Agent Scott Decker
Appearances
Aftermath: Hunt for the Anthrax Killer
Episode 2: Martha’s Not Crazy
Anthrax, the disease, is caused by the bacteria Bacillus anthracis. Anthracis is a Greek word for black or coal, because if you get cutaneous anthrax, your skin in that area turns black. And I guess the doctor looked at some pictures of cutaneous anthrax and said, boy, that sure looks the same to me.
Aftermath: Hunt for the Anthrax Killer
Episode 2: Martha’s Not Crazy
The doctor who had looked at him went back to his notes and said, I think I just looked at one of the hijackers of 9-11.
Aftermath: Hunt for the Anthrax Killer
Episode 2: Martha’s Not Crazy
It started off an investigation unto itself to determine whether this hijacker had an anthrax sore on his leg.
Aftermath: Hunt for the Anthrax Killer
Episode 2: Martha’s Not Crazy
We didn't know who it was, and we certainly hadn't neutralized them in any way.
Aftermath: Hunt for the Anthrax Killer
Episode 2: Martha’s Not Crazy
You know, I had the manifest of passengers on the airline, and just doing basic investigation, it was quickly determined where each of those hijackers lived before they got on the plane.
Aftermath: Hunt for the Anthrax Killer
Episode 2: Martha’s Not Crazy
And when they looked at the residences where these guys had lived, they found that two of them were living in an apartment that had been rented to them by Gloria Irish.
Aftermath: Hunt for the Anthrax Killer
Episode 2: Martha’s Not Crazy
Mike Irish was an editor at the AMI, and I guess a boss of Robert Stevens. He was married to Gloria Irish, who was a real estate agent in Boca Raton.
Aftermath: Hunt for the Anthrax Killer
Episode 2: Martha’s Not Crazy
These hijackers, operatives, whatever you want to call them, they weren't stupid. And we could see that they were very good at planning long term.
Aftermath: Hunt for the Anthrax Killer
Episode 2: Martha’s Not Crazy
We sampled their apartments and their cars, what we call environmental sampling, taking samples with a damp little piece of swab of gauze. And then you run a DNA analysis on that and look for anthrax DNA. So that was done in all the hijackers' cars, their apartments down in Boca.
Aftermath: Hunt for the Anthrax Killer
Episode 2: Martha’s Not Crazy
He's the guy that took the mail and walked around the building and gave you your mail.
Aftermath: Hunt for the Anthrax Killer
Episode 2: Martha’s Not Crazy
American media evidently destroyed their mail every night or every week. I mean, they got a lot of mail, and there's no reason for them to save it. They just destroyed most of it.
Aftermath: Hunt for the Anthrax Killer
Episode 2: Martha’s Not Crazy
The FBI and others thought that Al Qaeda was behind this. And it turned out not to be true. When I grew up, I was taught to take the easy shot first. Al Qaeda was the easy shot. It would have been nice to just say it was them and to be able to prove it.
Aftermath: Hunt for the Anthrax Killer
Episode 2: Martha’s Not Crazy
Trust me, we beat that dog to death, trust me. It's all classified. It caused a lot of heart pain and resources.
Aftermath: Hunt for the Anthrax Killer
Episode 2: Martha’s Not Crazy
My theory is that when Mueller and Ashkoff made public the fact that the hijackers lived in South Florida around Boca Raton, that our mailer, anthrax mailer, purposely sent letters to Boca Raton to make us think it was al-Qaeda.
Aftermath: Hunt for the Anthrax Killer
Episode 2: Martha’s Not Crazy
It was a coincidence. A very strange coincidence, but a coincidence. And that's kind of a trick. When you do these investigations, you've got to quickly recognize it's a coincidence and not chase it down. Because a real lead could be going unaddressed. I guess that's what makes a good investigator versus a not-so-good investigator.
Aftermath: Hunt for the Anthrax Killer
Episode 2: Martha’s Not Crazy
The worst thing that can happen to an FBI agent working a criminal investigation is to solve it in your mind before you really have the evidence.
Aftermath: Hunt for the Anthrax Killer
Episode 2: Martha’s Not Crazy
The FBI and others thought that al-Qaeda was behind this. We had no proof. We had a high suspicion, but no proof that it was an intentional act, i.e. terrorism.
Aftermath: Hunt for the Anthrax Killer
Episode 2: Martha’s Not Crazy
The worst case scenario would be somebody had produced a pound of dried anthrax powder very fine that could take out hundreds and thousands of people if done properly.
Aftermath: Hunt for the Anthrax Killer
Episode 2: Martha’s Not Crazy
We didn't know why he was targeted. I mean, he could have pissed somebody off. We didn't know. We have to keep an open mind.
Aftermath: Hunt for the Anthrax Killer
Episode 2: Martha’s Not Crazy
The doctor in South Florida recalled that he treated this guy for an ulcer on his leg. an open sore.