Scientist linked to 2001 anthrax attacks commits suicide

AUG 01, 2008

Physics Today

Various : Microbiologist Bruce E. Ivins, 62, died Tuesday at Frederick Memorial Hospital in Maryland. He was believed to have taken a massive dose of prescription Tylenol mixed with codeine after the FBI told him that he was going to be indicted as part of the investigation into the 2001 anthrax attacks .

According to the Associated Press, prosecutors were seeking the death penalty as part of the indictment.

Ivin’s lawyer, Paul F. Kemp, who has represented Ivins for the past year, issued a statement asserting Ivins’ innocence.

“For more than a year, we have been privileged to represent Dr. Bruce Ivins during the investigation of the anthrax deaths of September and October of 2001,” Kemp said. “We assert his innocence in these killings, and would have established that at trial.”

“The relentless pressure of accusation and innuendo takes its toll in different ways on different people, as has already been seen in this investigation. In Dr. Ivins’ case, it led to his untimely death. We ask that the media respect the privacy of his family, and allow them to grieve.”

Ivins worked for the U.S. Army Medical Research Institute of Infectious Diseases , at Fort Detrick in Maryland . Ivin’s was an expertise on anthrax and has been called on by the FBI to analyze the anthrax spores that were sent through the mail to media organizations and politicians shortly after the September 11, 2001, attacks. The anthrax letters killed 5 people and sickened 17.

In 2003 Ivins received the highest honor given to Defense Department civilian employees for helping solve technical problems in the manufacture of anthrax vaccine.

According to the LA Times, which broke the story , Ivins began showing signs of “serious strain” shortly after the government’s $5.8 million settlement with Steven J. Hatfill , who for many years, was the main suspect in the case, a fact that was leaked to the press and damaged his career.

After Ivins had expressed suicidal thoughts to a therapist he was seeing to treat depression, his access to sensitive work at the government labs was curtailed, and he was subsequently hospitalized for depression.

Ivins was released from the hospital on July 24, but he was facing the prospect of forced retirement, according to a colleague, who described him as “emotionally fractured” by the government scrutiny.

USA Today published a story in 2004 on Ivins and his casual nature nature in dealing with suspect anthrax contamination in a colleague’s office.

In 2003, Physics Today published some of the research connected to the investigation.