Anthrax Suspect Was on Brink Before Suicide

As FBI agents closed in on Bruce Ivins last fall, the anthrax suspect’s life was falling apart, the Washington Post reports. Ivins would sometimes drink a liter of vodka while downing sleeping pills and anti-anxiety drugs. He “was emailing me late at night with gobbledygook, ranting and raving,” a fellow scientist said. Ivins went to rehab twice before his death, as the scientist tried to help him through a 12-step recovery program.

Ivans ranted about "persecution" of his family by the FBI, the colleague said, as agents were pushing his family for evidence, even offering his son the $2.5 million reward in the fatal 2001 anthrax attacks. A therapist who saw Ivins in group sessions said he had “a very detailed plan to kill his co-workers.” The therapist , who acknowledges being a former drug user herself, sought a restraining order against Ivins, telling a Maryland judge he was a “sociopathic, homicidal killer.” Ivins told the colleague he suspected the therapist of being in league with the FBI.
(More Bruce Ivins stories.)