Expert: Anthrax Suspect I.D.'d

The Times (New Jersey Online) ^ | February 19th, 2002 | Joseph Dee

[wimpycat]

PRINCETON BOROUGH -- An advocate for the control of biological weapons who has been gathering information about last autumn's anthrax attacks said yesterday the Federal Bureau of Investigation has a strong hunch about who mailed the deadly letters.

But the FBI might be "dragging its feet" in pressing charges because the suspect is a former government scientist familiar with "secret activities that the government would not like to see disclosed," said Barbara Hatch Rosenberg, director of the Federation of American Scientists' Chemical and Biological Weapons Program.

[Ada Coddington]

Once arrested, he's discredited, and the judge would never let him present whatever dirt he has, and moreover they could probably find a judge who'd let them hold this guy more or less incommunicado

Once a scientist working in a US government lab is arrested, the "dirt", as you say, is already out, i.e., the US has been working on weaponized anthrax which is a treaty violation.

[thinden]

"We can draw a likely portrait of the perpetrator as a former Fort Detrick scientist who is now working for a contractor in the Washington, D.C., area," Rosenberg said. "He had reason for travel to Florida, New Jersey and the United Kingdom. . . . There is also the likelihood the perpetrator made the anthrax himself. He grew it, probably on a solid medium and weaponized it at a private location where he had accumulated the equipment and the material.

"We know that the FBI is looking at this person, and it's likely that he participated in the past in secret activities that the government would not like to see disclosed," Rosenberg said. "And this raises the question of whether the FBI may be dragging its feet somewhat and may not be so anxious to bring to public light the person who did this.

FYI pinging

[Ada Coddington]

Lol... the FBI decides it will give this guy the chance to kill more people, and they decided to tell some shmucko about thi

If one more microbiologist dies a mysterious death, who's gonna notice?

[The Great Satan]

An advocate for the control of biological weapons who has been gathering information about last autumn's anthrax attacks said yesterday the Federal Bureau of Investigation has a strong hunch about who mailed the deadly letters.

They have more than a strong hunch, Barbara, honey. They've had him in custody since November 2, 2001. The mailer's name is Allah Rakah. He received the anthrax letters from their preparer, Mohammed Atta, in Florida, where he then lived, before moving to Hamilton Township, New Jersey, from where he dispatched the threats to prominent figures in the US media and government, a few days after Atta's suicide attack on the World Trade Center. Unfortunately, Rakah is just more lowlife mosque scum, recruited as a mule by Atta: he knows nothing about whether there really are large caches of Saddam's anthrax on US soil, or who would be charged with dispersing them if push comes to shove and Saddam gives the order to do so.

How do I know all this? Let's just call it a "strong hunch," Barbara. I guess we'll have to wait and see whose "hunches" are on the mark, eh, Barbara?

[KirkandBurke]

Alibek/Patrick/spooks. Strange connections with the players and the companies. I'm not sure of the author's slant here, but I'm not the type to declare that snow is hot, just because a democrat says it's cold. The connections may all be coincidence, but why is it that we always seem to run into trouble with our CIA and their assets? (Barry Seal, Noriega, Bin Laden, etc.)

[Cooter]

Well, you should know. BTW, is your deal with x42 done yet? Can't you get your boy to just shut up and go away?

[Hagrid]

Remember, she was the one who suggested in summer 2001 that a scientist might have to spread anthrax to create enough people who would take the threat seriously and pass the treaty she was pushing. She probably knew even then of talk in her community of doing just such a thing.

I thought all along that it was someone within her organization or on the fringes of it who were the likeliest suspects. She probably knows what she knows more from the criminal side than from the govt side. Note her ant-govt spin.

This also fits the fact that Dems were targeted and warned to get treated, since they were the ones who needed to be activated. Also, Leahy was a leader of the Judiciary Committee, who had to approve the treaty that she and her group was pushing. It all fits together so nicely!

[TruthNtegrity]

BTTT and bookmarking

[Abbalon]

The anthrax hoaxes were bubba rightwingers used for an agenda. The real deal anthrax attacks were rightwing elites "with an agenda".

[mikhailovich]

Yeah.....and what ever happened to that Eric Rudolph guy?

[Dr. Eckleburg]

I suspect the mailer had limited supply...

Of oxygen, one hopes.

[The Great Satan]

Actually, Cheney and his staff were put on Cipro on September 11 (see, for example, Low on the Food Chain). Either Saddam made a direct threat, through channels, or the whole scenario had been wargamed beforehand. The latter seems quite likely. After all, the way events have unfolded -- Saddam sponsors massive terror attack in revenge for Gulf War et seq, backed up with the threat of anthrax to deter US retaliation -- is simply the unfolding of a rather predictable scenario, given the personalities and capabilities of the players involved.

[eno_]

He's been used up as an excuse. Kind of like how they couldn't say "center fuel tank" when AA587 blew up.

[cynicom]

mik

The government spent millions looking for one man. It would be interesting to know his fate.

[Fred Mertz]

Your "hunch" makes more sense than hers, TSG.

[Diddle E. Squat]

I thought the United Kimdom was Korea before the split?

[Dark Wing]

ping

[knak]

There's an article somewhere on FR where this woman made a statement about the anthrax case before and she was discredited soon after. I don't remember when or what it was called, but I clearly remember her name and that she was spouting off stuff without any type of proof.

[Carry_Okie]

I agree with the assessment that the author is a leftist flack. I also think that handling any bio-weapon scientist might demand extreme caution: This person might also have had access to smallpox and might therefore have prepared a "Doomsday" device to deter arrest by blackmail.

In such a case, careful surveillance would definitely be in order.

[maestro]

:-)

Vat Philbee Philbee.

:-(