RicinLetters containing ricin sent to Mayor Michael Bloomberg, gun-control advocacy group
Two letters sent to Mayor Michael Bloomberg – one to his office in New York, the second to the Washington, D.C. offices of Mayors Against Illegal Guns, a non-profit gun-control group he has founded — contained traces of the deadly poison ricin.
New York City mayor Michael Bloomberg, latest target of a ricin attack // Source: hoithao.org
Two letters sent to Mayor Michael Bloomberg – one to his office in New York, the second to the Washington, D.C. offices of Mayors Against Illegal Guns, a non-profit gun-control group he has founded — contained traces of the deadly poison ricin.
The NYPD says that the letter sent to New York was opened on Friday in the city’s mail facility in Manhattan. The letter sent to Washington, D.C. was opened on Sunday by Mark Glaze, the director of Mayors Against Illegal Guns, at the offices of the organization.
Fox News reports that chief NYPD spokesman Paul Browne said preliminary testing indicted the presence of ricin in both letters.
The Los Angeles Times reports that yesterday (Wednesday) the two letters were also tested positive for the poison at the National Bioforensic Analysis Center in Fort Detrick, Maryland.
The NYPD said that the people who first came into contact with the envelopes in both New York and Washington, D.C., exhibited no symptoms, but that three police officers, members of the NYPD Emergency Service Unit, who handled the New York letter an hour or so after being called to the scene, did exhibit “some minor symptoms.” The NYPD said that the officers were treated by medical staff and the symptoms “abated.”
The NYPD said that letters in both envelopes contained gun debate-related threats against Bloomberg and Mayors Against Illegal Guns, but would not offer details. “The writer, in letters, threatened Mayor Bloomberg, with references to the debate on gun laws,” Browne said.
The police also did not disclose where the letters were mailed from, but said they were not mailed from either NYC or Washington, D.C..
The Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) says that ricin is a poison found naturally in castor beans. Symptoms of ricin poisoning include difficulty breathing, vomiting, and redness on the skin.
There is no known antidote for the toxin.
