Postal inspector says anthrax investigation is personal

At 7:30 a.m. on Jan. 14, Chief Postal Inspector Kenneth Weaver was conducting a staff meeting at the Postal Service's Washington headquarters. An aide interrupted the meeting and told him that Deborah Willhite, the agency's senior vice president for government relations and public policy, was on the line. She wanted to know what was going on at the Friendship Heights Post Office, a major postal facility uptown. The post office looked like a crime scene, said Willhite. Emergency crews had responded to a report that a white powder had fallen out of an envelope, and the D.C. police had closed off Wisconsin Ave., a major thoroughfare. It was a nightmare for motorists. Local media outlets were on the scene, and White House officials were phoning the Postal Service. Within 15 minutes, Weaver was back on the phone with Willhite, telling her that the situation was under control. The substance turned out to be sugar. That was just one of 17,800 suspicious incidents the inspection service has had to deal with since Sept. 11. Responding to such incidents, some of them hoaxes, is not exactly how Weaver wanted to end his 31-year career with the Postal Service. On March 1, Weaver will turn in his badge and retire. It's a career that started in turbulent times in Madison, Wis. During his first week on the job there, students protesting the Vietnam War stormed a post office. Shortly before, radicals had exploded a bomb near a state university building in Madison that conducted research for the Defense Department. A graduate student working inside was killed. Weaver's career has taken him from investigating mail theft and child pornography to the Unabomber and now terrorism. Weaver discussed his career, the anthrax investigation, and mail fraud during an interview Jan. 15 with Government Executive: GE: What is the status of the anthrax investigation? Weaver: Working with the FBI and New Jersey State Police, we do what you do normally in investigations, which is run down every lead. We have eliminated many suspects who looked very good. We just recently increased the reward for finding the perpetrator of the anthrax mailings to $2.5 million. That is in concert with the FBI and one of our mailing partners, Advo (a Windsor, Conn.-based direct marketing firm). They contributed $500,000 to the reward. Just recently we mailed fliers to one-half million residents in Trenton highlighting the traits of the type of person we think the suspects might be … It is just a matter of time before we get that one right lead. We've had over 900 leads as the result of the "America's Most Wanted" involvement. [The Postal Service has formed a partnership with the syndicated television show "American's Most Wanted" to collect tips on suspected anthrax mailers.] I'm confident, because I know the quality of the people working on this case. They are not going to give up. GE: What's the first thought that runs through your mind when you get such calls from Debbie Willhite? Weaver: You can't print it. You just hold your breath thinking we don't need another one of these going through the mail. We don't need to put the American people and our employees through something like this. We are working very hard to safeguard our work environment, safeguard our mail and make sure the American people have confidence in the mail. That [confidence] was brutally attacked based on these mailings. GE: Personally, how does this affect you? Weaver: It has to be the most difficult and frustrating situation that I've had to face in my career. Difficult from the standpoint that we live in a free society where people should feel comfortable dropping a letter in the mailbox with the expectation that it is going to be delivered. From a delivery standpoint, they should have an expectation that whatever they receive is not going to harm them. It's a personal affront to me. I think it is a personal affront to every postal employee that our system was violated and that our people were put in harm's way. I know that not only myself, but the postmaster general, when we learned that two of our employees died because of this, it really almost made you sick to your stomach. GE: How are you reallocating resources to the investigation? Weaver: We've taken away from other areas where we investigate like mail fraud, theft of mail. I don't think there is an agency head out there that wouldn't welcome more resources. If this is going to be the norm, we are going to need additional resources … some things are being placed on the back burner. GE: How has the growth of e-commerce affected law enforcement at the Postal Service? Weaver: It really has. I like to characterize it as old wine in a new bottle. It's the same kinds of crime being perpetrated over the Internet that we have always investigated through hard copy. A couple of examples come to mind-child pornography [and] child exploitation, which are probably among the most vicious crimes in existence. Most of that use to be conducted through the mail. About 80 percent of our child investigations involve the Internet in some fashion. GE: What are you most proud of? Weaver: Being part of a great, great institution and that's the Postal Inspection Service. What I mean by that is our organization has a culture. You can't say that for every agency or organization out there. When you hire on to be a postal inspector it is not a job, it's a career. As I mentioned earlier, violations that occur become very personal. It's almost like violating your family. GE: What do you wish you had accomplished? Weaver: A solution to the anthrax situation. All the [employees] working on this know that and they have pledged to give me the first call when it happens. I'll be waiting for it.