Results tagged “anthraxattacks”

Some more details emerge about why FBI investigators suspected government biodefense scientist Dr. Bruce Ivins was behind the 2001 anthrax letter attacks. They matched "specific DNA patterns to anthrax cultures" that Ivins was responsible for in his lab. The FBI enlisted the Institute for Genomic Research to analyze the samples, and J. Craig Venter said the evidence suggested the "[culprit] almost had to be a government scientist." However, someone briefed on the investigation said that the evidence gathered so far was "circumstantial"--plus there's no evidence that Ivins traveled to NJ (where the letters were mailed from). Still, the Justice Department is rumored to be shutting down the investigation this week.

The LA Times, which broke news that government biodefense scientist Bruce Ivins committed suicide earlier this week as federal prosecutors were looking to charge him with the anthrax letter attacks of 2001, now reports that Ivins "stood to gain financially from massive federal spending in the fear-filled aftermath of those killings." Ivins shared two patents for a "genetically engineered anthrax vaccine" and had also applied, with another inventor, "to patent an additive for various biodefense vaccines."

According to the LA Times, Bruce Ivins, a government biodefense scientist at U.S. Army Medical Research Institute of Infectious Diseases, died in an apparent suicide. Sources say Ivins, who had aided the FBI with analysis in the anthrax-laced letter attacks in 2001, was going to be charged for the attacks.