Anthrax Found in Lawmakers' Offices

06/05/2001| IslamWeb

WASHINGTON (AP) - Trace amounts of anthrax were discovered Friday in the offices of three congressmen in a House office building as evidence of bioterrorism spread on Capitol Hill.
The spores were found in the offices of Reps. John E. Baldacci, D-Maine; Rush Holt, D-N.J., and Mike Pence, R-Ind., on the sixth and seventh floors of the Longworth House Office Building, said Capitol Police Lt. Dan Nichols.
The Longworth discoveries were the first in the offices of lawmakers since Oct. 15, when anthrax on Capitol Hill was first found in a letter postmarked from New Jersey and opened that morning in an office of Senate Majority Leader Tom Daschle in the Hart Senate Office Building.
On Thursday, officials disclosed the discovery of spores at two other locations in the Hart building, a stairway between its eighth and ninth floors and ninth-floor ventilation filter. On Wednesday, trace amounts of spores also were found in a freight elevator in the Hart building.
The Longworth building receives mail that is processed by a machine where anthrax was found last week. The machine is located in a separate House office building several blocks away.
The positive tests turned up as Congress struggled to recover from a bioterrorism scare that has gripped it for nearly two weeks now. Impatient lawmakers have been clamoring for faster cleanup so they can return to their shuttered offices.
Workers returned to the Senate's Dirksen building Friday, the fourth of Congress' six major office buildings to reopen since Oct. 17. The Longworth and Hart buildings were the only ones still closed Friday on Friday and will maintain that status until at least next week.