Scientist Set to Discuss Plea Bargain In Deadly Attacks Commits Suicide

Video

Researcher at Center of Anthrax Case Dies

A top U.S. Biodefense researcher apparently committed suicide just as the Justice Department was about to file criminal charges against him. The charges were in connection to the 2001 anthrax mailings that killed five people.

» LAUNCH VIDEO PLAYER

Federal agents had been looking at Ivins for perhaps the past two years, a government official said, interviewing people in the New York area and the District. They focused more intensely on Ivins after using genetic and forensic techniques to compare the properties of the anthrax bacteria in the letters with the bacteria used for research in labs nationwide, according to two sources briefed on the investigation.

Scientists working for the government matched the properties of anthrax powder in the letters to those of bacteria in a flask Ivins used in his laboratory, according to the government official and another source.

A complete picture of Ivins's thinking and what may have motivated his alleged involvement in the anthrax mailings remained unclear yesterday.

In March 2000, Ivins and other Army specialists filed to patent a method of making a genetically engineered anthrax vaccine. The patent was awarded in May 2002.

In the wake of the anthrax attacks, the U.S. government contracted with the California company VaxGen to manufacture 75 million doses of the vaccine at a total cost of $877 million. VaxGen's chief executive said his company was licensed to use the manufacturing method created by Ivins and the other Army specialists.

But the chief executive, James P. Panek, said in an interview last night that it would have been "very unusual" if Ivins and the other scientists had received a financial stake in the licensing deal.

Although it is common for scientists working for government laboratories and private corporations to apply for patents to protect inventions developed while on the job, it is relatively uncommon for those individuals to benefit personally from products developed and sold as a result of those patents.

Panek said that Ivins had no commercial arrangement with the firm.

VaxGen recently sold the vaccine to Emergent BioSolutions of Rockville for $2 million. The Los Angeles Times first reported on Ivins's patent in today's editions.

David R. Fowler, Maryland's chief medical examiner, said Ivins was admitted to Frederick Memorial Hospital early Sunday morning. He was pronounced dead at 10:47 a.m. Tuesday. The cause of death was listed as an overdose of acetaminophen, the active drug in Tylenol, which causes liver failure over several days. Fowler said that Ivins's death was ruled a suicide, based on doctors' reports, the condition of the body and recent events in his life.

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

Federal officials said they needed to share information with the survivors of the anthrax attacks and with the families of those who were killed. They also must navigate sensitive grand jury and legal considerations before they can speak freely about the case, a step that could take several days.