Was Bruce Ivins the anthrax killer?
by Justin Raimondo
The media narrative now being woven around the apparent suicide of U.S. government scientist Bruce E. Ivins – a prominent anthrax researcher who worked at Ft. Detrick’s U.S. Army Medical Research Institute for Infectious Diseases bio-weapons research lab (USAMRIID) – is that he was a lone nut, a “homicidal maniac” who poisoned the five people killed in the 2001 anthrax attacks and was determined to go on another killing spree at his workplace as the Feds closed in on him. The Times of London headline says it all: “Mad Anthrax Scientist in Threat to Kill Co-Workers.”
However, as we sift through the reams of media coverage occasioned by this startling development in a 7-year-old case, we get quite a different story from the alleged objects of his rage: his colleagues on the job at Ft. Detrick. As the Washington Post reported:
“Colleagues and friends of the vaccine specialist remained convinced that Ivins was innocent: They contended that he had neither the motive nor the means to create the fine, lethal powder that was sent by mail to news outlets and congressional offices in the late summer and fall of 2001. Mindful of previous FBI mistakes in fingering others in the case, many are deeply skeptical that the bureau has gotten it right this time.”‘I really don’t think he’s the guy. I say to the FBI, “Show me your evidence,”‘ said Jeffrey J. Adamovicz, former director of the bacteriology division at the U.S. Army Medical Research Institute for Infectious Diseases, or USAMRIID, on the grounds of the sprawling Army fort in Frederick. ‘A lot of the tactics they used were designed to isolate him from his support. The FBI just continued to push his buttons.'”
Another one of his co-workers, Richard O. Spertzel, pointed out that “USAMRIID doesn’t deal with powdered anthrax. I don’t think there’s anyone there who would have the foggiest idea how to do it. You would need to have the opportunity, the capability, and the motivation, and he didn’t possess any of those.”
In what seems very similar to the coordinated series of “leaks” that pinned the blame on Steven J. Hatfill, a former bio-warfare scientist recently awarded nearly $6 million in recompense and effectively exonerated, the effort to posthumously demonize Ivins has blanketed the “mainstream” media. The main feature of this effort has been the testimony of one Jean Duley, a counselor, who claims Ivins not only threatened her but also came to a group therapy session with a detailed story about how he had bought a gun, a bulletproof vest, and was planning to “go out in a blaze of glory” and kill as many of his coworkers as possible as the FBI closed in on him.
It’s passing strange, then, that these very same coworkers are springing to his defense. Two Ft. Detrick scientists, who presumably would have been mowed down by Ivins, the so-called “revenge killer” (as Duley describes him), told the Baltimore Sun they were “stunned and angry” at the posthumous targeting of Ivins. “Nobody thinks Bruce did it,” said one of them.
Nobody, that is, but the FBI, Duley, and Ivins’ estranged brother Tom, who hadn’t spoken to Bruce since 1985, and who averred, “It makes sense, what the social worker said. He considered himself like a god.” Giving credence to such crass bad-mouthing of the dead has got to be a new low, even for the agenda-driven “journalism” we’ve become so inured to.
As doubts arise about the government/media narrative, it is becoming all too clear that Ivins’ suicide – likely brought about by the unrelenting pressure brought to bear on him over many months of constant harassment by the FBI, rather than actual guilt – is the occasion for the institutional whitewashing of the FBI’s almost unbelievable incompetence, which seems more like a cover-up as events unfold. We are being treated to media reports burbling about how the suicide of Ivins means that the victims of the anthrax attack and their families will finally have “closure” – but what’s all too clear is that it’s the FBI seeking closure of a case that exposes its shameful (and, perhaps, criminal) conduct.
Move along, nothing to see here! Or is there?
http://www.antiwar.com/justin/?articleid=13251