2 Men Arrested as Suspected Anthrax Seized

A suspected white supremacist who was caught three years ago with deadly bacteria was back in custody Thursday on charges that he and another man possessed anthrax, an even more lethal biological agent, “for use as a weapon.”

Larry W. Harris, 46, a microbiologist from Ohio, held up a vial at a hotel room here earlier this week and bragged to an associate that it contained enough anthrax to “wipe out the city,” federal officials asserted in their criminal complaint. Months before, Harris had allegedly discussed plans for releasing toxins in the New York City subways, potentially endangering hundreds of thousands of people, the court papers assert.

But attorneys for Harris and the second man implicated in the affair, 47-year-old William J. Leavitt Jr. of Nevada, said the pair were merely conducting biomedical research and never planned to harm anyone. Tests will show, they said, that the material seized by authorities was not anthrax, but a vaccine for combating it. They suggested that the FBI’s tipster--who was twice convicted for conspiracy to commit extortion--was angered by a collapsed deal to sell the pair medical testing equipment.

“The FBI is treating this very seriously, and so would I, but there’s been a gross misunderstanding. I think this will come back as anthrax vaccine, and everyone will be incredibly relieved,” said Lamond Mills, an attorney for Leavitt.

Authorities expect to have test results back as early as today. In the meantime, the dramatic arrests in nearby Henderson, Nev., prompted a flood of calls to Las Vegas radio talk shows from worried residents wanting to know whether they should evacuate the area. One military surplus store in the area said it had all but sold out of gas masks.

President Clinton appealed for people “to understand that their law enforcement officials have this situation under control,” and the FBI said there was no evidence of any threat to residents of the area.

The two suspects were arrested Wednesday evening, just hours after federal officials received a tip from a research scientist in the Las Vegas area who told them Harris and Leavitt had contacted him about buying equipment to test the bacteria anthrax.

A virulent and deadly germ, anthrax can spread through the air and is potentially fatal even in microscopic amounts, experts say. Just two pounds can kill millions, causing vomiting, fever and eventually suffocation within a few days. But the disease can be treated with antibiotics at an early stage.

Authorities became particularly alarmed when the tipster mentioned Harris as one of the people seeking to purchase test equipment. That name gave the claim instant credibility because Harris has produced extensive literature on biological warfare and is on probation from a case in Ohio in which he was convicted of wire fraud for having illegally obtained bubonic plague bacteria by mail.

Once Harris’ name was mentioned, “we assumed we were dealing with a legitimate biological threat, so our planning and care level raised 20 levels higher,” said Walter B. Stowe Jr, assistant special agent in charge of the FBI’s field office in Las Vegas.

Harris “is a self-admitted member of the Aryan Nations,” according to the complaint filed Thursday, and he has been linked to other white supremacist groups as well.

In the course of a chaotic, 12-hour investigation, agents trailing Harris and Leavitt saw the two men leave the Gold Coast Hotel and Casino around 6:30 p.m. Wednesday with a white plastic foam cooler, which they placed in a beige Mercedes-Benz automobile.

Later that evening, authorities said, the two suspects drove to a medical office complex in nearby Henderson and dropped the cooler off inside. With nearly all of the FBI’s more than 70 local agents mobilized, along with a SWAT team and other emergency personnel, authorities quickly arrested the two men without incident as they returned to their car from the office. They were taken away in an ambulance to a hospital by agents trying to determine whether the suspects had been contaminated.

But that still left the potential danger of what the pair might have left behind.

Stowe said agents found only unopened petri dishes inside the medical clinic. But according to the court papers filed by the FBI, their tipster had told them there were eight to 10 black leather flight bags in the trunk, marked “biological.”

Authorities wrapped the vehicle in see-through plastic “like a sandwich” and transported it to Nellis Air Force Base outside Las Vegas.

It was believed that chemicals found in the car were transported to the Aberdeen Proving Grounds, a weapons testing and research center in Maryland. Results of the tests could be back today.

“Our primary concern was the safety of the community. At all times we were considering the safety of the community,” said Las Vegas FBI Agent Bobby Siller. “There is no evidence of any contamination anywhere in this community as a result of this investigation.”

But the congressman who heads a House panel on military research criticized authorities for what he said was a slow response in removing the suspected poison.

Rep. Curt Weldon (R-Pa.) said he had “unverified reports” that agents and firefighters at the site had to wait 90 minutes before removing the suspected anthrax. “With a chemical and biological agent potentially spreading, every minute is crucial. Firefighters can’t be waiting an hour and a half for the military to arrive,” he said.

“Because of their incredible capacity for death and destruction, as well as their relatively low production cost, chemical and biological weapons are going to increasingly become the weapons of choice for would-be terrorists,” Weldon said.

By one estimate, a determined biological terrorist could amass “a major biological arsenal” on a budget of just $10,000 and house it in a 15-foot-by-15-foot room.

Authorities, however, were quick to praise their own efforts, noting repeatedly throughout the day that they were able to apprehend the two men and thwart the possible plot just 12 hours after the original tip.

“I know that there’s a lot of second-guessing [of the FBI] in what we do--Ruby Ridge and Waco--but we did all the right things in this case,” Stowe said.

But defense lawyers and supporters of the suspects were insisting Thursday that the FBI had bungled this one.

“I’m shocked, but I also think this is a bad mistake. There is something terribly askew here,” said Ted Marshall, who was the Clark County, Nev., district attorney in the 1960s and has known the Leavitt family for years. He described Leavitt, the father of four, as “a model citizen.”

Outside the courthouse where her son and Harris appeared, Betty Leavitt said: “My son is the most caring person you would ever find. He’s extremely religious. He is concerned about the world situation and germ warfare. Every day he says, ‘Mom, can we have a prayer together? I want to pray that we can settle the world’s conflicts.’ ”

Leavitt’s attorneys said the researcher who tipped off the authorities is at the center of the case.

Harris and Leavitt, who met several months ago at a science conference, were conducting legitimate research into anti-anthrax vaccines, even getting lawyers involved to approve a consulting contract, the lawyers said. They went to the tipster prepared to pay him millions of dollars to buy his testing equipment for their research.

But the tipster wanted the money in advance, causing problems in the negotiations and prompting him to put the squeeze on Leavitt and Harris, the lawyers said. “When he couldn’t get the money upfront, the FBI shows up,” Mills said.

Indeed, while federal officials said the tipster came to them “simply as a citizen performing his civic duty,” their affidavit in court acknowledges that he has two felony convictions for conspiracy to commit extortion in 1981 and 1982.

Neither the tipster nor his lawyer could be reached for comment.

Authorities stressed that they believed there was no danger to the community, but many were shaken nonetheless.

“It’s kind of scary--just to think there are people out there like that, and so close,” said Mary Brother, whose family runs a used car lot down the road from the Las Vegas military base where the suspects’ car was brought.

In New York City, Mayor Rudolph W. Giuliani sought to ease concerns about a biological threat to his city. Giuliani said he had spoken several times with FBI Director Louis J. Freeh and there was no “ongoing or present threat” to the city’s subway system.

“There was nothing in the immediate arrest that suggested that this was a planned attack on the New York City subway system or planned attack at all,” Giuliani told a City Hall news conference.

The federal affidavit said that Harris told associates last summer about plans to place a “globe” of bubonic plague toxins in a New York subway station, where it would be broken by a passing train and could cause hundreds of thousands of deaths. A similar plot in Japan in 1995, using sarin gas, a nerve agent, killed a dozen people and injured thousands.

The complaint accuses the two men of conspiring to possess a biological agent “for use as a weapon,” but--despite its hints at schemes of destruction in New York City and Las Vegas--it never spells out what they allegedly planned to do with the anthrax. Officials were circumspect in press briefings as well. “I can’t get in their minds,” Siller said.

Harris is the author of a manual that describes how people can protect themselves against biological warfare. In its introduction, he describes how he started taking courses in advanced microbiology at Ohio State University in 1991.

He adds that he became acquainted at the school with an Iraqi graduate student, who after the bombing of the World Trade Center in New York in February 1993, confessed to him she was afraid the United States would falsely blame Iraq for the terrorist attack and retaliate.

The student said such action could set off an attack in the United States by Iraq using biological weapons, Harris related in the manual’s introduction.

He said the student described in detail Iraq’s biological weapons program and bacterial warfare delivery methods. Fear of such an attack prompted him to began work on the manual, Harris said in the book.

Harris was arrested May 12, 1995, in his hometown of Lancaster, Ohio, and accused of illegally receiving three vials containing freeze-dried bubonic plague bacteria. The vials of yersinia pestis were discovered in the glove compartment of his 1989 Subaru sedan, which was parked in his driveway.

When law enforcement officers entered his house, they found a certificate showing he was a lieutenant in the Ohio chapter of Aryan Nations, a paramilitary white supremacist group headquartered near Hayden Lake, Idaho.

Prosecutors alleged that Harris used deception to obtain the bubonic plague bacteria from a laboratory in Rockville, Md. At the time, he was employed as a well and septic tank inspector for a Lancaster, Ohio company.

Harris later said in court papers that he wanted the bacteria to try to develop an antibody to counteract an “imminent invasion from Iraq of super-germ carrying rats.” He was convicted of wire fraud and placed on probation.

Internet sites on biological weapons cite Harris widely, said Abraham Cooper of the Simon Wiesenthal Center, which tracks racism and terrorism online and elsewhere.

“This is not someone who’s been hiding out. He has a persona within this movement, and this is obviously someone who needs a serious look,” he said.

Times staff writers John Goldman in New York and Marc Lacey, Ronald Ostrow and Paul Richter in Washington and researchers Lynette Ferdinand in New York and Anna Virtue in Miami contributed to this story. Gorman reported from Las Vegas and Lichtblau from Los Angeles.