Terrorism here in the US

[American Patriot]

Found on another site...


Farid Yusif Karakra—The MSM is showing his mug shot. That photo was taken last July 2007, when he was arrested for UNAUTHORIZED USE OR POSSESSION OF FRAUDULENT ID, a F-3 felony (Case Number: 07-CF-015528). He got it all reduced to traffic court and the case was closed in Sept. 2007. Why did he need a phony ID last year?


Interesting, a Muslim “student” on a visa with phony ID. Sounds familiar somehow...

[Jag]

Two Russian Men Questioned Over Prepaid Cellphone Purchases - Central Ohio

February 12, 2008

The sheriff’s office questioned two Russian men Sunday who told a deputy they bought more than 200 prepaid cell phones over the weekend from area stores.

Neither was charged with a crime, but the Ottawa County Sheriff’s Office notified Immigration and Customs Enforcement in Cleveland of the incident, according to a sheriff’s office report.

The men, who have lived in the United States for at least five years, told the deputy they bought the Tracfones from stores in the Port Clinton and Sandusky areas to resell to a businessman, according to the report. The businessman, whose name or location they did not provide, then would sell the phones on eBay, they told Deputy George Byington.

Prepaid cell phones have been linked to terrorist activity in the past, causing store officials to consider the men’s behavior suspicious. Some stores have limits on the number of prepaid cell phones customers can buy at one time.

ICE spokesman Greg Palmore of the agency’s Detroit office said he had no information regarding the incident.

“This is the first I’ve heard of it,” Palmore said. “If it was something we had a major interest in, I would have heard about it.”

Byington was not available for comment.

Managers at Wal-Mart on East Harbor Road called the sheriff’s office Saturday after seeing the men enter the store repeatedly to buy the phones, according to the report. Security video shows they slightly modified their appearance each time, sometimes putting on a hat or glasses or removing their jackets, the deputy reported.

An employee at Dollar General, located at the front of the Wal-Mart driveway, told deputies the men had looked at Tracfones in the store but left, the report shows.

When the men returned to the store Sunday, managers again called authorities. A sheriff’s deputy confronted them while one of the men was at the checkout with two Tracfones, the report shows.

The men produced Michigan driver’s licenses, both of which listed residents in the Detroit area — Troy and West Bloomfield, according to the report. They said they visited Ohio to buy the phones and stayed at a Sandusky hotel, the deputy reported.

They work construction, and selling Tracfones is a legitimate business that supplements their income, they told the deputy.

A Wal-Mart manager told the men not to return to the Portage Township store, according to the report.

http://www.portclintonnewsherald.com...802120303/1002

http://www.nationalterroralert.com/u...-central-ohio/

Russian men with Michigan driver's licenses and lives in Detroit area....made the hair on the back of my neck stand up!!!!!
Jag

[American Patriot]

The men produced Michigan driver’s licenses, both of which listed residents in the Detroit area — Troy and West Bloomfield, according to the report. They said they visited Ohio to buy the phones and stayed at a Sandusky hotel, the deputy reported.

well, well.

Bloomfield, when I lived there was a rather... upper crust sort of neighborhood. My dad used to make deliveries there, and Troy and most of that area.

There was a very LARGE contingent of various Middle Easterners... Over the past couple of years, I've heard a lot of people use the name "Dearborn" in vain, implying that is the largest group of ME folks. I'm not sure of that these days, but the Media makes that claim.

Troy and Bloomfield are north of Downtown, about 10 or 12 miles, in fact, I think that they start at 10 mile road if I remember. All the suburbs there are kind of laid out in a checkerboard fashion, with one of the "Mile" roads as a division line. 8 Mile Road is the edge of Detroit (and is 8 miles from an imaginary point in Detroit, and up one of the main feeder roads, which are laid in a spoke like fashion).

When I was growing up in the area (I lived between 7 mile and 8 Mile road roughly, and off of Mac Ave) on the East Side, I traveled a LOT with dad during the summer throughout the city delivering wine. We delivered to "party stores", which sell pretty much only wine and beer, and some spirits, grocery stores and the like. A good NUMBER of those were owned by "ME Interests" (I won't tell you what my dad called them, lol)

In fact, now that I am older and have a much better understanding of Islam, I find it extremely curious about the number of liquor stores owned by Muslims in that area.

Sandusky is quite a drive from those areas, way south in another state. I can't BELIEVE someone is buying cellular phones, driving to another state to sell them at a profit, and selling to "businessmen who sell them on Ebay".

Let me see, from a purely commercial, capitalistic point of view, why not buy the phones and sell them YOURSELF on Ebay?

Hmmm

I think this is MORE than fishy. They are foreigners who've lived here five years?

Come on, this SMACKS of terrorism involvement.

[American Patriot]

U.S. revives cross-border terror talk more than a dozen ties have entered U.S. via Canada
The Ottawa Citizen ^ | February 13, 200 | Ian MacLeod,



The top U.S. domestic counter-terrorism official says more than a dozen people with suspected terrorist ties have attempted to enter the United States from Canada.


Under the headline "Michael Chertoff's deepest fears: Terrorists entering U.S. from Canada," the New York Daily News says Mr. Chertoff, in a recent interview, revealed "much more than a dozen" individuals with links to al-Qaeda, Hezbollah and other extremist groups have been caught trying to enter the U.S. since 9/11.


The head of Homeland Security said the individuals were stopped for links to "a mix" of terror groups through finances, family or spy intercepts.


"Do I know they were coming in on a mission as opposed to something else? That I can't necessarily tell you," he said.


His comments coincide with an article in the Cairo-based Middle East Times, in which foreign affairs and counter-terrorism analyst Olivier Guitta claims "potentially hundreds of terrorists may have been allowed into the U.S. (from Canada) without showing any proof of identification."
Under the headline "Danger from Canada," she states that "historically, a number of terror attacks targeting the U.S. have originated in Canada."
The only reported incident of a terrorist attempting to enter the U.S. from Canada for an attack is the 1999 case of "millennium bomber" Ahmed Ressam.


Mr. Chertoff's remarks, meanwhile, are the most specific yet to quantify the problem of cross-border terrorist traffic.
A Homeland Security spokeswoman could not say how

(Excerpt) Read more at canada.com ...

[American Patriot]

Posting this here, even though it occurred in India... read and you will see WHY I posted it in the US terrorism thread. - RD

Three Afghans nabbed with fake Mexican passports
HotAir ^ | February 14, 2008 | Bryan

Nothing to see here, move along.

Three Afghan nationals were arrested at the Nedumbaserry International Airport, near here [India], today for travelling on fake Mexican passports, Immigration officials said.

The three were earlier in the day deported from Kuwait after authorities there doubted their claim to be Mexican nationals.

Immigration and other security officials interrogated the three for several hours and finally arrested them on charges of travelling on forged passports.

According to Immgiration officials, they were Afghan nationals trying to go to France. However, their real names have not been disclosed so far.

The Mexican passports which they were carrying identified them as Antonio Lopez Juan (42), Javier Sanchez Alberto (20) and Atonio Lopez Ernesto (16). They had left from Nedumbaserry Airport on February 11 for Kuwait en route to France.

However, the emigration officials at Kuwait had found them to be suspects as they reportedly could not understand any Spanish. They also suspected the passports to be forged.

(Excerpt) Read more at hotair.com ...

[American Patriot]

Police arrest traveler who fled from security screeners at Miami International Airport
The Charleston Gazette ^ | 02-26-08 | ap

MIAMI (AP) -- A man with multiple passports was arrested Monday after he bolted from security screeners at Miami International Airport, jumped from a second floor concourse and broke his arm and ribs, authorities said.

Transportation and Security Administration officials became suspicious of Faid Beydoun as he stood in a security line, waiting to board a Los Angeles-bound flight. When Beydoun's travel documents also raised concerns, agents asked him to step out of line for a secondary screening.

Beydoun, who was carrying multiple passports, then ran from security screeners, jumped 25 feet off the second floor concourse and broke his arm and ribs, The Miami Herald reported.

The man was charged with disorderly conduct and resisting arrest without violence, according to a statement. They did not identify him, but Miami-Dade County Corrections Department spokeswoman Janelle Hall said Beydoun was arrested for the same charges Monday, as well as loitering and prowling.

Telephone calls by The Associated Press to Miami-Dade Police, the FBI and U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement were not returned Monday night.

Beydoun, 42, was being held in the hospital ward of the Miami-Dade jail at Jackson Memorial Hospital, Hall said. Beydoun did not have an attorney listed.

Two other men, also headed to Los Angeles, were taken off a later flight that was still on the tarmac. They told investigators they paid for Beydoun's plane ticket and that he was their Miami Beach party guide. No weapons or dangerous material were found with them.

AP-ES-02-26-08 0152EST

[American Patriot]

February 26, 2008 8:00 AM

15 Years@War
The WTC bombing was radical Islam’s declaration of war against the United States.

By Andrew C. McCarthy

On the morning of February 26, 1993, Islamic militants steered a nondescript Ryder van through the winding darkness of the parking garage under the World Trade Center. They had spent years planning this moment in secret meetings at mosques and jailhouses, in rural outposts that served as paramilitary camps, and in safehouses where explosive compounds were mixed in makeshift labs.Loaded into the van’s rear compartment was a 1,400-pound chemical bomb.

The explosive detonated at a few minutes after noon. The hyper-intensive shockwave bored a six-story canyon into the bowels of the complex. Seven people were killed (one of the six officially listed murder victims having been well along in her pregnancy), over a thousand were injured, and the structural damage would cost nearly a billion dollars to repair.
Amid the terror, the dark cloud that envelops us still 15 years later, was a silver lining. This time, the “battalion of Islam” — as the “blind sheikh,” Omar Abdel Rahman, liked to refer to the cells in his emerging jihad army — had failed.It had been the intention of the World Trade Center bombers to annihilate tens of thousands of Americans, in addition to rendering the world’s most significant financial district uninhabitable. Detonation was consciously timed for maximum carnage: high noon on a Friday, when as many as 120,000 business professionals, laborers, diners, tourists, and area residents typically swarmed the Twin Towers and their immediate Wall Street environs. More diabolically, not content with their sophisticated, powerfully combustible urea-nitrate mixture, the jihadists laced the compound with deadly sodium cyanide and attempted to boost the explosion with hydrogen tanks. The aim was a horror virtually unimaginable back then (though it is, today, an omnipresent fear): wide dispersal of a lethal, aerated chemical, killing the thousands too distant to be obliterated by the sheer force of the blast.The battalion, however, miscalculated. They’d hoped to place the bomb close enough to primary support structures that one tower, in its decimation, might topple into the second. The van, though, had been parked many yards away from the ideal location. Added to this good fortune, the hydrogen tanks had been destroyed upon detonation, adding nothing but shards to the impact. And another break: The cyanide failed to vaporize — simply burning away like the rest of the bomb components. So yes, the aftermath resembled the ninth ring of hell, but the devastation was orders of magnitude less than it could have been. In hindsight, we now know the silver lining caused us to miss the ferocity and determination of our enemies. Only a few weeks before the bombing, the blind sheikh, who had been in constant communication with his co-conspirators, had attracted a crowd of followers at a Brooklyn rally. “God has obliged us to perform jihad,” he thundered. “The battalions of Islam and its divisions must be in a state of continuous readiness . . . to hit their enemies with strength and power.” The “enemies at the foremost of the work against Islam,” he declared, were “America and the allies.” For them, he had a warning:

If those who have the right [to have something] are terrorists then we are terrorists. And we welcome being terrorists. And we do not deny this charge to ourselves. And the Qur’an makes it among the means to perform jihad for the sake of Allah, which is to terrorize the enemies of God and our enemies too. . . . Then we must be terrorists and we must terrorize the enemies of Islam and frighten them and disturb them and shake the earth under their feet.

Radical Islam had sought an Armageddon for its declaration of war. But the paltry number of deaths, an absolute miracle under the circumstances, denied the jihadists the monstrous “victory” they’d hoped for. Simultaneously, it confirmed us in our determination to regard them as mere criminals.

That they would learn from their errors faster than we from ours is now clear. In truth, it was clear then. On the hard drive of Nidal Ayyad, one of the bombers arrested in early March 1993, the FBI recovered a claim-of-responsibility letter. It is even more chilling today than it was all those years ago:

We are, the Liberation Army fifth battalion, again. Unfortunately, our calculations were not very accurate this time. However, we promise you that next time it will be very precise and World Trade Center will continue to be one [of] our targets unless our demands have been met.

And so it was.
— Andrew C. McCarthy, an NRO contributing editor, directs the Center for Law & Counterterrorism at the Foundation for Defense of Democracies. His book, Willful Blindness: A Memoir of the Jihad, will be published by Encounter Books next month.

[American Patriot]

9/11 Redux: "Thousands of Aliens" in U.S. Flight Schools Illegally
ABC News ^ | Feb. 27, '08

Thousands of foreign student pilots have been able to enroll and obtain pilot licenses from U.S. flight schools, despite tough laws passed in the wake of the 9/11 attacks, according to internal government documents obtained by ABC news.

"Some of the very same conditions that allowed the 9/11 tragedy to happen in the first place are still very much in existence today," wrote one regional security official to his boss at the TSA, the Transportation Security Administration.

"Thousands of aliens, some of whom may very well pose a threat to the country, are taking flight lessons, being granted FAA certifications and are flying planes," wrote the TSA official, Richard Horn, complaining that the students did not have the proper visas.

Under the new laws, American flight schools are only supposed to provide pilot training to foreign students who have been a background check by the TSA and have a specific type of visa. But in thousands of cases this has not happened.

"TSA's enforcement is basically nonexistent," said former FAA inspector Bill McNease. McNease says in one year alone he found some 8000 foreign students in the FAA database who got their pilot licenses without ever being approved by the TSA.

The new laws were passed after it was learned that all the 9/11 hijackers, including ringleader Mohammed Atta, who were involved in flight operations had trained at U.S. schools with improper visas.

(Excerpt) Read more at abcnews.go.com ...

[American Patriot]

Ricin found in hotel in Las Vegas...

So, golly... no terrorism, nothing to see here, move on.

[American Patriot]

'Don't Worry, Be Happy' (Oliver North)
Townhall.com ^ | February 29, 2008 | Oliver North

WASHINGTON -- In 1988, singer and songwriter Bobby McFerrin penned a Grammy-winning tune, "Don't Worry, Be Happy." When it comes to collecting intelligence on America's enemies, McFerrin's pleasant a cappella song is now the theme song for Democrats in the House of Representatives.

On Feb. 14, House Speaker Nancy Pelosi decided to send the members of the House home on vacation instead of having them vote on extending the Protect America Act, a measure that already had passed in the U.S. Senate 68-29. The bill, among other things, provides civil immunity for private companies that assist U.S. intelligence agencies in intercepting terrorist communications to, from or through the United States. With the House adjourned, the PAA expired -- and Americans became instantly more vulnerable.

As might be expected in the midst of a presidential election year, Republicans and administration officials immediately went to the airwaves and print to decry Pelosi's decision. Director of National Intelligence Mike McConnell took the unusual step of appearing on Fox News Channel to point out that termination of the PAA "introduces a level of uncertainty that is going to be very difficult for us."

Now, Senate Intelligence Committee Chairman Jay Rockefeller, D-W.Va., who backed the bill in the Senate, assures us that he's "going to work something out" with his House colleagues, but he refuses to speculate about how long that might take. Meanwhile private-sector telecom executives, wary of legal assaults from shareholders and "public interest" groups, are understandably reluctant to assist U.S. officials in breaking into terrorist communications. Concerns about what we may be missing -- and the immediate risk of a major terrorist attack -- go well beyond Washington politics.

Given the enormous flow of global voice and data communications, any interruption or delay in collecting "signals intelligence" jeopardizes the ability of analysts to determine and disseminate whether, where, how and when a terrorist organization may be planning an attack. That's what happened in the months leading up to 9/11 -- and the kind of vulnerability the PAA was designed to redress. Here's why U.S. and allied defense, security and intelligence officers are so worried about being deaf and blind right now:

On Jan. 28, Libyan terrorist Abu Laith al-Libi, No. 3 in al-Qaida, was killed by a missile strike in Pakistan's Waziristan province. The weapon is widely presumed to have been fired from a U.S. unmanned aerial vehicle. On Feb. 27, Ayman al-Zawahri, No. 2 in Osama bin Laden's worldwide organization, vowed vengeance in a 10-minute video placed on radical Islamic Web sites: "No chief of ours had died a natural death, nor has our blood been spilled without a response." What that response might be we may never know until after it has happened. And that's not all.

On Feb. 12, Imad Mughniyah, the man responsible for murdering and kidnapping hundreds of Americans in Lebanon and elsewhere, was killed when his car exploded in Damascus, Syria. Both Israel and the United States have been blamed for the terror chieftain's death. Since then, Hezbollah Secretary-General Hassan Nasrallah has promised to "avenge our martyred brother." Mohammad Ali Jafari, commander of Iran's Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps, has vowed "retribution," and Ayatollah Khomeini has pledged "destruction on the illegal Zionist entity and their supporters."

Two days after Mughniyah's fiery demise, the Iranians canceled a previously scheduled "private discussion" with U.S. officials in Baghdad about the situation in Iraq. On Feb. 20, at a rally in Bandar Abbas, Iran, President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad described Israel as "filthy bacteria" and lashed out at nations that have allowed it to grow. Then Feb. 23, the theocrats running Tehran warned of "firm reprisals" against any country trying to impose new sanctions on Iran for proceeding with their nuclear program. Since then, the Iranian regime has confirmed that the March 2 visit by Ahmadinejad to Baghdad will be "historic for the changes it will bring to the region."

That's just what these "leaders" are saying in public. What they may or may not be saying in private about plans for attacks against American citizens we may not know until it is too late. For that, we can thank Madam Pelosi and her decision to postpone action on the PAA.

Those who claim that this delay won't hurt us should heed the warning proffered this week by Maj. Gen. Amos Yadlin, the chief of Israeli military intelligence. Testifying before the Knesset Foreign Affairs and Defense Committee Feb. 26, the normally tight-lipped general forecast: "Hezbollah will likely time its reprisals for the 40th day of mourning for its commander, Imad Mughniyah. That will be March 22-23."

Terror leaders such as those in Afghanistan, Pakistan or Tehran, who want to know our secrets, need only subscribe to The Washington Post or The New York Times. For the United States, the mission of finding out what our enemies are planning to do to us before they have a chance to do it always has been a challenge. That task has become far more difficult because of the Democrats running our House of Representatives. "Don't worry, be happy," indeed.

Oliver North is the founder and honorary chairman of Freedom Alliance and author of The Assassins .

[American Patriot]

More on the ricin. Been following it closely today.


LAS VEGAS -- A man was comatose in a hospital after a substance that initial tests indicate is the deadly toxin ricin was found in his room at a motel, police said Friday.

Police Lt. Lewis Roberts said investigators don't believe foul play was involved, and the FBI said the case didn't appear to be terrorism-related but federal authorities were assisting local police.
The comatose man was believed to have been living in the room at the Extended Stay America Motel several blocks west of the Las Vegas Strip where a vial of powder identified as ricin was found Thursday afternoon.
Story continues below
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Officials said the vial was in a plastic bag, and castor beans also were found in the room.
The man's identity was not made public.
"He's in very critical condition," Roberts said.
Police said three motel employees and three police officers were also hospitalized, mostly as a precaution.
Ricin is made from processing castor beans, and can be extremely lethal. As little as 500 micrograms, or about the size of the head of a pin, can kill a human, according to the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention in Atlanta.
Police were called to the motel Thursday and retrieved a package from the motel manager that was determined to be a chemical or controlled substance, Officer Ramon Denby said.
A 19-member Nevada National Guard team specializing in weapons of mass destruction took samples of the material from the motel office and a police evidence locker and initially identified it as ricin, said Air National Guard Capt. April Conway, spokeswoman for the state National Guard office in Carson City.
Conway said Friday the National Guard team was no longer involved in the police investigation.
Denby said two preliminary tests indicated the substance contained ricin, and that results from further tests by the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention and a second local lab were expected Friday.
A man who brought the substance to the manager told police he found it in a suite and it did not belong to him, police Capt. Joseph Lombardo told a news conference Thursday night. Lombardo did not identify the man.
"Ricin has no medical uses other than cancer research," Lombardo said. "An individual citizen other than being involved in cancer research or cancer prevention would not have any legal means or proper means of having that."
Police cordoned off the area and isolated the room where the substance was found.
Three motel employees and another person were quarantined and decontaminated at the site, then taken to hospitals for further testing, Denby said. All appeared to be in good condition, he said. Three police officers who had been exposed were also taken to hospitals.
Someone exposed to ricin shows signs of contamination in six to eight hours, Denby said.
Homeland Security officials joined the FBI and Southern Nevada Health District in the investigation.
A woman who answered the phone at the Extended Stay America Motel declined to comment.

[Backstop]

“Several vials of the deadly toxin ricin”, guns, an "anarchist type textbook", several pets including a dead dog, and a sick man…

Very strange.

And yet, from Rick’s article, is the absolute “BEST” quote I’ve read:

Police Lt. Lewis Roberts said investigators don't believe foul play was involved, and the FBI said the case didn't appear to be terrorism-related but federal authorities were assisting local police.

http://ap.google.com/article/ALeqM5i...V9VwwD8V4ID3G0

Guns, 'Anarchist Book' Found With RicinBy KEN RITTER – 3 hours ago

LAS VEGAS (AP) — Firearms and an "anarchist type textbook" were found in the same motel room where several vials of the deadly toxin ricin was found, police said Friday.

The room was most recently occupied by a 57-year-old man who has been in critical condition with breathing problems at a hospital for more than two weeks.

Las Vegas police said there was no apparent link to terrorist activity, and no indication of any spread of the deadly substance beyond the several vials of powder found in a plastic bag in the man's room on Thursday. But what the ricin was doing there remained a mystery.

A pinprick of ricin is enough to kill.

"Six to eight hours, you're going to start showing symptoms," said Greg Evans, director of the Institute for Biosecurity at Saint Louis University in Missouri.

Capt. Joseph Lombardo said at a news conference late Friday that the book was tabbed at a spot with information about ricin. Lombardo did not give more information about the book or specify what kinds of weapons were found.

A friend or relative of the sick man found the vials after going to the Extended Stay America motel, several blocks west of the Las Vegas Strip, to retrieve his belongings, police Deputy Chief Kathy Suey said.

Tests by police homeland security officers, the Nevada National Guard and a laboratory in Las Vegas came back positive for ricin, she said. A cleanup of the motel has been completed, she added.

Seven people, including the man who found the ricin, the manager, two other motel employees and three police officers, were decontaminated at the scene and taken to hospitals for examination, but none have shown any signs of being affected by ricin, Suey said. All were released overnight.

"There is no information to lead us to believe that this is the result of any terrorist activity or related to any possible terrorist activity," Suey said.

"We don't have any reason to believe any of it left the property."

Police cordoned off the hotel and told residents to stay in their rooms.

The cordon was lifted early Friday morning, and the motel has been open since then.

Lombardo said precautionary tests were also done a room in the Excalibur hotel, where the friend or relative had been saying. He said they came back negative.

Suey said the manufacture of ricin is a crime, but it was not clear the substance found belonged to the man, who was hospitalized in critical condition Feb. 14 after summoning an ambulance to the motel and complaining of respiratory distress.

The man was unconscious and unable to speak, Suey said, adding that he was not currently a suspect.

"We don't know an awful lot about him," Suey said. "We don't even know that it was him that was in possession of the ricin." She said she could not say how much ricin was in the vials.

Cancer research is the only legitimate reason for anyone to have ricin, Evans said.

Ricin is made from processing castor beans, and can be extremely lethal.

As little as 500 micrograms, or about the size of the head of a pin, can kill a human, according to the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention in Atlanta.

Castor beans also were found in the man's room, officials said.

An American Medical Response paramedic crew that took the man to the hospital about 11 a.m. Feb. 14 had no indication of ricin poisoning, AMR general manager John Wilson said.

Wilson would not say whether the two paramedics who handled the call entered the man's room, but said neither have shown symptoms of exposure.

Naomi Jones, spokeswoman for Spring Valley Hospital, said the patient was in critical condition when he arrived at the hospital. She said Las Vegas police contacted the hospital Wednesday about a possible ricin exposure investigation.

"The investigation started two days ago, that's when we began cooperating," Jones said. "The patient who has been exposed is not contagious to anyone else, as ricin has to be injected, ingested or inhaled."

Police refused to comment on whether the hospital was contacted Wednesday, a day before police said the ricin was found.

Evans said the fact that the man suffered respiratory illness suggested he was exposed to a powder fine enough to float in the air.

"If he went to the hospital with difficulty breathing, he actually inhaled it," Evans said. "For some reason he opened the vial and it must have been aerosolized."

Multiple vials would probably contain enough ricin to sicken many people if it was spread, for example, around a buffet table or sprayed in a closed room.

"If it was aerosolized in a confined space then it certainly could harm dozens of people," he said.

Police said they had spent 12 hours containing and cleaning up the site.

"My understanding is cleanup has been done," said Dr. Lawrence Sands, chief health officer of the Southern Nevada Health District. "There should not be a threat to anybody at this time."

The motel room had been unoccupied since the man was hospitalized. Someone who knew the sick man found the ricin in the room and brought it to the apartment manager, Suey said.

"He claimed to be a relative. We haven't confirmed that yet whether he is a relative or a friend," she said.

The manager had begun an eviction because the sick man hadn't paid his bill, and the friend or relative had gone to retrieve his items, she said.

Suey said there were several pets in the room when officers arrived. A dog was found dead but the animal had gone at least a week without food or water, Suey said, and she did not attribute the death to ricin.

Evans, of the Institute for Biosecurity, said that if ricin is inhaled, symptoms would include difficulty breathing, fever, cough and nausea.

Injection would lead to vomiting and severe diarrhea. Eventually these symptoms would progress to seizures, hallucination, bloody urine and damage to the kidney, liver and spleen and death.

Tom Obrig, an expert on ricin who teaches nephrology at the University of Virginia, said there have been about 700 reports over the years of people trying to commit suicide by eating castor beans.

"Usually it doesn't work because it's not digested well," he said.

For the most part, however, the toxin has more of a cloak-and-dagger reputation linked more closely to spies and assassins. He recalled one particularly famous murder in 1978 involving Georgi Ivanov Markov, a Bulgarian dissident in London.

Markov "was standing on a corner waiting for a bus and some spy came along and injected a pellet in his leg from an umbrella," Obrig said. "The guy died three days later. It was traced back by Scotland Yard who figured the only thing potent enough to do that was ricin."

Associated Press Staff writers Noaki Schwartz in Los Angeles and Kathleen Hennessey in Las Vegas contributed to this report.

[Jag]

Man Says Ricin Belonged to His Brother

By ALLISON HOFFMAN – 1 day ago
SAN DIEGO (AP) — The man at the center of a ricin scare at a Las Vegas motel says he never had any intention of hurting anyone with the deadly biological agent, his brother told The Associated Press.

Roger Bergendorff, who finally regained consciousness last week after almost a month of hospitalization, possessed the ricin powder found in his motel room in February and believes he was contaminated by it, said Erich Bergendorff, who talked to his brother on the phone Sunday.

"He just confirmed that it was not intended for anybody," Erich Bergendorff said in a telephone interview from his home north of San Diego in Escondido. "It was something that would be used for his own purposes, for self-defense."

Roger Bergendorff, 57, was upgraded from critical to fair condition Monday at Spring Valley Medical Center.

Erich Bergendorff said his brother was cooperating with investigators who questioned him at the hospital Friday. Las Vegas police referred questions to the FBI, which declined to comment Monday.

Erich Bergendorff said Sunday's conversation was his first with Roger since he regained consciousness. He said his brother told him the ricin powder was easy to make but wasn't clear on whether he or someone else made it.

"He did talk as though he just had it there; he was almost kind of casual about it," Erich Bergendorff said. "... He did mention the ricin and seemed to say something like, 'Gee, it sure worked on me.'"

Ricin can be lethal in amounts the size of the head of a pin. It has no antidote and is legal only for cancer research.

In court documents, police said "a large quantity" of ricin was in vials found in Roger Bergendorff's hotel room. He summoned an ambulance Feb. 14, complaining of respiratory distress, but the ricin wasn't discovered until a cousin went to the hotel to pick up his belongings two weeks later.

Police say they also found firearms in the room, along with castor beans — from which ricin is derived — and four "anarchists cookbooks" in the room, marked at sections describing how to make ricin. But officials have said they have not found evidence in the motel room or elsewhere of contamination and have downplayed the possibility that Roger Bergendorff posed a threat.

Authorities have refused to say whether they plan to charge Roger Bergendorff, who had been suffering from respiratory ailments and failing kidneys.

Doctors have not formally diagnosed his condition, his family said. Hospital spokeswoman Naomi Jones declined to specify details, citing patient confidentiality rules.

Experts have said his symptoms appeared consistent with ricin exposure, but the poison breaks down in the body within days, making it hard to trace.

Ricin is categorized as a biological agent under the Biological Weapons Anti-Terrorism Act of 1989, which provides for the possibility of life in prison and unspecified fines for production, acquisition or possession of a biological agent, according to Dean Boyd, a spokesman for the Justice Department.

Mere possession for purposes other than "bona fide research" or "other peaceful purpose" carries the possibility of fines and up to 10 years in federal prison, Boyd said.

Nevada state law makes manufacturing or possessing a biological weapon or toxin a felony punishable by up to 10 years to life in state prison.

Friends and family members described Bergendorff, an illustrator, as a loner who struggled to pay his bills while moving around California, Nevada and Utah with his beloved dog and cats.

He had lived in recent months at the Extended Stay America motel several blocks off the Las Vegas Strip while waiting for a freelance job contract.

Erich Bergendorff said his brother was deeply saddened by the death of their older brother in January but insisted Roger Bergendorff had not been suicidal.

"He did say he felt very empty with his loss," said Erich Bergendorff. He added that his brother was lonely in the hospital and newly distraught after learning that his dog was euthanized after the Humane Society found her starving and without water in his motel room.

http://ap.google.com/article/ALeqM5j..._wJpwD8VFGNV80

Jag

[Jag]

Picatinny Weapons Arsenal

Two people are being detained after being taken into custody near the Picatinny Arsenal and authorities are investigating photos taken around the area of the base late Sunday afternoon. One witness, according to the Daily Record, reported seeing an official using what appeared to be a Geiger counter near the seen. This has not been confirmed by officials. (See Article Below)
We will continue to update this story as details become available.

Authorities closed a span of Route 15 South near the Rockaway Township-Wharton border around 4:30 p.m., where FBI agents, state, county and local police gathered around a tan Nissan Pathfinder with New Jersey license plates.

The suspect vehicle may have been used by two individuals who fled after being spotted taking photos that piqued the interest of the Department of Defense, said Robyn D’Onofrio, a spokeswoman for the Morris County Prosecutor’s Office.

The section of the shoulder where the SUV apparently stopped runs alongside a grassy divide that separates southbound Route 15 from a small side street, West Union Turnpike.

The SUV, which had a small, white, bumper sticker that said “I Love Israel” on the rear bumper, was towed away around 7:45 p.m. Diapers were visible in the trunk near a pair of flip-flops and other items, and a box of baby wipes apparently had been placed on the street with other items from the vehicle.

The investigation into the content of the photos is ongoing and is being led by the Department of Defense, according to the Morris County Prosecutor’s Office.

At about 4:30 p.m., a State Police trooper asked Edward Weissman to stay in the house he was in on West Union Turnpike. Weissman said he later saw an official using what appeared to be a Geiger counter, a device used to measure radiation, around the SUV.

Toni Kelly, 40, of Wharton was driving home with her 7-year-old twins around 5:30 p.m. when she was diverted off Route 15, adding about a half hour to her trip.

“It was horrible,” Kelly said. “A police officer that was blocking traffic wouldn’t say anything, and I was just thinking that maybe someone who escaped (from the base) and was running around our neighborhood. My heart sinks even thinking there could have been terrorist actions taken at Picatinny. It’s a scary world out there.”

The military base is situated on 6,500 acres in northwest New Jersey, and is accessible shortly off of northbound Route 15. The motto on the Picatinny Arsenal’s Web site is “Home of American Fire Power.”

“Picatinny plays a unique role in the United States’ ability to wage war,” according to Picatinny’s Web site. “There is no other comprehensive armaments facility like it in the country; it is a one-of-a-kind facility that provides virtually all of the lethal mechanisms used in Army weapon systems and those of the other military services.”
Source - Daily Record

Jag

[Jag]

2 Detained Near Picatinny Weapons Arsenal - Charged With Unlawfully Taking Photos of Installation

March 31, 2008

UPDATE: The two men detained Sunday night near Picatinny Arsenal have been charged with unlawfully photographing the installation, authorities said.

Picatinny police spotted the two men outside the Picatinny gates Sunday afternoon and asked them to leave, according to Tonya Townsell, a Picatinny spokeswoman.

The two left, but were spotted a second time photographing the installation, so the officers called in back-up from local police departments, Townsell said.

Townsell said the men never entered the base and were first spotted in the area arond the visitor’s center, which is closed on weekends.

The two men were detained while their tan SUV was searched on Route 15, alongside a grassy divide that separates southbound Route 15 from a small side street, West Union Turnpike.

The FBI’s Joint Terrorism Task Force, Rockaway Township Police and the Morris County Prosecutor’s Office assisted in the investigation.
Source - Daily Record

——————

UPDATE:

Two men were released from police custody this morning after they took photos of Picatinny Arsenal Sunday afternoon, an incident that led to Route 15 in Morris County being shut for three hours last night.

A Picatinny policeman saw the two men taking pictures near the front gate of the Army base about 4 p.m. Sunday, the base commander Brig. Gen. William Phillips said this morning. The officer told the men, who had asked where the PX was, that it is against the law to take pictures of the post, a weapons research and development facility in Rockaway Township, and asked them to leave.

The men left, but were stopped a short time later on Route 15 north after the Picatinny officer saw them continuing to take photographs.
The men were detained while their car was searched, Phillips said. The FBI’s Joint Terrorism Task Force, Rockaway Township Police and the Morris County Prosecutor’s Office assisted in the investigation, Phillips said.

Route 15 was closed in case there was “something hazardous in the vehicle,” Phillips said.

The men told authorities a friend who grew up in the area asked them to take pictures to see how the area had changed, Phillips said.

“They looked at the laptop to see if there is anything suspicious,” Phillips said. “Everything they told police checked out.”

“At no time was anyone on Picatinny in any kind of danger nor did anyone get inside our facility,” Phillips said. “We take security very seriously on the installation.”

Strange....
Jag

[Backstop]

Good job.

http://www.local6.com/news/15762829/detail.html

Passenger Detained At Orlando Airport Had Bomb Materials In Bag

Behavioral Specialists Spot Suspicious Passenger

POSTED: 12:54 pm EDT April 1, 2008
UPDATED: 4:51 pm EDT April 1, 2008

ORLANDO, Fla. -- A man behavior specialists spotted acting suspiciously was detained after components used to make pipe bombs were found in his luggage at Orlando International Airport.

Officials said agents noticed something about the man's body language that prompted officers to move in near the Virgin Atlantic and Jamaica Airlines ticket counters.

A portion of the Terminal A in front of Virgin Atlantic was closed Tuesday afternoon and passengers were evacuated.

The man, believed to be Jamaican, and his bags were then searched by bomb squad members.

During the search, bomb materials were found in at least one of the man's bags.

Passengers waiting to board flights said they noticed the man acting suspiciously before agents moved in.

"He looked rather crazy," a passenger said. "He was rocking left and right and up and down. He looked a little wacko."

The passenger was scheduled to fly on Air Jamaica Flight 80 to Montego Bay, Local 6 reported. The flight departed Tuesday afternoon.

Local 6 showed video of a man with his arms behind his back being checked by a member of the bomb squad outside of the airport.

Large crowds formed around the portion of the airport and traffic backed up on nearby streets.

TSA officials said flight operations were operating normally and both security checkpoints were open.

The identity of the man taken into custody was not known.

[American Patriot]

http://www.reuters.com/article/domes...40792820080401
Pipe bomb parts found in Florida airport bag: paper
Tue Apr 1, 2008 6:27pm EDT


By Barbara Liston

ORLANDO, Florida (Reuters) - Components that potentially could be made into a pipe bomb were found in the luggage of a man preparing to fly from Orlando International Airport to Jamaica on Tuesday, the Orlando Sentinel newspaper said.

The Transportation Security Administration confirmed only that "suspicious" items were found in a search of the man's luggage.

FBI spokesman David Couvertier, whose agency is handling the case, said the items "generated a high level of concern," but he declined to confirm the newspaper's report that the suspicious items included "unassembled pipes with end caps, metal ball bearings and other potentially explosive materials."

The man, whose name was not released, was taken into custody by Orlando Police and turned over to the FBI, according to police spokeswoman Sgt. Barbara Jones.

He was ticketed on an Air Jamaica flight scheduled to leave Orlando for Montego Bay, Jamaica, on Tuesday afternoon.

According to the TSA, an officer keeping watch for suspicious behavior singled out the man for luggage inspection. Airport spokeswoman Carolyn Fennell said the man was preparing to check the luggage when he was detained.

Passengers were evacuated from a section of the airport terminal around the Air Jamaica, Air Canada and Air Frontier ticket counters, and 11 flights were delayed, Fennell said.

(Editing by Jane Sutton and Mohammad Zargham)

[American Patriot]

Suspect identified in Orlando International Airport bomb parts case

Incident called 'probably the most serious . . . we've had'


Kevin Brown, 32, is charged with attempting to carry an explosive or incendiary device on an aircraft. (SEMINOLE COUNTY SHERIFF'S OFFICE)

Jim Leusner and Willoughby Mariano |Sentinel Staff Writers

April 2, 2008

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A Jamaican planning to board a flight at Orlando International Airport was detained and questioned by FBI agents Tuesday after they found components for pipe bombs and explosive and flammable liquids in his checked luggage.

The suspect was identified late Tuesday as Kevin Brown, 32, a Jamaican national who was scheduled to fly on Air Jamaica Flight 80 to Montego Bay at 2:55 p.m. Transportation Security Administration officers spotted him acting suspiciously about noon, TSA and law-enforcement officials said. Several officials said the man was "acting strange" and questioned his mental stability.

Brown was charged with attempting to carry an explosive or incendiary device on an aircraft and booked into theSeminole County Jail late Tuesday. He will appear before a federal judge in Orlando today.

Wearing blue jeans and a white shirt, Brown was searched by a bomb technician on a curb outside the airport terminal. His camouflage-style backpack also was seized and searched by an Orlando Fire Department bomb squad.



Related links

• Man detained at OIA Photos

TSA searched his luggage and found "suspicious items," according to TSA officials. Among the items seized were two galvanized pipes, end caps, two small containers of BB pellets, batteries, two containers of liquids, a laptop computer and bomb-making literature, according to an FBI statement released Tuesday night.

The search took place during the busy spring-break vacation season, with many visitors departing town after attending WrestleMania 24 on Sunday. Orlando police sealed off a 300-foot perimeter near the check-in counters at Terminal A for more than two hours while bomb-squad technicians searched the suspect and his backpack at curbside. Several airlines, including Air Canada, WestJet, Air Jamaica and Virgin Atlantic, had flights delayed.

Joel Salazar, 25, who was en route to Lima, Peru, was among the hundreds of confused travelers standing in long, snaking lines and waiting for direction from airport personnel.

"Nobody told us what was going on," Salazar said.

Lee Kair, the top TSA official in Orlando, would not give details about the seized materials in the luggage, the suspect or whether he was traveling with anyone.

"I can say there was no immediate threat to passengers in the terminal," Kair said.

Authorities also said they did not think the materials posed a direct threat to passengers on the plane.

Brown was detected by a TSA "behavioral specialist" trained since 2006 in spotting involuntary actions by people being deceptive, Kair said.

After the passenger checked in his bag, officials diverted it from the normal screening process, looked inside and found the prohibited items. Officers later confronted him.

"It's really a testament to the system working," Kair said. He did not say how far the suspect got into the airport before being taken into custody.

U.S. Rep. John Mica, R- Winter Park, a member of the House Transportation Committee, said he was briefed by TSA on Tuesday but could not discuss details for security reasons.

"If what TSA has described to me is true, it's probably the most serious incident we've had at OIA," said Mica, former chairman of the House Aviation Subcommittee. "At least one and possibly two [security] backup systems we put in place worked."

FBI spokesman Dave Couvertier said agents detained the man and questioned him about the items found in his luggage.

Airport officials temporarily routed passengers away from the Virgin Atlantic and Air Jamaica check-in areas at Terminal A. Flight operations and check-in continued elsewhere, according to the TSA.

Air Jamaica Chairwoman Shirley Williams said the man, who was born in Jamaica and carried a passport from that country, lives in the United States and used his green card to check in at the airport. She said Flight 80 took off at 5:31 p.m. with 96 passengers aboard.

OIA spokeswoman Carolyn Fennell said 11 of the daily 1,000 commercial, private and cargo flights were affected. The incident occurred about noon; it was 5:30 p.m. before operations returned to normal.

Passengers at the airport described confusion in Terminal A, where they were forced to abandon luggage at ticket counters and faced long lines when they were allowed to return.

Janet Lawe was almost to the ticket counter about noon when airport officials announced that the area was being evacuated.

"We were also told there was a guy with an explosive," said Lawe, 40, who was visiting from Kingston, Jamaica, with her husband and two children. The family was booked on the same flight as Brown.

Tuesday's incident follows a security breach at OIA in March 2007, when federal agents arrested two airline employees who used their security privileges to smuggle 13 handguns, a rifle and 8 pounds of marijuana aboard a Delta flight to San Juan, Puerto Rico.

The incident prompted the Greater Orlando Aviation Authority to spend $5 million on security upgrades.


Jason Garcia, Beth Kassab, Sarah Lundy and Tamara Lytle of the Sentinel staff contributed to this report. Jim Leusner can be reached at 407-420-5411 or jleusner@orlandosentinel.com. Willoughby Mariano can be reached at wmariano@orlandosentinel.com or 407-420-5171.

[American Patriot]

Fox is also reporting the guy above had Army service time, and may (or may NOT) have served in Iraq.

I'm thinking "Not"

[American Patriot]

I'm also thinking this was a "test run" to see what they could get through TSA screeners