2003 ricin letters

Content sourced from Wikipedia, licensed under CC BY-SA 3.0.

In 2003, two letters laced with ricin were found in October and November. One went to the White House and was intercepted at a mail facility; the other was found in Greenville, South Carolina, with no address. A separate incident in February 2004 at the Dirksen Senate Office Building was later linked in public reporting, but investigators never confirmed a connection to the earlier letters.

The letters were signed by someone calling themselves “Fallen Angel,” who said they owned a trucking company and claimed anger over new federal trucking rules. In January 2004, the government announced wide changes to trucker hours of service, reducing daily driving time from 11 to 10 hours and changing how delays counted, among other provisions. The sender said he would act if his demands were not met.

Details of the Greenville letter:
- Found October 15, 2003, at a mail-sorting center near Greenville, South Carolina.
- Contained a vial of ricin powder inside a sealed envelope.
- Included a warning label about the poison and a message directed at the Department of Transportation, threatening ricin if the new rules were adopted.
- The CDC confirmed ricin presence on October 21.

Details of the White House letter:
- Found November 6, 2003, nearly identical in appearance and threat to the Greenville letter.
- Addressed to the White House but also directed at the Department of Transportation.
- Initially tested negative for ricin, but later tests on mail equipment showed ricin contamination, and investigators considered the letter “probable” for ricin by November 10.
- It was postmarked October 17 in Chattanooga, Tennessee.

Public health and law enforcement response:
- The discovery prompted a delayed public warning. The CDC’s Morbidity and Mortality Weekly Report on November 21 advised healthcare workers and public health officials to treat ricin as a potential threat until Fallen Angel was caught.
- The White House letter’s public disclosure occurred in February 2004.

The Dirksen Senate Office Building incident:
- February 2, 2004, a white powdery substance was found in a mail room serving Senator Bill Frist.
- February 3 testing confirmed ricin in six of eight preliminary tests.
- More than a dozen staffers were decontaminated, and several Senate buildings were closed temporarily.
- The FBI led the investigation and looked for a link to Fallen Angel; investigators also examined whether the positive tests could be due to paper by-products.
- By early 2005, no clear source or suspects had been identified, and officials had not confirmed a connection to Fallen Angel. No definitive explanation for the ricin found in Frist’s office had been established.

Rewards and aftermath:
- A $100,000 reward was offered in January 2004 by the FBI, the U.S. Postal Inspection Service, and the Department of Transportation’s Office of Inspector General, later raised to $120,000.
- As of 2005 and later updates, no one had been charged in connection with the letters, and no proven link between the Dirksen incident and the Fallen Angel letters had been found. Authorities continued to pursue leads, but the origin of the ricin remained unknown.