20 white powder letters addressed to politicians around the country

The Associated Press | July 15 2003

[Princeton]

Postal Worker Finds Suspicious Powder In Letters

TALLAHASSEE, Fla. -- A postal worker found white powder in about 20 letters addressed to politicians around the country early Tuesday, leading firefighters to seal off part of the city's main post office.

The Tallahassee Fire Department said the powder was being tested by the Leon County Health Department to see if the powder was anthrax or another hazardous material was placed in the letters, which were addressed to members of Congress. Test results weren't expected for two or three days, officials said.

Postal workers immediately secured the area after discovering the powder and called 911, officials said. A hazardous materials team decontaminated the area and no postal workers are thought to have been contaminated, they said.

On Oct. 15, 2001, just a month after the Sept. 11 attacks, an anthrax-bearing letter was opened in the office of then-Senate Majority Leader Tom Daschle, D-S.D. Traces of the toxin were found in other areas of the Capitol, apparently the result of the exposure of other letters in the mail system, and thousands of workers were treated with antibiotics as a precaution. The one million-square-foot Hart Senate Office Building where Daschle's office was located was declared safe three months later after it was decontaminated with chlorine dioxide, a toxic gas. Five people around the country, including a photo editor at a Boca Raton-based supermarket tabloid, died from the attacks, but no Capitol Hill employees were harmed. Copyright 2003 by The Associated Press. All rights reserved. This material may not be published, broadcast, rewritten or redistributed.

[Shermy]

Hatfill needs to be investigated on this one. His parents live in Florida. (Hmmmm...very suspicious.) Plus I heard there has been an influx of Thai restauranteurs in Talahassee. Thailand neighbors Malaysia and Hatfill's girlfriend is from Malaysia.

See what I mean? Let's e-mail Kristof!

[Princeton]

"I bet all of the addressees are democrats, and it's a staged occurance as an election campaign tactic... but then, I'm cynical..."

2001: First(?) came "the real thing", and then.......




FBI says threatening letter an apparent hoax
DAVID ESPO
Associated Press


WASHINGTON ---- A threatening letter containing a powdery substance was opened barely 20 feet from the Senate chamber Thursday in what Majority Leader Tom Daschle called an apparently harmless "copycat mailing" of last fall's anthrax attack.

"The early test showed in this case that it was not anthrax," Daschle told reporters. "While we don't know what the substance was, we hope to find out in the next 48 hours."

Discovery of the letter in Daschle's second-floor suite of offices sent an emergency team rushing to the Capitol and prompted officials to briefly quarantine some areas of the building.

In comments to reporters several hours later, Daschle said the letter bore some similarities to one mailed to him last fall that contained anthrax.

"The content of the letter (opened Thursday) was very similar in tone and the wording of the letter that was sent to us on Oct. 15. It said 'this was anthrax, death to America,' something to that effect, and 'Stop the bombing' was the only phrase that was new," Daschle told reporters.

The "Stop the bombing" apparently referred to the American air campaign over Afghanistan, which had not yet swung into full gear at the time the anthrax-tainted letters were postmarked in October.

Earlier, an FBI official, speaking on condition of anonymity, said the new letter appeared to be an anthrax hoax. It was sent to the Army's Fort Detrick in Maryland for further testing........"

[archy]

See what I mean? Let's e-mail Kristof!

Nah. If we e-mail him, we won't be able to include any powder for his dentures. And we won't even have to mention what it is, he'll probably be able to figure it out on his own

Unless you figure he's more likely to be the denture cream sort....

-archy-/-

[Princeton]

And again.......

No Anthrax In Daschle Letter

WASHINGTON, Jan. 4, 2001

(AP / CBS)

"It said this was anthrax, death to America, something to that effect, and 'stop the bombing' was the only phrase that was new."
Sen. Daschle

(AP) The suspicious powder sent in a threatening letter to Sen. Tom Daschle's office was talc, the FBI said Friday.

"We are going to investigate the letter as a criminal hoax," FBI spokesman Chris Murray said.

He declined to discuss details of the letter.

The tests confirmed earlier procedures which showed the letter did not contain anthrax, unlike a heavily contaminated letter sent to the senator Oct. 15.

Discovery of the new letter Thursday prompted a quick response from emergency crews, who were dispatched to Daschle's Capitol office. But an FBI official, speaking on condition of anonymity, said later that the new letter appeared to be an anthrax hoax. It was sent to the Army's Fort Detrick, Md., testing facility.

Fort Detrick spokesman Chuck Dasey said tests on the new letter would take about 48 hours and final results were not expected before late Saturday. He said the results would be announced by the FBI.

Daschle described the letter opened Thursday as "a copycat mailing" that was similar in message and tone to the previous letter.

"It said this was anthrax, death to America, something to that effect, and 'stop the bombing' was the only phrase that was new," Daschle told reporters.

"Stop the bombing" apparently referred to the American air campaign in Afghanistan, which had not yet swung into high gear at the time the anthrax-tainted letter was postmarked in October.

Daschle, who was not in the room at the time, said the new letter was opened Thursday morning in the Capitol barely 20 feet from the Senate chamber. Congress is currently in recess.

"The early test showed in this case that it was not anthrax," Daschle said in a telephone conference call with reporters. "We took this white powder very seriously. There was a note inside that basically said this was anthrax."

Daschle said the substance was in a separate packet, possibly explaining why no powder fell out when the corner of the envelope was cut under congressional mail screening procedures. The mail was irradiated, and a field test showed the substance is not hazardous, Capitol Police spokesman Lt. Dan Nichols said.

Nichols would not rule out the possibility the substance could have been harmful before it was irradiated.

Discovery of the letter in Daschle's second-floor suite of offices prompted officials to briefly quarantine some areas of the Capitol, but the building was not evacuated.

Sen. Patrick Leahy, D-Vt., also has received a letter contaminated with anthrax. Five people have died from anthrax since early October and 18 more were infected.

An FBI official, speaking on condition of anonymity, said the new letter appeared to be an anthrax hoax. It was sent to the Army's Fort Detrick in Maryland for further testing.

A separate law enforcement source, who would not be quoted by name, said the letter was postmarked from London in November. The letter had a stamp affixed, whereas anthrax-contaminated letters previously sent to Daschle nd Leahy were on pre-stamped envelopes used only for domestic mail.

The initial field test on the new letter normally would pick up the presence of anthrax spores even if they had been killed in the irradiation process now used on all mail addressed to Congress, the law enforcement source said.

However, Dr. Richard Meyer, an expert at the federal Centers for Disease Control and Prevention in Atlanta, said field tests were not very good at detecting low amounts of anthrax and that laboratory tests were more reliable.

The October letter sent to Daschle exposed more than two dozen people to anthrax spores and led to the closure of the Hart Senate Office Building, where Daschle also maintains an office. The Hart building, which is across the street from the Capitol, remains closed. But Environmental Protection Agency officials said they believe a repeat fumigation effort last weekend killed any remaining spores.

Azeezaly Jaffer, a Postal Service vice president, said postal officials were talking with the FBI about increasing to $2 million the reward for information leading to the arrest of anyone mailing anthrax.



©MMII The Associated Press. All Rights Reserved. This material may not be

[Centurion2000]

Then he wiped his finger under his nose, sniffed hard, and left the podium.

Now I have this mental image of Bill Clinton playing the proctologist doctor from Cannonball Run.

[Princeton]

Florida:


Howard Troxler, columnist for the

St. Petersburg Times received

a "hoax" letter:

"Howard Toxler .....1st case of disease now blow away

this dust so you can see how the real thing flys.

Oklahoma-Ryder Truck! Skyway bridge-18 wheels."



Psychotic Looseness of Associations or Symbolism?

[Darksheare]

Oh no.... that does it for me...
*dies laughing*
Sorry about that mental image.
I'm so sorry..

[ConservativeMan55]

Can anybody help me use this lexis nexus search feature? I am completely lost? How does it work?

[Princeton]

Well over a year and a half since the mailings of the anthrax letters and the Amerithrax investigation into the first fatal biological attack on Americans appears to have slipped from the back burner off of the stove.

I say, "appears", as we are not privy to the investigative machinations and, perhaps, that's how it should be.

Nevertheless, white powder "hoaxes" continue to plague communities, terrifying recipients, tying up police and hazmat teams from Seattle to the Senate to The U.S. Consulate's visa processing office in Rome.

Reporting on these events has, for the most part, been scant of substitutive details, such as how envelopes are addressed or, more importantly, where they were postmarked.


Rather then rest on his laurels, perhaps the Anthrax Mailer is keeping himself in minor league headlines.

[Darksheare]

I have not a clue.
I just lurk around, speak once in awhile, and return to my corner.
I poke around once in a blue moon using the search engine onsite, but I usually blunder into what I'm looking for rather than through actual deep knowledge of it's functions.

Usually, my 'puter locks up and crashes and I spend more time beating it into submission than I do here on FR.
This week I'm lucky, so far..
No crashes.
Yet.

[Centurion2000]

Oh no.... that does it for me...
*dies laughing*

Glad I'm not the only one that remembers that movie or that image of the doctor hanging out of the van .... "You sure you don't need an exam ?"

[jpl]

These anthrax hoaxes have actually been going on since since at least 1998, well before the real letters. From what I've read, most of them have by sent by these "Army of God" whackos. If I had to bet, I'd bet that this latest round probably falls into that type of category.

[Eroteme]

A postal worker found white powder in about 20 letters addressed to politicians around the country early Tuesday, leading firefighters to seal off part of the city's main post office.

In order to "find" white powder in letters mailed to politicians around the country, one must open them. I note the article did not say "postal authorities" or "inspectors, or FBI opened the letters--just singular, "a postal worker."

You get court orders to open mail; you don't just sit down and open envelopes on a hunch. Even if there was valid reason for suspicion, that's even more reason NOT to open the letters. So I suspect the worker knew there was no real danger.

[Princeton]

"From what I've read, most of them have by sent by these "Army of God" whackos. If I had to bet, I'd bet that this latest round probably falls into that type of category."

---

"It is probably not a coincidence that three years of anthrax hoaxes predated the actual attacks....."


Monterey Institute of International Studies
Research Story of the Week

Tracking Anthrax Hoaxes and Attacks



Clayton Lee Waagner, anthrax hoax suspect.

By Laura Snyder and Jason Pate

Much attention has been paid to the anthrax letters sent last fall to major media outlets and two U.S. senators that resulted in five deaths and 17 non-fatal infections. However, in the midst of the turmoil in late 2001, it largely escaped attention that more than 750 hoax letters claiming to contain anthrax were sent worldwide in October and November. More than 550 of these hoax letters were sent to abortion clinics in the United States by a single group called the Army of God.

This was not the first time that abortion clinics were the victim of anthrax hoaxes. In 1998, at least 12 clinics received letters that claimed to contain anthrax, followed by more than 35 such letters in 1999 and over 30 in 2000. Indeed, from 1998 to September 2001, more than 400 anthrax hoaxes occurred in the United States.

THE LETTERS

First Wave: On October 15, 2001, the same day the anthrax-tainted letter was found in Senator Daschles office, nearly 300 family-planning centers received letters purporting to be from U.S. government agencies.

[1] The letters, which listed either the U.S. Marshals Service or the U.S. Secret Service as the return address, were also labeled Time SensitiveUrgent Security Notice Enclosed. When opened at abortion clinics around the nation, the envelopes turned out to contain threatening letters from the Army of God, a radical anti-abortion group that has been associated with multiple attacks against abortion doctors and clinics.

Accompanied by threatening white powder, later identified as a relatively harmless insecticide, the letters warned recipients that they had been exposed to the bacterium that causes anthrax and described in detail the symptoms of the disease.[2] The letters also cautioned the reader to call the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) for treatment.[3]

This wave of hoax letters was concentrated in the South and the Northeast. According to an analysis of 272 letters by the National Abortion Federation, Florida received the most letters (68), followed by Pennsylvania (50), and Ohio (29). Almost all of the October letters were postmarked in Knoxville or Chattanooga, Tennessee; Cleveland or Columbus, Ohio; Atlanta, Georgia; or Washington, D.C.[4]

Second Wave: On November 7, 2001, more than 250 Army of God anthrax hoax letters were received by clinics and advocacy groups.[5] These letters were sent in FedEx envelopes and purported to be from the Planned Parenthood Federation of America or the National Abortion Federation; the sender had somehow obtained the NAF and Planned Parenthood FedEx account numbers and forged the envelopes. This was the first time that FedEx packages had been used to deliver the anthrax threats.

Thirty-one of the letters in this second wave were concentrated in New England, and 20 others were received in the Mid-Atlantic states. One explanation for the fact that very few hoax letters were received on the West Coast is that many of the letters were stopped in transit after postal authorities learned of the other hoaxes.

THE INVESTIGATION

In late November 2001, fugitive Clayton Lee Waagner claimed responsibility for both waves of anti-abortion anthrax hoaxes. Waagner, 44, of Kennerdell, Pennsylvania, had escaped from an Illinois county jail in February 2000 while awaiting sentencing for weapons possession and auto theft. He has known ties to the Army of God and claimed that God had called on him to murder abortion providers and to attack clinics.

Waagners obsession with abortion doctors and clinics began in September 1999, following a funeral service that was held after his daughter suffered a miscarriage. He claims that God called on him to be [his] warrior and kill abortion doctors.[6] In a statement posted online in June 2001, Waagner declared: I am anointed and called to be God's Warrior. And in that call I am protected by THE MOST HIGH GOD.[7] According to Neil Horsley, an Army of God member whom Waagner supposedly visited over Thanksgiving weekend in November 2001, Waagner claimed to have identified 42 abortion clinic workers he was planning to kill.[8]

On December 5, 2001, Waagner was captured outside of Cincinnati, Ohio, and on January 25, 2002, he was sentenced to more than 30 years in prison for illegal possession of firearms, theft, and breaking out of prison.[9] On April 18, 2002, Waagner was convicted on six firearms and car theft charges. He faces up to 15 years in prison and a $250,000 fine for each count.[10] Waagner has been transferred to Philadelphia for questioning in the anthrax hoax letters and will probably stand trial for the hoaxes in summer 2002.

CONCLUSION

Although the media have begun to focus on the anthrax hoax phenomenon in light of the fall 2001 anthrax letter attacks, the hundreds of anthrax hoaxes that occurred in the United States in 1998-2001 received very little attention.

It is probably not a coincidence that three years of anthrax hoaxes predated the actual attacks. Although there is as yet no clear linkage between the perpetrators of the anthrax letter attacks and the anthrax hoaxes, systematic tracking of hoax events could provide some basis for bioterrorism response planning.

[Darksheare]

I'm now going to be scarred forever with the image of Clinton AS THE DOCTOR....

[TrebleRebel]

Sun is shining in Matagorda, Wadsworth, and Bay City. Matagorda county did well, from what I can tell. Power was only out for about 20 minutes.

[Dog Gone]

Good, I have a house between Wharton and Bay City and I'm a little concerned that a tree is lying on top of it. I don't think I can get down there to check until Friday.

[ALOHA RONNIE]

Partners in Terrorism = CLINTONS

Freedom-Hating CLINTONS =

N. Korea Rattles is NUKES =

White Powder Exercise =

Media Attacks call BUSH a LIAR =

Sedition in -Time of War-...

only now it's OUR Freedom at stake.

[maestro]

Your# 12......I cannot find this article anywhere, do you have an original link?

Correct!

Nothing on the evening news either!?

?Games?

:-(