PORTLAND, Oregon (Reuters) — A former
nurse from Vancouver, Washington, was sentenced to two years in prison
on Wednesday for mailing more than 100 threatening letters containing
white powder to members of Congress and media organizations in February
of 2012.
Christopher Carlson, 41, pleaded guilty to a charge of conveying
false information and a hoax purporting to expose recipients of the
letters to a biological toxin in a mass mailing that set off
coast-to-coast anthrax scares.
White powder contained in the envelopes, postmarked from Portland,
Oregon, was later revealed to consist of celery salt and corn
starch, the U.S. attorney for Oregon said in a statement about the
sentencing.
The letters were sent to congressional offices on Capitol Hill, and
their field offices across the country, as well as to various media
outlets, including The New York Times, National Public Radio and
"The Daily Show with Jon Stewart."
About two dozen of the letters were received and opened by staff
members before law enforcement was able to intercept the remainder.
The mailing triggered a flurry of evacuations, the dispatch of
hazardous materials squads and decontamination procedures, with
dozens of police and emergency medical teams responding in 24
federal districts, authorities said.
The threatening letters "expressed frustration with politicians,
corporations and lobbyists" and promised a "new American
revolution," according to the statement from the U.S. Attorney's
Office.
Some also included the warning message: "Oh yeah, the powder. 50
Senators were randomly selected to received this letter as opposed
to the other one. Since I put the bug in ten of these letters, again
randomly selected, there's a 20% chance that you've just been
exposed. If you aren't wearing a biohazard suit, anyway."
Carlson was arrested at his home in March, about a month after the
mailing, and had been jailed without bond since then. He had worked
as a registered nurse, then as a trainer in electronic recordkeeping
at a Vancouver hospital, just across the Columbia River from
Portland, until taking a leave of absence in December 2011.
The security alert he set off marked the biggest postal scare in the
nation's capital since deadly anthrax-laced letters were sent to
several news organizations and Senate offices in 2001 in the wake of
the September 11 attacks on the World Trade Center and Pentagon.
Five people were killed and 17 sickened by those letters, which
federal investigators ultimately traced to a U.S. Army scientist who
committed suicide in 2008.
In addition to his two-year prison term, Carlson was ordered to pay
$36,310 in restitution for the cost of emergency responses his
mailings triggered.
In sentencing Carlson, the judge said he was taking into account the
defendant's now-diagnosed bipolar disorder, and the testimony of a
psychiatrist that Carlson committed the hoax in the midst of a manic
episode, the Oregonian newspaper reported.
Carlson apologized in court in court "to all the people that I
scared, all the government resources I wasted, all the havoc that I
caused," adding that "I wasn't right in the head," according to the
newspaper.
(Reported by Teresa Carson; editing by Steve Gorman and Eric Walsh)
