and can unfairly harm a person's reputation.
(Excerpt) Read more at washingtonpost.com ...
After the Dr. Z debacle, they might be a little touchy about covering anthrax.
The anthrax was taken from a special lab in Texas where they have been working with if for years. They had in their employ, several non-nationals that managed to sneak some out. The message written on the letters (YOU HAVE THIS ANTHRAX) was referring to the fact that they GOT IT from US. Could HATFIELD have been a part of getting it to them? Maybe, but he certainly didn't participate in it any further than that.
The minds of the FBI (not to mention several uninformed Freepers) have already decided it was Hatfill. Please stop confusing them with facts that prove otherwise...
What binder chemicals are you referring to?
Assuming that the press is telling the truth here, it's rather difficult to reconcile this amazing statement with the 24 hour surveillance, wiretapping, and electronic eavesdropping that Hatfill alleges in his lawsuit complaint, is it not?
I can only assume one of three things is going on here:
1) Hatfill and his lawyer are lying about the surveillance and wiretapping.
2) The FBI is lying with their statement that Hatfill is not a suspect and no evidence links him to the crime.
3) The FBI knows that Hatfill is innocent, but are harrassing him purely out of spite in order to punish him for going public during the case.
If #3 is what is going on, and I hope that it isn't, then God help us all.
1) Hatfill and his lawyer are lying about the surveillance and wiretapping.
They are definitely not lying. They've taken reporters along with them while being followed. Many reporters have seen it, and one of the FBI employees ran over Hatfill's foot when Hatfill went to confront him. Remember?
2) The FBI is lying with their statement that Hatfill is not a suspect and no evidence links him to the crime.
They're not lying. There's never been even a hint of incriminating evidence against Hatfill.
3) The FBI knows that Hatfill is innocent, but are harrassing him purely out of spite in order to punish him for going public during the case.
Hatfill didn't go public until after the FBI made that public search of his apartment and put him under 24 hour surveillance.
I agree that it doesn't make any sense. But that doesn't mean it isn't true. What's the alternative? What else could the FBI do? Should they have said that Dr. Hatfill is innocent and that Dr. Rosenberg is wrong? How do you prove someone innocent except by finding the person who is guilty?
And why would people believe the FBI instead of Babs Rosenberg when it's part of Rosenberg's argument that the FBI is covering up for Hatfill? Saying that Hatfill is innocent without satisfactorily countering all the rumor and innuendo about Hatfill would just convince Rosenberg's supporters that the FBI was covering up for Hatfill.
Plus, it isn't just Rosenberg, Foster and Cross. It's the media and the public. What Rosenberg and Foster did was get the media hyped up and believing. And the media got the public hyped up. And the public got politicians hyped up. As a result we got newspapers demanding that Hatfill be arrested, even though there is absolutely NO proof that he was behind the anthrax mailings.
It's all politics. There's nothing that scares people like Ashcroft more than being accused of incompentency. So, the DOJ had the FBI investigate every "tip" about Hatfill no matter how stupid the tip was. If they didn't, they'd be accused of not doing their job. And they put Hatfill under 24-hour surveillance in case something else happened. If there was another mailing, they would need to know where Hatfill was.
There are a lot of people who believe Barbara Hatch Rosenberg. She's a "scientist", so they figure she should know what she's talking about. Ha!
Ed
September 28, 2003, Sunday, Final Edition
Anthrax, Homicides, Financial Probes on Agenda for Chief of FBI's D.C. Office
The rookie FBI undercover agent was sitting at a picnic bench with some ex-convicts in a back yard in Connecticut. Two menacing dogs -- a German shepherd and a Rottweiler -- were nearby.
One of the men kept peppering agent Michael Mason with questions, acting suspiciously, trying to check him out. Suddenly, another man -- a major heroin dealer under investigation -- turned to Mason and blurted: "You don't have to answer him. He thinks he's J. Edgar Hoover, he thinks he's the FBI!"
"I was really freaked by that," Mason said the other day, as he recalled the episode early in his career. He said he wound up making an undercover heroin buy, but "talk about a cold sweat."
Eighteen years later, Mason's propensity to jump into the thick of it has landed him the job as head of the FBI's Washington field office, which covers the District and Northern Virginia. He is at the forefront of a host of major cases, including the anthrax investigation and various financial scandals.
Mason, 45, a personable man of good humor, is the second African American to head the Washington field office. It's a distinction, he says, that he clearly recognizes.
"A lot of people who came into the FBI, African Americans, took a lot of grief, were not welcomed with open arms, were given crappy jobs. I'm talking about 25 or 30 years ago," said Mason, whose eighth-floor office displays a picture of baseball legend Jackie Robinson.
"But they stayed for a better day," Mason said. "I have felt as if they are looking at me and saying . . . 'We took a lot of [grief] so you could ascend to that position.' "
One of six children, and the son of a truck driver for the Chicago school district, Mason worked his way through high school, bagging groceries and pumping gas. He graduated from Illinois Wesleyan University in 1980 with an accounting degree and then spent five years with the Marine Corps.
In 1985, he joined the FBI, a goal born in seventh grade when he started watching a weekly television show about the bureau starring Efrem Zimbalist Jr. He was first assigned to Hartford, Conn., where he began dating his future wife, fellow agent Susan Sherland, who has since left the bureau. They have two sons, ages 9 and 12.
Mason later moved to several other assignments, including jobs at FBI headquarters and field offices in Syracuse, N.Y., Buffalo and Sacramento. As head of the Sacramento office, he was credited with improving strained relations between the FBI and local law enforcement agencies.
"He was tops; they don't come any better," said Stanislaus County Sheriff Les Weidman in Modesto, Calif. "He's charismatic, intelligent, quick-witted, sincere."
The Washington field office is the FBI's second-largest, with 700 agents. Mason took over Sept. 2, replacing Van Harp, who retired after nearly two years at the helm.
In recent weeks, Mason, who lives in Northern Virginia, has been meeting not only with agents but with many support personnel. One of his early stops: a visit to the FBI's car mechanics in Northeast Washington, to let them know they are a key part of the operation.
His colleagues give him high marks as an agent. Mason, however, said that he does not consider himself an expert on terrorism. He said he planned to rely on Mike Rolince, a veteran supervisor in the office, "who I consider the face of the war on terrorism."
While terrorism is the top priority, Mason said he will not ignore other crimes.
"As evil and as bad and vile as terrorism is, in 2002 we had over 18,000 homicides in this country, and not one was committed by al Qaeda," he said. "So we have other concerns. We also have public corruption, we have government fraud."
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Two years isn't very long. My guess is that VanHarp got sent to the woodshed.
Which, we must admit, may have been its sole purpose.
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