Authorities monitor trucker Web sites,radio stations in ricin case

[Ruby Romaine]

WASHINGTON -- If at first you don't succeed, appeal to greed.

FBI agents and DOT officials recently arranged for the host of the "Truckin' Bozo" radio show to publicize the $100,000 reward for information on ricin-laced letters.
Radio show host Dale Sommers was contacted by FBI agents in Greenville, N.C., and by Heather Hollowell with the Transportation Department's inspector general's office to broadcast the reward information on three separate occasions, the Washington Post reported Feb. 6.

According to the Post article, authorities also have been studying various trucking companies to see if they can find the person calling himself or herself "Fallen Angel." A package containing ricin and a threatening letter was found in the postal facility serving the Greenville-Spartanburg International Airport in October 2003 and in November a similar letter and vial of ricin were found at a White House postal facility.

The writer of both letters, "Fallen Angel," claimed to be the fleet owner of a tanker company who threatened to start dumping ricin if DOT didn't rescind the new Hours of Service rules.
(snip)
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Does this mean the ricin might be from a home grown truck driving terraist?




http://www.thetrucker.com/stories/02_04/0209_ricin_appeal.html

[qanda]

1. What ricin-laced letters?

I thought they hadn't found any letters that they could trace back to the ricin.

[Ruby Romaine]

2. seems like a trucker is a suspect in another ricin case?

http://www.etrucker.com/apps/news/article.asp?id=42936

Trucking Headlines
FBI queried ex-trucker in ricin case
By Sean Kelley

A former trucker, who has clashed repeatedly with his former carriers, the Department of Labor, the Federal Bureau of Investigation and various judges, said the FBI interviewed him in October regarding a ricin-tainted letter.

The letter, which was mailed on Oct. 15 at a South Carolina postal facility, contained a vial of the deadly poison as well as warnings about the new hours of service rule. But Daniel Somerson said he had nothing to do with the threatening letter or a similar letter reportedly sent to the White House in November and one that shut down the U.S. Senate Feb. 3. He thinks the FBI interviewed him because he has a history of truck safety-related activism, including a website that targets various trucking executives and transportation officials.

“I have a history of First Amendment activity ... that’s put a target on my back,” Somerson said. That website, truckingsolutions.com, details Somerson’s fight against former employers Yellow Freight and Mail Contractors, both of which he claims to have unfairly fired him.

[Ruby Romaine]

3. Just heard on ieamerica.com powder in Frist's office was paper dust!

Perhaps paper has a microscopic amount of ricin from natural sources?

[damnyankee2601]

4. There was TRACE ricin in the paper dust.

The paper dust was from a letter opening machine. The implication is that a ricin-tainted letter was opened in the machine, but since nobody got sick, it probaly found it's way into the circular file before the Homeland Insecurity biohazard flunkies got around to a routine test of the mail room.

[damnyankee2601]

5. Another right-wing terrorist.

Ashcroft is too busy sending cab drivers to Gitmo to investigate his own constituents.