BioterrorismFormer agent sues FBI for retaliating against him for criticizing anthrax letters investigation
Richard L. Lambert, a former senior FBI agent who, for four years, ran the investigation into the 2001 anthrax attacks, has sued the FBI, accusing the agency of trying “to railroad the prosecution of [Bruce E.] Ivins” – the main suspect in the attacks — and, after Ivins’s 2008 suicide, of creating “an elaborate perception management campaign” to bolster its claim that Ivins was guilty. Lambert’s lawsuit also charges that the FBI and the Justice Department forced the Energy Department’s lab in Oak Ridge, Tennessee to dismiss him from his job as senior counterintelligence officer there in retaliation for his critique of the FBI’s conclusions in the anthrax case.
Richard L. Lambert, a former senior FBI agent who, for four years, ran the investigation into the 2001 anthrax attacks, has sued the FBI, accusing the agency of trying “to railroad the prosecution of [Bruce E.] Ivins” – the main suspect in the attacks — and, after Ivins’s 2008 suicide, of creating “an elaborate perception management campaign” to bolster its claim that Ivins was guilty.
Lambert says that the bureau gathered “a staggering amount of exculpatory evidence” regarding Dr. Ivins, which has remained under wraps to this day.
The New York Times reportedlast month that Lambert’s lawsuit also charges that the FBI and the Justice Department forced the Energy Department’s lab in Oak Ridge, Tennessee to dismiss him from his job as senior counterintelligence officer there in retaliation for his critique of the FBI’s conclusions in the anthrax case.
Lambert had worked at the FBI for twenty-four years.
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See also:
FBI’s investigation of 2001 anthrax attacks was flawed: GAO, 22 December 2014
Lawmakers, scientists question FBI’s investigation, conclusion in 2001 anthrax attacks, 14 August 2013
Former colleagues: accused anthrax killer could not have done it, 11 October 2011
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Lambert notes that he believes that Bruce Ivins may well have been behind the anthrax mailings, but that no court would have convicted him on the basis of the evidence gathered by the FBI had he not committed suicide and instead faced criminal charges.
A few weeks after the 9/11 attacks, several envelopes containing anthrax were mailed to U.S. senators and news organizations, causing panic. Five people died of anthrax poisoning and seventeen were taken ill. The cost of decontaminating the buildings which had to be evacuated exceeded $1 billion.
In the aftermath of the attack, the FBI launched one of the most comprehensive investigations in the organization’s history. Investigators initially zeroed in on a former Army scientist and physician, Dr. Steven Hatfill, but he was cleared and eventually reached a $4.6 million settlement with the FBI for harassment and damages.
The National Academy of Sciences and the Government Accountability Office (GAO) both faulted aspects of the FBI’s scientific work on the case.
Lambert, who himself was faulted for focusing for so long on Hatfill as the main suspect in the attacks, now admits that the investigation was hampered from the start.
