Free Republic

ANNAPOLIS, Md. - During the anthrax mail attacks in 2001, Bill Paliscak, a gung-ho, hockey-playing postal investigator who had missed 3 days of work in 11 years, removed a filthy filter above a mail-sorting machine to preserve it as evidence. Anthrax-laden dust showered down on him. Skip to next paragraph David Scull for The New York Times Bill Paliscak cannot live at his home until an elevator is installed. Enlarge This Image Agence France-Presse Workers in October 2001 cleaned the Brentwood postal facility in Washington, where employees like Mr. Paliscak were exposed to anthrax. Four days later he began to...

The U.S. Postal Service shut down 11 postal facilities in the Washington area late on Thursday after preliminary tests indicated possible anthrax at a U.S. Navy mail handling center, officials said. The Navy closed the automated mail handling operation at its naval air station in Washington on Thursday to run additional tests after sensors detected traces of a substance that could be anthrax, a Navy spokeswoman said. The substance was identified late on Wednesday by equipment that routinely samples the air in the facility and preliminary tests indicated that it could possibly be anthrax, a deadly bacterial disease, Lt. Corey...

Traces of the deadly toxin ricin were found on a letter at a South Carolina postal facility, federal officials said Wednesday. The FBI was investigating but terrorism was not suspected. The letter appeared to be connected to an extortion plot, government officials told The Associated Press. "Based on the evidence obtained so far, we do not believe this is linked to terrorism but is related to threats criminal in nature," said Brian Roehrkasse, spokesman for the Homeland Security Department. Officials also said that the ricin did not pose a health threat to workers or the public. The ricin on the...