BRUCE E. IVINS: A Scientist's Quiet Life Took a Darker Turn

[babylonsister]

BRUCE E. IVINS
A Scientist's Quiet Life Took a Darker Turn

By Joby Warrick, Marilyn W. Thompson and Nelson Hernandez
Washington Post Staff Writers
Saturday, August 2, 2008; Page A01


For most of his career, he was a casting agent's vision of a bench scientist: shy, eccentric, nerdy, soft-spoken. But sometime this spring, with the FBI closing in on him, Bruce E. Ivins's life took a dark turn that frightened his closest friends.

In March, police officers summoned to a quiet Frederick neighborhood found the 62-year-old microbiologist unconscious in his home. Four months later, he was admitted to a psychiatric clinic after making wild threats against co-workers at the Army research institute where he kept his lab. Then, a week ago, his therapist urgently petitioned a judge for protection from Ivins. She described a man spiraling out of control, making "homicidal threats, actions, plans."

His death Tuesday from a drug overdose was followed by a revelation even more jarring to those who knew him: a report that Ivins had been implicated in the 2001 anthrax attacks, one of the FBI's biggest unsolved mysteries and most baffling technical cases. Ivins, a leading expert on anthrax vaccines, was on the verge of being indicted in the case, according to officials familiar with the investigation, and took his life by swallowing a large quantity of acetaminophen.

The allegations of a possible link to the case known as "Amerithrax" dumbfounded friends and co-workers who knew Ivins as a gentle, bighearted family man who raised two children in Frederick, volunteered for community charities and played keyboards for the local Catholic church. His work with the deadly anthrax bacteria was devoted to developing more effective vaccines that could save lives in a future biological attack.

"He was passionate about it -- he really cared," said a fellow scientist who co-authored studies with Ivins.

Yet, slowly over the past two years, FBI investigators began to focus on Ivins under the theory that he had used his knowledge of anthrax bacteria to pull off the nation's deadliest episode of biological terrorism. As a researcher for the Army's main lab for studying bioterror agents, Ivins had easy access to anthrax bacteria, including the specific strain of Bacillus anthracis used in the attacks on media outlets and congressional offices in the fall of 2001. His expertise eventually earned him a front-row seat for the FBI's investigation, as he was called upon to help the bureau with its analysis of the wispy powder used in the attacks.

Despite the allegations -- and even after Ivins's apparent plunge into mental illness -- longtime friends and colleagues say it is inconceivable that Ivins could have been a bioterrorist. Many contend that he was driven to depression and suicide because of months of hounding by federal investigators.

more...

http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2008/08/01/AR2008080102326.html?hpid=topnews

[FreakinDJ]

1. "Show me the Motive"

I question did he act alone or take the fall

[floridablue]

2. If he was a suspect

why was he left in the lab where he could get the stuff and kill untold numbers. We let a WMD walk around for months ???????

[DearAbby]

4. I agree...strange they would allow a suspect to work with WMD n/t

[RUMMYisFROSTED]

3. *

[Liberal Gramma]

5. Does anyone else think it's suspicious

that Democratic-leaning targets, if not Democratic politicians, were targeted? And now a convenient suicide which keeps us from learning whatever the truth really is?

[rurallib]

6. yep

didn't believe this story from the get go.
just like the dc madam who said she would never kill herself and then was found hanging.

[stray cat]

7. They better have the evidence and not just pushed an innocent guy over the edge

They already terrorized one innocent guy there.

[zippy890]

8. will be interesting to see what the FBI says on this

I think they were pressuring him because of suspicions he did not act alone. Sounds to me like the FBI had the goods on this guy Ivins, but others may be involved. We'll see how the case proceeds from this point.

strange. mentally unbalanced man in such a position handling toxins at this level. something weird here.

[stray cat]

9. My understanding that he became unbalanced during the course of the investigation

which could probably unbalance many of us - myself included.

[OmmmSweetOmmm]

10. They have so much info here, that it sounds like one of those obits that newspapers sit with

and update until the person dies......

[mmonk]

11. Petition for Peace Order - Stalking, Harrassment, Threats of Violence, Other

http://www.thesmokinggun.com/archive/years/2008/0801081anthrax1.html

[Supersedeas]

12. did the DoJ stumble onto a 'potential' suspect and a 'convenient' suicide?

are you ready for Muck Muck Mukasey to say the case is closed -- get ready.