CASE CLOSED … what really happened in the 2001 anthrax attacks? … a search for the truth

Posts Tagged ‘Congressman Nadler & anthrax’

* recent correspondence between Congressman Jerrold Nadler and the FBI reveals the FBI’s longstanding, continuing and apparently purposeful refusal to answer direct questions asked by the Congressman

Posted by Lew Weinstein on September 18, 2011

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Congressman Jerrold Nadler

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Chronology (2008-2011) in reverse order

  • Congressman Nadler to FBI Director Mueller … Sept 13, 2011 (see letter below)
    • noting that the FBI’s letter of August 9, 2011 has still failed to explain why their April 2009 answer to questions asked in November 2008 was incomplete
    • noting that specific questions asked in May 2011 regarding additional samples were not answered in the FBI’s letter of August 9, 2011
  • Letter from FBI Assistant Director, Laboratory Division to Congressman Nadler … August 9, 2011 (see letter below)
  • Congressman Nadler to FBI Director Mueller … May 2011 …
    • asking why the FBI’s April 2009 letter provided incomplete information in response to Nadler’s questions asked in November 2008
    • asking specific new questions regarding the NAS report and whether certain additional samples were tested
  • FBI letter to Congressman Nadler … April 2009 … providing incomplete information in response to questions asked by the Congressman in November 2008
  • Questions first raised by Congressman Nadler … November 2008
  • FBI press conference in August 2008 announcing that Dr. Bruce Ivins was the sole perpetrator of the 2001 anthrax attacks and that the case would soon be closed

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Congressman Nadler to FBI Director Mueller … Sept 13, 2011

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Letter from FBI Assistant Director, Laboratory Division

to Congressman Nadler … Aug 9, 2011

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see also …

* PBS Frontline, McClatchy and ProPublica … The FBI’s false case against Dr. Bruce Ivins, built on obviously unproven innuendos and assertions, is beginning to unravel.

 * Congressman Jerrold Nadler complains to FBI Director Robert Mueller that questions he first asked in September 2008 regarding silicon content in the anthrax in several of the 2001 attack letters were answered incorrectly … previous posts on this blog assert that the correct information may be very relevant to determining who the real perpetrator(s) of those attacks were

 * responses to Congressman Nadler’s questions of the FBI regarding the % of weight of the silicon in the powder used in the 2001 anthrax attacks

 * and then there were three … Congressman Nadler joins Holt and Bartlett in calling for Congressional review of the failed FBI anthrax investigation … waiting for Senators Grassley and Specter

* the FBI’s answers to questions posed by members of the House Judiciary Committee in September 2008 as to certain aspects of the FBI’s investigation of the 2001 anthrax attacks are insulting and demeaning to the U.S. Congress and to the American people

* Congress tries to scrutinize the FBI’s anthrax investigation … so far with little success

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LMW COMMENT …

The letters presented above show a longstanding, continuing, and apparently purposeful refusal of the FBI to answer clear, specific, and important questions asked by a United States Congressman in his official capacity.

The FBI doesn’t say the information they refuse to divulge is being withheld for security or any other reasons. They don’t say the FBI doesn’t know the answers. They simply do not answer the questions asked, some of which were asked almost three years ago. 

It is my view that no member of the U.S. government has the right to treat a U.S. Congressman in the manner the FBI has treated Congressman Nadler. 

Meanwhile, the anthrax attacks of 2001 have not been solved. After 10 years of the most expensive investigation in the FBI’s history, the American people do not know who committed those attacks. Maybe the FBI knows but isn’t saying, or maybe they don’t know either.

But in any case, the accusation of a dead man where there are no witnesses, no physical evidence, and no conclusive science, with nothing but an unsupported veneer of conjecture, should not be allowed to stand. The FBI’s case could never have achieved a conviction in court.

It is important that our country still doesn’t know who attacked us with anthrax in 2001.

It is important that the perpetrators are still out there, perhaps planning another attack.

And it is very important that the FBI respond fully and respectfully to Congressman Nadler, to the entire U.S. Congress and to the American people.

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Posted in Uncategorized | Tagged: , , , , , , | 12 Comments »

* Congressman Jerrold Nadler complains to FBI Director Robert Mueller that questions he first asked in September 2008 regarding silicon content in the anthrax in several of the 2001 attack letters were answered incorrectly … previous posts on this blog assert that the correct information may be very relevant to determining who the real perpetrator(s) of those attacks were

Posted by Lew Weinstein on May 27, 2011

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UPDATE 5/27 … Greg Gordon writes …

  • The FBI said the bureau had received the letter and would respond directly to Nadler.

LMW: let’s hope it doesn’t take 7 months to answer this time

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UPDATE 5/27 … Jim White writes on firedoglake …

FBI Ignored, Hid Data Potentially Excluding Bruce Ivins as Anthrax Killer

  • The FBI ignored as potentially erroneous a measurement of silicon in one anthrax sample and then hid this information from Congressman Jerrold Nadler (D-NY).
  • Even more importantly, the high silicon measurements in at least two samples also were coupled with high tin measurements, opening up the possibility that silicon was added to the attack material in a form that is not mentioned in any of the FBI documents.
  • Significantly, it is virtually impossible that Bruce Ivins, whom the FBI has concluded acted on his own to carry out the attacks, would have been able to perform the necessary chemical manipulations involved in this treatment of the spores.
  • Ivins likely also would not have had access to the necessary laboratory equipment to perform this treatment.


http://my.firedoglake.com/jimwhite/2011/05/20/fbi-ignored-hid-data-potentially-excluding-bruce-ivins-as-anthrax-killer/

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Congressman Nadler & FBI Director Mueller

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 Congressman Jerrold Nadler writes to FBI Director Mueller (5/25/11) …

Nadler specifically asked Mueller why the FBI appears to have provided incorrect information on the case to Nadler and the Judiciary Committee subsequent to a September 16, 2008 oversight hearing on the FBI.

excerpts from Nadler’s letter are shown below …

see the entire letter at … 


http://nadler.house.gov/index.php?option=com_content&task=view&id=1665&Itemid=132

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see also …

* Greg Gordon (McClatchy): the apparent failure of the FBI to pursue this avenue of investigation raises the ominous possibility that the killer is still on the loose … Stuart Jacobsen: it is “outrageous” that the scientific issues haven’t been addressed.

* RMR-1029 was registered as #7737 in Building 1412 ; what were particulars of #7736? Was it from same seed stock? Did it have a silicon signature?

* Did the anthrax grown in soil reported at the June 2001 anthrax conference by Dr. Ezzell and his colleagues contain a Silicon Signature?

* Silicon Signature – what were samples 040030-2 and 040255-1 that showed Silicon Signature? If one was Flask 1030, what was the other? Dugway?

* the GAO review of the FBI’s anthrax investigation has begun … a report is expected to be issued by September 20, 2011 … *** UPDATE: a series of fascinating comments to this post suggest many pertinent questions that GAO might want to consider

… among many other posts and comments on this blog dealing with the silicon signature

and its often ignored significance in identifying the perpetrator(s) of  the anthrax attacks

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excerpts from Congressman Nadler’s letter

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  • On September 16, 2008 …  I asked you the following:  “[W]hat was the percentage of weight of the silicon in the powders that your experts examined?”

LMW NOTE: it took 7 months for Director Mueller to respond

to what was a very simple factual question !!!

  • On April 17, 2009, (the FBI) responded with the following answer:
    • FBI Laboratory results indicated that the spore powder on the Leahy letter contained 14,470 ppm of silicon (1.4%).
    • The spore powder on the New York Post letter was found to have silicon present in the sample; however, due to the limited amount of material, a reliable quantitative measurement was not possible.
    • Insufficient quantifies of spore powder on both the Daschle and Brokaw letters precluded analysis of those samples.
  • A February 15, 2011 report by the National Academy of Sciences (“NAS report”) … raises three questions about this DOJ/FBI response to me.
    • First, with respect to the anthrax on the letter sent to Senator Leahy, the NAS report shows on pages 66 and 67 (Table 4.4) that the silicon content found by the FBI was 1.4% in one sample and 1.8% in a second sample.

Nadler: Why were both figures not provided to me

in response to my questions?

    • Second, the NAS report shows on pages 66 and 67 (Table 4.4) that the FBI found the silicon content in the New York Post letter anthrax to be 10% when the bulk material was measured by mass and 1-2% when individual spore coats were measured by mass per spore.

Nadler: Why was neither piece of data provided to me

in response to my questions?

    • Third and finally, the NAS report raises questions about the appropriateness of the measurements taken of the anthrax on the letter to the New York Post.
      • (the NAS said) … additional samples should have been analyzed to determine representativeness.  
      • If such data exist, they were not provided to the committee. 
      • Lacking this information, one cannot rule out the intentional addition of a silicon-based substance to the New York Post letter, in a failed attempt to enhance dispersion.  
      • The committee notes that powders with dispersion characteristics similar to the letter material could be produced without the addition of a dispersant.

Nadler: Were additional samples tested to determine the extent

to which the ones examined were representative

of the New York Post letter material? 

If not, why not? 

  • If the FBI did do these additional tests, please provide the resulting data to me and NAS.

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LMW COMMENT …

It seems clear from Congressman Nadler’s letter that FBI Director Mueller has been less than forthcoming to the House Judiciary Committee on crucial issues regarding the investigation of the 2001 anthrax attacks.

The Congress and the American people need to know the truth and also why Director Mueller has avoided fully stating that truth.

The FBI’s publicly presented case against Dr. Ivins is clearly bogus:

… no evidence, 

…. no witnesses, 

…. an impossible timeline, 

…. science that proves innocence instead of guilt. 

So what really happened? And why doesn’t the FBI offer America a credible story?

As regular readers of this blog well know,

I can imagine only 3 possible “actual” scenarios …

  1. The FBI has more evidence against Dr. Ivins but is, for some undisclosed reason, withholding that evidence … POSSIBLE BUT NOT SO LIKELY
  2. The FBI, despite the most expensive and extensive investigation in its history, has not solved the case and has no idea who prepared and mailed the anthrax letters that killed 5 Americans in 2001 … EVEN LESS LIKELY
  3. The FBI knows who did it (not Dr. Ivins) but is covering up the actual perpetrators, for undisclosed reasons …THE MOST LIKELY SCENARIO

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Posted in Uncategorized | Tagged: , , , , , , , , , , , | 23 Comments »

* responses to Congressman Nadler’s questions of the FBI regarding the % of weight of the silicon in the powder used in the 2001 anthrax attacks

Posted by Lew Weinstein on January 20, 2011

Congressman Nadler & FBI Director Mueller

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Posted in Uncategorized | Tagged: , , , , , | 18 Comments »

* Anonymous Scientist summarizes the FBI’s case against Dr. Bruce Ivins … if it wasn’t so serious, it would be laughable

Posted by Lew Weinstein on March 10, 2010

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The New York Times says the FBI’s anthrax case has “too many loose ends.” Find out where some of those looses ends might have originated in my novel CASE CLOSED. Sure it’s fiction, but many readers, including a highly respected member of the U.S. Intelligence Community, think my premise is actually “quite plausible.”

* buy CASE CLOSED at amazon *

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see related post …

* Questions arising from a reading of the Summary of the FBI Investigation of Dr. Bruce E. Ivins

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Anonymous Scientist offers this summary …

It has been two weeks since the FBI announced the official closing of Amerithrax, its 8+ year investigation  into the 2001 Anthrax Atttacks – eighteen months after the “suicide” of their prime suspect.

  • Even the FBI’s head office wasn’t particularly proud of its anthrax detectives. It released the report suddenly with no fanfare, no press opportunities in the deadest of news dead zones–Friday afternoon at 4, the same day as Tiger Wood’s mea culpa. It was no contest.
  • The media spent one breathless day on it and then it was over, we had closure. The biggest FBI investigation in history ended with a whimper and it wasn’t even on the mop-up segments of cable news debating parlors. The only real traction the story  got was in the low precincts where Ivins’ off-hour  interests in bondage, blind-folded women and sororities titillated.

While mainstream reaction was muted, a hearty band of skeptics came out swinging: They say the case against Dr. Ivins, which never has to be proven in court, screams reasonable doubt.

  • There is no incriminating physical evidence.
  • Ivins had even passed his polygraph.
  • Narrative inconsistencies.
  • Hearsay quotes.
  • Scientific implausibility.
  • Selective prosecution based on circumstantial evidence requiring an X-Files like leap of faith into  Mulder and Scully-land.

Paul Kemp,  Ivins’  former lawyer, thundered:”There’s absolutely no evidence he did anything…”

Rep. Rush D. Holt, a Democrat from central New Jersey, grumbled: “This has been a closed-minded, closed process from the beginning. Arbitrarily closing the case on a Friday afternoon should not mean the end of this investigation… The evidence the FBI produced would not, I think, stand up in court. But because their prime suspect is dead, and they’re not going to court; they seem satisfied with barely a circumstantial case. The National Academies of Science review of the FBI’s scientific methods in this case won’t be released until summer, but the FBI doesn’t seem to care.”

Rep. Jerrold Nadler (D–NY) echoed Holt’s skepticism and called for a probe of the FBI’s casework.

Sen. Leahy

But the cagey Sen. Patrick Leahy, one of the targets of the attacks and a critic of the FBI’s performance, held his fire. The Senator who’s told FBI Director Mueller directly that there was conspiracy and cover-up at the core of the anthrax murders  had no comment and refused interviews on the topic. What’s up with that?

The best detailed blog-response came from Dr. Merryl Nass, named in the report as an activist critic who drove  Ivins nuts while he was working on a controversial anthrax vaccine for the Army with the private company BioPort.

Forensically, the FBI was taken to task for sidestepping the crucial issue of ‘weaponization” of the attack powder, ignoring Army data and the FBI’s own admission of high levels of the additive silicon—a story we broke on this blog last July.

This failure to grapple with the hard science was picked up by Richard Bernstein in the New York Times and International Herald Tribune which followed veteran investigative reporter and author Edward Jay Epstein’s much discussed piece in the Wall Street Journal a few weeks prior to the closing of the case.

Bottom line, the FBI report did nothing to mollify leading mainstream opinion recently outlined by Salon’s Glenn Greenwald:

“The case against Ivins is so riddled with logical and evidentiary holes that it has generated extreme doubts not merely from typical government skeptics but from the most mainstream establishment-revering, and ideologically disparate sources. ”

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Posted in Uncategorized | Tagged: , , , , , , , , , , , | 44 Comments »

* and then there were three … Congressman Nadler joins Holt and Bartlett in calling for Congressional review of the failed FBI anthrax investigation … waiting for Senators Grassley and Specter

Posted by Lew Weinstein on March 4, 2010

 

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Congressmen Bartlett, Holt & Nadler

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and then there were three …

Congressman Nadler joins Holt and Bartlett

in calling for Congressional review

of the failed FBI anthrax investigation

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Senators Grassley & Specter

now where are Senators Charles Grassley and Arlen Specter,

who have in the past expressed strong doubts

about the FBI’s case against Dr. Bruce Ivins

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Congressman Jerrold Nadler (D-NY), Chair of the House Judiciary Subcommittee on the Constitution, Civil Rights and Civil Liberties, reiterated his call for an independent investigation into the 2001 anthrax attacks which killed five people and sickened 17.

He issued the following statement:

  • “Despite the FBI’s assertion that the case of the anthrax attacks is closed, there are still many troubling questions.
  • For example, in a 2008 Judiciary Committee hearing, I asked FBI Director Robert Mueller whether Bruce Ivins was capable of producing the weaponized anthrax that was used in the attacks.
  • To this day, it is still far from clear that Mr. Ivins had either the know-how or access to the equipment needed to produce the material.
  • Because the FBI has not sufficiently answered such questions, I join Congressman Holt in urging an independent investigation of the case.”

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Posted in Uncategorized | Tagged: , , , , , , | 3 Comments »

* Barry Kissin … will Congress force the FBI to answer Congressman Nadler’s crucial question?

Posted by Lew Weinstein on February 27, 2010

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When I read about the FBI/DOJ press conference in August 2008, I was so upset by the lack of any real evidence against Dr. Ivins that, over the next 45 days, I wrote my novel to explain why  the FBI had failed to solve the anthrax murders. CASE CLOSED is of course a fiction, but it has been described by many readers, including one respected member of the U.S. Intelligence Community, as a quite plausible scenario .

* buy CASE CLOSED at amazon *

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will Congress force the FBI to answer

Congressman Nadler’s crucial question?

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We have posted portions of Barry Kissin’s powerful memo on this blog. In light of the small step taken by the House Intelligence Committee to begin an investigation of the obviously flawed FBI investigation of the anthrax murders, it s worth repeating the crux of Kissin’s case, focused on a question asked by Congressman Gerald Nadler and the answer given by FBI Director Robert Mueller …

Congressman Nadler & FBI Director Mueller

Nadler’s question read:

“How, on what basis, and using what evidence did the FBI conclude that none of the laboratories it investigated were in any way the sources of the powder used in the 2001 anthrax attacks, except the U.S. Army Laboratory at Fort Detrick, Maryland? Please include in your answer why laboratories that have publicly identified as having the equipment and personnel to make anthrax powder, such as the U.S. Army’s Dugway Proving Grounds in Dugway, Utah and the Battelle Memorial Institute in Jefferson, Ohio, were excluded as possible sources.”

Mueller promised to answer promptly, but seven months went by before the FBI responded. Its response read:

“Initially, the spores contained in the envelopes could only be identified as Bacillus Anthracis (Anthrax). They were then sent to an expert, who “strain typed” the spores as Ames. Once the strain type was identified, the FBI began to look at what facilities had access to the Ames strain. At the same time, science experts began to develop the ability to identify morphological variances contained in the mailed anthrax.

“Over the next six years, new scientific developments allowed experts from the FBI Laboratory and other nationally recognized scientific experts to advance microbial science. This advancement allowed the FBI to positively link specific morphs found in the mailed anthrax to morphs in a single flask at USAMRIID.

“Using records associated with the flask, the FBI was able to track the transfer of sub samples from the flask located at USAMRIID to two other facilities.

“Using various methods, the FBI investigated the two facilities that received samples from the parent flask and eliminated individuals from those facilities as suspects because, even if a laboratory facility had the equipment and personnel to make anthrax powder, this powder would not match the spores in the mailed envelopes if that lab had never received a transfer of anthrax from the parent flask.”

Kissin says … on its face, the FBI’s response is absurd …

  • The response literally says that after identifying “two facilities” that received samples of anthrax from the USAMRIID (Bruce Ivins) flask, these facilities were excluded as possible sources of the attack anthrax because they “never received” anthrax from said flask.

Kissin adds …

  • That the FBI has engaged in cover-up in its Amerithrax investigation is readily apparent.
  • So far, Congress has failed in its oversight role with respect to Amerithrax. An important example of this failure is the absence of any reaction on the part of Congressman Nadler or any other member of Congress to the miserable FBI response highlighted in this Introduction.

Read Kissin’s entire memo at …
http://www.fredericknewspost.com/media/pdfs/FortAnthraxRushHolt.pdf

LMW COMMENT …

  • There is no question that the FBI’s case against Dr. Bruce Ivins is bogus and could never convince a jury to convict him. It was so convenient to charge a dead man who could never defend himself and reveal, under oath, the pathetic nature of the FBI’s case.
  • But the really important question is not whether the FBI has failed, but why. Have they failed to solve the case? Have they solved the case but are covering up their solution?
  • Congress, until now, has done little to get at the truth. The investigation which Congressman Holt has been pushing for over a year was finally, at least in part, approved by the House Intelligence Committee.
  • It still needs the approval of the entire House and the Senate to become law, and then the investigation would have to unfold in a rigorous and unfettered manner. We need to follow all of these steps closely.

Posted in Uncategorized | Tagged: , , , , , , , , | 3 Comments »

* Epstein (WSJ 1-24-10) … The FBI says Ivins was the sole perpetrator, but it has presented no evidence to support that conclusion … and the largest case in FBI history is still open

Posted by Lew Weinstein on January 25, 2010

CASE CLOSED is a novel which answers the question … Why did the FBI fail to solve the 2001 anthrax case?

The (fictional) DIA team considers the role of the President and Vice-President in the early days of the FBI’s anthrax investigation …

“Then a curious thing happens. A second attack is made against the great country, this time with lethal anthrax powder mailed in envelopes. Is it a coincidence that this occurs within days of the launching of a massive retaliatory attack on Osama? The answer to that question is currently outside the bounds of this fable, although if it was not a coincidence, our tale becomes much, much darker.

“The very best police force in the land is assigned to track down the person or persons who prepared and mailed the lethal anthrax envelopes. But even before any evidence is obtained, the great leader announces the desired result – there may be some possible link to Saddam, he says; I wouldn’t put it past him. The great vice-leader also chimes in, saying that Saddam had henchmen who were trained in the use and deployment of these kinds of substances, so you start to piece it all together.

“I would ask you to note that these instantaneous, unsupported allegations are directed at Saddam; Osama, who sent the planes, is not mentioned.”

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The FBI says Ivins was the sole perpetrator,

but it has presented no evidence to support that conclusion

… and the largest case in FBI history is still open

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Edward Jay Epstein writes in the Wall Street Journal (1-24-10) …

  • The investigation of the 2001 anthrax attacks ended as far as the public knew on July 29, 2008, with the death of Bruce Ivins.
  • Less than a week after his apparent suicide, the FBI declared Ivins to have been the sole perpetrator of the 2001 Anthrax attacks.
  • The FBI’s six-year investigation was the largest inquest in its history, involving 9,000 interviews, 6,000 subpoenas, and the examination of tens of thousands of photocopiers, typewriters, computers and mailboxes.
    • Yet it failed to find a shred of evidence that identified the anthrax killer—or even a witness to the mailings.
    • Eventually, the FBI zeroed in on Ivins.
    • The FBI turned the pressure up on him, isolating him at work and forcing him to spend what little money he had on lawyers to defend himself.
    • He became increasingly stressed. Then came his suicide (which) provided an opportunity to close the case.

      FBI announces - August 8, 2008 - that Dr. ivins is the sole perpetrator and the case will soon be closed

  • But there was still a vexing problem—silicon.
    • Silicon was used in the 1960s to weaponize anthrax.
    • since weaponization was banned by international treaties, research anthrax no longer contains silicon, and the flask at Fort Detrick contained none.
    • Yet the anthrax grown from it had silicon, according to the U.S. Armed Forces Institute of Pathology.
    • This silicon explained why, when the letters to Sens. Leahy and Daschle were opened, the anthrax vaporized into an aerosol. If so, then somehow silicon was added to the anthrax.
  • But Ivins, no matter how weird he may have been, had neither the set of skills nor the means to attach silicon to anthrax spores.
    • At a minimum, such a process would require highly specialized equipment that did not exist in Ivins’s lab—or, for that matter, anywhere at the Fort Detrick facility.
  • The FBI’s answer was that the anthrax contained only traces of silicon, and those, it theorized, could have been accidently absorbed by the spores from the water and nutrient in which they were grown.
    • No such nutrients were ever found in Ivins’s lab, nor, for that matter, did anyone ever see Ivins attempt to produce any unauthorized anthrax (a process which would have involved him using scores of flasks.)
    • Natural contamination was an elegant theory that ran into problems after Congressman Jerry Nadler pressed FBI Director Robert Mueller in September 2008 to provide the House Judiciary Committee with a missing piece of data: the precise percentage of silicon contained in the anthrax used in the attacks.
  • The answer came seven months later on April 17, 2009.
    • According to the FBI lab, 1.4% of the powder in the Leahy letter was silicon.
    • “This is a shockingly high proportion,” explained Stuart Jacobson, an expert in small particle chemistry. “It is a number one would expect from the deliberate weaponization of anthrax, but not from any conceivable accidental contamination.”
  • in an attempt to back up its theory, the FBI contracted scientists at the Lawrence Livermore National Labs in California to conduct experiments in which anthrax is accidently absorbed from a media heavily laced with silicon.
    • When the results were revealed to the National Academy Of Science in September 2009, they effectively blew the FBI’s theory out of the water.
    • The Livermore scientists had tried 56 times to replicate the high silicon content without any success.
    • Even though they added increasingly high amounts of silicon to the media, they never even came close to the 1.4% in the attack anthrax. Most results were an order of magnitude lower, with some as low as .001%.
    • “If there is that much silicon, it had to have been added,” Jeffrey Adamovicz, who supervised Ivins’s work at Fort Detrick, wrote to me last month.
  • If Ivins had neither the equipment or skills to weaponize anthrax with silicon, then some other party with access to the anthrax must have done it.
  • So, even though the public may be under the impression that the anthrax case had been closed in 2008, the FBI investigation is still open—and, unless it can refute the Livermore findings on the silicon, it is back to square one.

Read the entire article at …
http://online.wsj.com/article/SB10001424052748704541004575011421223515284.html?mod=googlenews_wsj

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LMW COMMENT …

Readers of this CASE CLOSED blog have been aware of everything in Mr. Epstein’s article, and much more, for months.

The FBI’s case has always been unfounded, and the FBI’s insistence that Dr. Ivins was the sole perpetrator does a disservice to our nation.

It’s time for Director Mueller to fess up. Either the FBI doesn’t know who perpetrated the attacks, or they do know and they’re covering up the truth.

Which is worse?

Posted in * questioning the FBI's anthrax investigation | Tagged: , , , , , | 46 Comments »

* Cover-Up … The Truth About The Anthrax Attacks … by Barry J.C. Kissin, Esq

Posted by Lew Weinstein on November 18, 2009

CASE CLOSED is a novel which answers the question “Why did the FBI fail to solve the 2001 anthrax case?” … Here’s an excerpt from the CASE CLOSED story; the (fictional) DIA team reviews the connection between the anthrax attack and the subsequent invasion of Iraq …

“After the nationwide panic caused by the anthrax mailings settled down, pretty much nothing happens in the FBI’s anthrax investigation. The next we hear about anthrax is in February 2003, when Secretary of State Abner Grant goes to the United Nations and holds up a vial of something – it wasn’t actually anthrax – claiming that Saddam can deliver biological weapons of mass destruction to the eastern seaboard of the U.S. Of course, we learn later that Saddam had neither WMD nor any way to reach our shores. U.N. arms inspector Blix said something much like that a few days before we invaded Iraq.”

*** click here to buy CASE CLOSED by Lew Weinstein

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Cover-Up …

The Truth About The Anthrax Attacks

by Barry J.C. Kissin, Esq.

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Excerpts from Mr. Kissin’s lengthy post follow. The entire post can be read at
http://freethoughtmanifesto.blogspot.com/2009/11/truth-about-anthrax-attacks.html

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On September 16 and 17, 2008, the House and Senate Judiciary Committees respectively, conducted “Amerithrax oversight” hearings consisting of questioning FBI Director Robert Mueller. Salon.com journalist Glen Greenwald recounted this as follows:

  • (Congressman Gerald) Nadler asked one of the most central questions in the anthrax case: he pointed out that the facilities that (unlike Ft. Detrick) actually have the equipment and personnel to prepare dry, silica-coated anthrax are the U.S. Army’s Dugway Proving Ground and the Battelle Corporation, the private CIA contractor that conducts substantial research into highly complex strains of anthrax.
  • Nadler asked how the FBI had eliminated those institutions as the culprits behind the attack. After invoking generalities to assure Nadler that the FBI had traced the anthrax back to Ivins’ vial (which didn’t answer the question),
  • (FBI Director Robert) Mueller’s response was this: I don’t know the answers to those questions as to how we eliminated Dugway and Battelle. I’ll have to get back to you at some point.

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Seven months went by before the FBI responded. Its response read:

  • “Using records associated with the flask, the FBI was able to track the transfer of sub samples from the flask located at USAMRIID to two other facilities.
  • Using various methods, the FBI investigated the two facilities that received samples from the parent flask and eliminated individuals from those facilities as suspects because, even if a laboratory facility had the equipment and personnel to make anthrax powder, this powder would not match the spores in the mailed envelopes if that lab had never received a transfer of anthrax from the parent flask.”

On its face, the FBI’s response is absurd … The response literally says that after identifying “two facilities” that received samples of anthrax from the USAMRIID (Bruce Ivins’) flask, these facilities were excluded as possible sources of the attack anthrax because they “never received” anthrax from said flask.

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Battelle and Dugway

Given that both Battelle and Dugway had RMR-1029, Battelle and Dugway are no less incriminated than Bruce Ivins by the science underlying Amerithrax.

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Congress has failed

  • So far, Congress has failed in its oversight role with respect to Amerithrax.
  • An important example of this failure is the absence of any reaction on the part of Congressman Nadler or any other member of Congress to the miserable FBI response highlighted (above).

LMW COMMENT … Likewise, the absence of any progress by the House Judiciary Committee on Congressman Rush Holt’s legislation to create an Anthrax Investigation Commission shows how little the Congress is doing to get to the truth about the 2001 anthrax attacks.

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Matsumoto … from weaponized to not

In order to cover-up the evident connection between our secret anthrax weaponization projects and the attack anthrax, it would be necessary to negate the fact that the attack anthrax (particularly in the letters to the Senators) was weaponized.

This aspect of the cover-up is described in “Anthrax Powder: State of the Art?” by Gary Matsumoto, that appeared in the November, 2003 edition (Vol 32) of Science Magazine:

  • “Early in the investigation, the consensus among biodefense specialists working for the government and the military [was that] . . . the powder mailed to the Senate . . . was a diabolical advance in biological weapons technology
  • [But] by the fall of 2002, the awe inspiring anthrax of the previous spring had morphed into something decidedly less fearsome.
  • According to sources on Capitol Hill, FBI scientists now reported that there was ‘no additive’ in the Senate anthrax at all

Of course, once the DOJ/FBI arrived at its formulation that Bruce Ivins was the lone culprit, it became that much more necessary to portray the attack anthrax as other than “weapons-grade.”

******

Spertzel … attack anthrax could not have been produced at USAMRIID

Richard Spertzel, quoted in the above-cited Science Magazine, was not only a chief UNSCOM inspector, he also worked at Fort Detrick for 18 years, and served as Deputy Commander of USAMRIID. On August 5, 2008 (one week after the death of Bruce Ivins), the Wall Street Journal published an op-ed by Mr. Spertzel entitled “Bruce Ivins Wasn’t the Anthrax Culprit.” Excerpts follow:

  • “Let’s start with the anthrax in the letters to Sens. Tom Daschle and Patrick Leahy.
  • The spores could not have been produced at USAMRIID where Ivins worked, without many other people being aware of it.
  • Furthermore, the equipment to make such a product does not exist at the Institute.
  • The multiple disciplines and technologies required to make the anthrax in this case do not exist at USAMRIID.

******

anthrax from RMR-1029 was widespread

On August 18, 2008 (three weeks after the death of Bruce Ivins), FBI scientists and their consultants conducted a briefing for journalists with “well-respected scientific journals.”

  • QUESTION: So I’ve seen different estimates. How many people at Detrick or anyone else actually have access to RMR-1029?
  • DR. MAJIDI: The total body — the total universe of people at some point were associated with RMR-1029 — I’ll qualify that. Roughly, about 100-plus.

******

FBI and Battelle closely interlinked

  • James Burans (identified above as the FBI’s “expert on processing”) is introduced at the beginning of the briefing by FBI Lab Director Hassell as “the associate laboratory director of the National Bioforensic Analysis Center.”
  • What is never revealed is the fact that the Department of Homeland Security contracted with Battelle to manage and operate the National Bioforensic Analysis Center, and that James Burans is a Battelle employee.

******

Mr. Kissin’s conclusion …

  • the only bio-attack in our history, is an officially acknowledged “inside job,” one that we know originated from our own so-called “biodefense” program.
  • No, the anthrax letters were not the work of a “lone nut.”
  • They were the work of our military-industrial-intelligence complex, a complex of revolving participants that manufactures weapons and war for power and profits.
  • The decision in early 2001 to unilaterally reject inspections and verification as a part of international bioweapons arms control (precisely to avoid inspections of our secret weaponization projects) was the choice to pursue arms race over arms control.
  • The anthrax letters that soon followed served and fulfilled two purposes.
    • As a “false flag operation,” with language in the letters that read “Death to America, Death to Israel, Allah is Great,” the anthrax attacks played a major role in the run-up to the Iraq war.
    • As a stimulator of fear of bio-threat, the anthrax attacks served as the pretext for a massive expansion of our so-called biodefense program, with expenditures on this program quickly becoming twenty times what they were before the attacks.
  • Only massive delusion can explain how we could assume that the necessary response to the only bioattack in our history is to massively expand the program that itself generated that attack.

******

see related posts …

******

Reader comments about CASE CLOSED …

“Fiction?? Maybe?? But I don’t think so!! More likely an excellent interpretation of what may have really happened.”

“CASE CLOSED reads fast and well. It could have happened just the way the author said. Full of intrigue mixed in with almost current events. The real people are just behind the fictional ones.”

*** click here to buy CASE CLOSED by Lew Weinstein

Posted in * FBI refusal to testify, * questioning the FBI's anthrax investigation | Tagged: , , , , , , | 178 Comments »

* tracking Dr. Ivins’ RMR-1029 anthrax; more questions for UM and LSU researchers

Posted by Lew Weinstein on June 28, 2009

… why the FBI failed to solve the 2001 anthrax caseCASE CLOSED

* purchase CASE CLOSED (paperback)

* see CASE CLOSED VIDEO on YouTube

Dr. Bruce ivins

Dr. Bruce Ivins


tracking Dr. Ivins’ RMR-1029 anthrax;

more questions for UM and LSU researchers


The following email was sent to researchers who performed anthrax vaccine research at the University of Michigan (UM) and Louisiana State University  (LSU) in 2001 …

Dr. James Baker has graciously replied to my earlier questions, stating …

  • That work was done
    • at USAMRIID by a microbiologist under Dr. Ivins direct supervision
    • and at LSU under the direction of Dr. Hugh Jones.
  • There was never any ‘distribution’ of anthrax and all the work done at UM used simulant organisms.
  • I apologize if the citation was confusing.

Dr. Baker’s answer has been posted to the CASE CLOSED blog. There is a comment posted to that article (see … DXer said June 27, 2009 at 6:47 pm), which includes citations from various patent applications and other materials, and asks the following questions, which I am forwarding to you

  1. When was the research at USAMRIID done? What month(s) and year(s)?
  2. When was the research at LSU done?
  3. Who was the microbiologist who worked under the supervision of Bruce Ivins at the BL-3 lab at USAMRIID?
  4. Who were the NanoBio scientists who worked under the supervision of Dr. Martin Hugh-Jones at LSU?
  5. Was Bruce Ivins-supplied virulent Ames at LSU?
  6. If so, was it still in existence at the time of the subpoenas during the mid-October 2001 through February 2002?
  7. What do the LSU researchers, including FBI genetics consultant Kimothy Smith, say about whether virulent Ames was at LSU and, if so, whether any supplied by Bruce Ivins was provided in response to the subpoena.
  8. What does Pamala Coker say? (she would have taken over by the time of the subpoena from Kimothy)

You may wonder why I am asking these questions. Who am I, and what right do I have to bother you so many years after these events took place?

CASE CLOSEDI am a novelist, the author of CASE CLOSED, which presents a fictional scenario to explain why the FBI failed to solve the anthrax case. I started the CASE CLOSED blog to promote the novel, but it has taken on a life of its own as a forum for those who don’t believe the FBI’s accusation of Dr. Ivins (and a few who do) to present and argue their positions. This has stimulated me to continue to seek answers.

The FBI’s case simply does not wash. Why?

The central problem is that the FBI accused Dr. Ivins, claiming he is the sole perpetrator of the 2001 anthrax attacks, without ever proving its case. It is very convenient to the FBI to have charged a dead man, eight days after his alleged suicide, since this means they never have to go into court and actually prove their case.

The FBI has ever since their announcement refused to answer questions, even those from Congressmen and Senators. Many people, including scientists, journalists, Congressmen and Senators, have publicly expressed their doubts about the FBI’s conclusions. The FBI has presented no witnesses and no physical evidence to support its case against Dr. Ivins. More pertinent to the questions included here is that the FBI has never explained how it excluded other research labs as potential sources of the attack anthrax.

RMR-1029 log - p.1

RMR-1029 log - p.1

The CASE CLOSED blog has now obtained and published Dr. Ivins’ RMR-1029 inventory logs …


http://caseclosedbylewweinstein.wordpress.com/2009/06/26/dr-bruce-ivins-rmr-1029-inventory-records-pursuant-to-an-foia-request/

It is the intent of the CASE CLOSED blog to track down, to the extent possible, and to eliminate, to the extent possible, other potential sources of RMR-1029 anthrax which might have been diverted and modified for use in the 2001 attacks.

So … if you have answers to any of the questions above, I look forward to your responses.

LEW WEINSTEIN

Posted in * anthrax science, * FBI refusal to testify, * questioning the FBI's anthrax investigation, * recent anthrax news, Ames anthrax | Tagged: , , , , , , , , , , , , , , | 45 Comments »

* do you want the Anthrax Commission to happen? Here’s how you can help

Posted by Lew Weinstein on June 26, 2009

CASE CLOSED by Lewis WeinsteinCC - front cover - small

… explores the FBI’s failed investigation of the 2001 anthrax case

* purchase CASE CLOSED (paperback)

* see CASE CLOSED VIDEO on YouTube

***

do you want Congressman Holt’s Anthrax Commission to happen?

Here’s how you can help

***

Congressman Holt

Congressman Holt

On March 3, 2009, Congressman Rush Holt (D-NJ
http://holt.house.gov/
), whose district included the Hamilton Post Office which was infested with anthrax and subsequently closed for nearly three and a half years, introduced the Anthrax Attacks Investigation Act of 2009, legislation that would establish a Congressional commission to investigate the 2001 anthrax attacks and the federal government’s response and investigation of the attacks.

Co-sponsors of the bill were …

The Anthrax Attacks Investigation Act of 2009 was referred to the House Committee on the Judiciary, where it remains today. The House Judiciary Committee is a busy place; there are hundreds of bills competing for attention. What can those of us who want this Anthrax Commission to happen do?

We can contact our local representatives who are

  • members of the House Judiciary Committee (see below)
  • or who sponsored the bill (see above)
  • … It is a fact of political life that Congressmen respond to people who live in their districts; most Members of Congress will not even accept emails from people who don’t live in their district.

Suggested approach to your Congressman or Congresswoman …

  • Many scientists, journalists, and other Congressmen and Senators do not believe the FBI has made a credible case against Dr. Bruce Ivins as the sole perpetrator of the 2001 anthrax attacks.
  • If Ivins is not the sole perpetrator (or invoved at all), then one or more perpetrators are still at large and we don’t know yet who committed that terrorist attack on America … or why
  • Does Congressman/Congresswoman xxxxxxx believe the FBI’s assertion that Dr. Bruce Ivins is the sole perpetrator of the 2001 anthrax attacks?
  • What will Congressman/Congresswoman xxxxxxxx do to get the  Anthrax Attacks Investigation Act of 2009 passed in the Judiciary Committee and brought to the House floor for a vote … in 2009?

You might also mention that considerable information and a variety of views on the 2001 anthrax attacks can be found at the CASE CLOSED blog at …
http://caseclosedbylewweinstein.wordpress.com/

After you contact your representative, or try to, post a comment on this blog and tell us what happened.

  • Did you get a favorable response?
  • Did you get ignored?

for members of the House Judiciary Committee or sponsors of the bill …

  • Click on the link next to your member’s name; you will go directly to that member’s web site.
  • Look on your member’s site for the ways to contact your representative
  • Contact BOTH the DC office and the local district office nearest to you.
  • Send an email, talk to a staffer, make your views known.
  • Insist on getting answers

House Judiciary Committee

Members of the U.S. House Judiciary Committee


Democrats

*********************

Hon. Conyers Jr.
Chairman
(D) Michigan, 14th

Hon. Berman
(D) California, 28th

Hon. Boucher
(D) Virginia, 9th

Hon. Nadler
(D) New York, 8th

Hon. Scott
(D) Virginia, 3rd

Hon. Watt
(D) North Carolina, 12th

Hon. Lofgren
(D) California, 16th

Hon. Jackson Lee
(D) Texas, 18th

Hon. Waters
(D) California, 35th

Hon. Delahunt
(D) Massachusetts, 10th

Hon. Wexler
(D) Florida, 19th

Hon. Cohen
(D) Tennessee, 9th

Hon. Johnson
(D) Georgia, 4th

Hon. Pierluisi
(D) Puerto Rico, Resident Commissioner

Hon. Quigley
(D) Illinois, 5th

Hon. Gutierrez
(D) Illinois, 4th

Hon. Sherman
(D) California, 27th

Hon. Baldwin
(D) Wisconsin, 2nd

Hon. Gonzalez
(D) Texas, 20th

Hon. Weiner
(D) New York, 9th

Hon. Schiff
(D) California, 29th

Hon. Sánchez
(D) California, 39th

Hon. Wasserman Schultz
(D) Florida, 20th

Hon. Maffei
(D) New York, 25th


Republicans

*******************

Hon. Smith
Ranking Member
(R) Texas, 21st

Hon. Sensenbrenner Jr.
(R) Wisconsin, 5th

Hon. Coble
(R) North Carolina, 6th

Hon. Gallegly
(R) California, 24th

Hon. Goodlatte
(R) Virginia, 6th

Hon. Lungren
(R) California, 3rd

Hon. Issa
(R) California, 49th

Hon. Forbes
(R) Virginia, 4th

Hon. King
(R) Iowa, 5th

Hon. Franks
(R) Arizona, 2nd

Hon. Gohmert
(R) Texas, 1st

Hon. Jordan
(R) Ohio, 4th

Hon. Poe
(R) Texas, 2nd

Hon. Chaffetz
(R) Utah, 3rd

Hon. Rooney
(R) Florida, 16th

Hon. Harper
(R) Mississippi, 3rd

Posted in * FBI refusal to testify, * questioning the FBI's anthrax investigation | Tagged: , , , , , , | 7 Comments »

 
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