The Leading Anthrax Scientist, USAMRIID Dty. Cdr. and Microbiologist

Ron Kessler in his new book The Terrorist Watch quotes FBI Director Robert Mueller on the subject of WMD and the risk of infiltration:

“Al Qaeda is tremendously patient and thinks nothing about taking years to infiltrate persons in and finding the right personnel and opportunity to undertake an attack. And we cannot become complacent, because you look around the world, and whether it’s London or Madrid or Bali or recently Casablanca or Algiers, attacks are taking place.”

In November 2007, FBI Director Mueller gave a speech in which he warned against the need to guard against spies at universities, who for example, may have access to pre-patent, pre-classification biochemistry information.

A colleague of leading anthrax scientist Ken Alibek and former USAMRIID Deputy Commander Charles Bailey, a prolific Ames strain researcher, was convicted of sedition and sentenced to life plus 70 years in prison. He worked in a program co-sponsored by the American Type Culture Collection and had access to ATCC facilities, as well as facilities of the DARPA-funded Center for Biodefense at George Mason University then run by Dr. Alibek and Dr. Bailey. Grants by the Defense Advance Research Project Agency (”DARPA”) funded unclassified research using avirulent Ames strain from the National Institute of Health (NIH). The bionformatics grad student once had a high security clearance for mathematical support work for the Navy. I spoke to William Livingstone, one of the officers of ExecutiveAction, in advance of the group’s release of the monograph they wrote for Pharmathene titled “Spores: The Threat of a Catastrophic Anthrax Attack on America.” I asked him, “How much more obvious does a case of infiltration have to be — does he need to be sitting on Dr. Ken Alibek’s lap?”

jpl, that sort of unwarranted invective just plays into the hands of Zawahiri’s strategy of infiltrating and using the weapons of his enemies. It’s only the guy (Ali) talking alongside the blind sheik’s son, a member of AQ’s WMD committee, that is the bad guy in the story.

Relying on an unnamed “law enforcement source,” FoxNews recently reported that the FBI has narrowed its investigation to “about individuals — to include a leading anthrax scientist, a former Deputy Commander and a microbiologist linked to USAMRIID. USAMRIID found that the powder made by leading scientist Ken Alibek was closest. It was assumed by the person who had spoken with the email writer that former deputy commander Chuck Bailey knew what his colleague was doing. (The email appears to be from June 2006).

Dr. Alibek and Dr. Bailey were working at the George Mason University Center for Biodefense (and Hadron) under a contract using Delta Ames that they had obtained from NIH. There were two multi-million dollar DARPA grants funding the USAMRIID contract. A $3.6 million grant MDA972-01-C-0084 was awarded July 2001 by DARPA. There was also an earlier grant DAMD17-01-C-0033 awarded by the Department of the Army. Ken was Principal Investigator for “Novel Therapeutic and Prophylatic Modalities to Protect U.S. Armed Forces Against Major Biological Threat Agents” and would report on the contract with the U.S. Army Medical Research and Materiel Command.

Ali Al-Timimi, who had been taught by and was working with Bin Laden’s sheik, had access to pre-patent, pre-classification know-how. See, e.g., March 14, 2001 patent application relating to use of silica to concentrate pathogens. Dr. Alibek and Dr. Bailey were not — are not — guilty of anything. Â Indeed, it was Ken, who has always been helpful to everyone, who years ago told me the FBIÂ’s theory. The Washington Post first reported the FBI suspected Al-Timimi of involvement in the anthrax mailings in September 2006 in an article titled “Hardball Tactics in an Era of Threats.” The Post cited named FBI agents who submitted an affidavit in support of a search. In contrast, the anonymous writer of the USAMRIID email, of course, only has the limited perspective of the forensics — what powder was said to be the closest match. The email writer is sharing the perspective of someone looking in a microscope rather than a broad view of the FBI’s investigative interest and theory as to motive. A long while ago, before he stopped working in biodefense and turned to cancer and cardiac research, Ken told me that in a draft of Biohazard2 he was going to explain his view that the perpetrator used a fluidized bed dryer instead of a spraydryer. After Major General John Parker officially confirmed that the Armed Forces Institute of Pathology had detected silica, former Deputy Commander Bailey — Alibek’s co-director of the Center for Biodefense at GMU– told a reporter that the presence of silica is significant, but he declined to say why, citing national security concerns. ”I don’t think I want to give people — terrorists — any information to help them, said Dr. Bailey. Now the problem was that at about the time he said that, the man in contact with and mentored by Bin Laden’s sheik al-Hawali was at a desk about 15 feet away. Ali was roughly 15 feet from Ken’s unsecured computer and 15 feet from Charles’ unsecured computer. (The area has been entirely renovated and looks totally different). William Patrick in an interview says he used to keep his bioweapons formulas in black notebooks on the bookshelf in his living room. As Ken says, when asked if a student of his could have weaponized the anthrax that was mailed — the knowledge is out there. Indeed, it might just be a bookshelf away. Ali arranged to have a message from Bin Laden’s sheik hand-delivered to every member of Congress on the first anniversary of the anthrax mailing to the Senators. Like Ken says, this isn’t rocket science.

By the way, Philip M. Zack is not jewish. He’s Catholic. Married a Methodist. Divorced in 1993. Newspaper article describing the wedding (that I don’t know how to upload). If you trace it back, you’ll see that the Hartford Courant and Balt. Sun never said he was jewish. Some internet poster assumed it. Washington Report assumed it. That journalist also published in the Arab News. Jihad Unspun reported it. Justin Raimondo never bothered to check if he was after I told him there was no basis to think he was. So an entire conspiracy theory gained momentum over the next half decade all because some folks wanted to assume something that fit their preconceptions of the world. But if anyone had bothered to ask any co-worker in making the false allegation of murder, it might have been corrected. The above publications still have not made the correction even though they are all on formal notice. I told the publications at the time that they should make narrow corrections as to their Hatfill stories. Those that did (like redflags and FAS) were not sued. Most of those who didn’t were.

Here are some FBI memos re the investigation of media leaks.

In early August 2002, the head of the District of Columbia Field Office initiated a leak investigation related to Amerithrax information. The first leak investigation concerned leak of bloodhound story to Newsweek (according to email discussed in deposition of lead prosecutor Daniel Seikaly in which he repeatedly pled the Fifth Amendment). A memo from DC Field Office head Van Harp read:
TO: OPR
NSD
From: Washington Field
ADIC’s Office: Harp Van A (202) xxx-xxxx
***
Title: UNSUB
UNAUTHORIZED DISCLOSURE AND/OR
MEDIA LEAK IN CONNECTION WITH THE
AMERITHRAX INVESTIGATION
***
[REDACTED]
[REDACTED]
The appearance of this information in the media affects the conduct of this investigation as well as the morale of the dedicated personnel who have expended enormous energy and effort on this investigation.
As such, I am requesting that either a media leak or OPR investigation be initiated. In the event a leak investigation is initiated then the enclosed LRM should be hand delivered to AAG Chertoff. [REDACTED]
The investigation was closed in October 2002. The memo read:
Date: October 8, 2002
To: Mr. H. Marshall Jarrett
Counsel
Office of Professional Responsibility
United States Department of Justice

From: David W. Szady
Assistant Director
Counterintelligence Division
Subject: [REDACTED[
The purpose of this memorandum is to notify your office of the closing of the FBI’s criminal investigation of the captioned media leak matter. It is the understanding of the FBI that your continUed investigation of this matter will be pursued by your office.
[REDACTED]
***
After a January 9, 2003 “exclusive” report by ABC’s Brian Ross that the FBI was focusing on Hatfill and was going to conduct a second round of interviews with other former and current government scientists so that they might rule them out by the process of elimination, the FBI initiated a second media leak investigation. This time it was to proceed with “extreme zeal.”
The memo read:
Precedence: PRIORITY Date: 1/13/2003
To: Director’s Office
Washington Field
From: Washington Field
Contact Richard L. Lambert 202-xxx-xxxx
Approved by: Harp Van
Lambert Richard L
Title: AMERITHRAX
MAJOR CASE 184
00: WFO
Synopsis: To request the opening of new OPR media leak investigation regarding captioned case.
[large redacted passages]
To demonstrate the seriousness with which the FBI views this matter, it is requested that the OPR inquiry commence with an interview of IIC Rick Lambert who will waive all Fifth Amendment privileges and accede to a voluntary polygraph examination to set a tone of candor, forthrightness and cooperation.
[redacted]
The instant matter is the second unauthorized media disclosure to occur in this investigation. Its potential detriment to the effective prosecution of the case is substantial. Accordingly, in the interests of both specific and general deterrence, the Inspector in Charge requests that this OPR inquiry be pursued with unprecedent zeal.

The purpose of this memorandum is to notify your office of the closing of the FBI’s criminal investigation of the captioned media leak matter. It is the understanding of the FBI that your continUed investigation of this matter will be pursued by your office.

It still looks like the FBI planted false information with Seikaly at the DOJ to see if he'd leak it. When he did, the FBI had no way to prosecute someone in the DOJ without help from the DOJ, so they let the people at the DOJ handle it. Seikaly left the DOJ, and he's still sweating out possible prosecution. The FBI got what it wanted: They stopped Seikaly from leaking any more information.

Not every criminal ends up in jail. This looks like a negotiated resulution that caused the least embarrassment to all concerned.

Ed at www.anthraxinvestigation.com

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