Cyanide Found in Recalled Sudafed Pill, FBI Confirms

One of three suspect Sudafed capsules recovered in a nationwide recall has been determined to contain a highly toxic form of cyanide typically used in the metal plating industry, FBI officials confirmed Friday.

Assistant special agent John Eyer said the capsule was purchased at a K mart store in the Tacoma, Wash., suburb of Lakewood and near where two people died and a third fell seriously ill after taking Sudafed 12-Hour capsules laced with cyanide.

“The capsule was examined at our FBI laboratory in Washington, D.C., and found to contain sodium cyanide,” Eyer said. “Part of the continuing investigation will be to determine the concentration and source of this substance.”

FBI officials have yet to complete their analysis of two additional altered capsules turned in by consumers, he said. Separately, the Food and Drug Administration has examined 124,000 Sudafed capsules pulled from store shelves in the past week.

Burroughs Wellcome Co., which produces Sudafed, is offering a $100,000 reward for information leading to a conviction in the tampering case, company officials said.

Meanwhile, Tumwater, Wash., Police Chief H. M. Vandiver suggested a possible connection between the advent of the poisonings and the publication of an article in the February issue of Reader’s Digest about a tampering case in 1986.

In that case, two people from the Seattle suburb of Auburn died after ingesting capsules of extra-strength Exedrin laced with cyanide. Auburn resident Stella Nickell was found guilty in 1988 of causing death by drug tampering and was sentenced to 90 years in prison.

Nickell’s victims included her husband, Bruce, and Auburn resident Susan Snow. Prosecutors said that Nickell, who tainted bottles of extra-strength Exedrin and Anacin in the Nickells’ home and on local store shelves, killed her husband as part of a scheme to collect $176,000 in life insurance.

Seattle FBI agent John Thurston declined to speculate on a motive for the recent tamperings. However, he noted that the Reader’s Digest article was available around mid-January, which would have coincided with some of the known purchases of suspicious Sudafed capsules.

Dozens of people have been interviewed by law enforcement authorities here over the past week including Joe Meling, 29, the husband of a Tumwater woman who survived cyanide poisoning on March 2.

Meling told authorities that he bought the Sudafed and took one of the capsules before his 28-year-old wife Jennifer ingested a tainted dose and lapsed into a coma. She eventually recovered after having her stomach pumped.

On Tuesday, Jennifer Meling, who has been recuperating at her parents’ home in Vancouver, Wash., filed a divorce petition against her husband.

“We haven’t confirmed nor eliminated any suspect,” Vandiver said, “and we are talking to a lot of people in association with this case and Joe Meling is one of them.”

Vandiver added that “there are 25 FBI agents assigned to this case and what they want they usually get.”