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| FILE - In this Jan. 14, 2013 photo, New York City Mayor Michael Bloomberg speaks at a gun violence summit at Johns Hopkins Bloomberg School of Public Health in Baltimore, where he outlined his proposals for federal gun control reforms. Police said Wednesday, May 29, 2013, that threatening letters containing traces of the poison ricin were opened Friday, May 24, 2013 at New York City’s mail sorting facility and Sunday, May 26, in Washington at the headquarters of the nonprofit started by Bloomberg, Mayors Against Illegal Guns. Both were addressed to Bloomberg and contained threats referencing the debate on gun laws. |
NEW YORK (AP)
-- Two threatening letters containing traces of the deadly poison ricin
were sent to Mayor Michael Bloomberg in New York and his gun-control
group in Washington, police said Wednesday.
The
anonymous letters were opened in New York on Friday at the city's mail
facility in Manhattan and in Washington on Sunday at an office used by
Mayors Against Illegal Guns, the nonprofit started by Bloomberg, police
said.
Chief New York Police spokesman Paul
Browne said preliminary testing indicted the presence of ricin in both
letters but that more testing would be done. He said the threats
contained references to the debate on gun laws and an oily
pinkish-orange substance.
The billionaire
mayor has emerged as one of the country's most potent gun-control
advocates, able to press his case with both his public position and his
private money.
The people who initially came
into contact with the letters showed no symptoms of exposure to the
poison, but three officers who later examined the New York letter
experienced minor symptoms that have since abated, police said.
Browne
would not comment on what specific threats were made or where the
letters were postmarked. He also wouldn't say whether they were
handwritten or typed and whether investigators believe they were sent by
the same person.
The letters were the latest
in a string of toxin-laced missives. In Washington state, a 37-year-old
was charged last week with threatening to kill a federal judge in a
letter that contained ricin. About a month earlier, letters containing
the substance were addressed to President Barack Obama, a U.S. senator
and a Mississippi judge. A Mississippi man was arrested in that case.
Federal
officials and NYPD were investigating. Browne would not say whether the
letters were believed to be linked to any other recent ricin cases.
Police
said the letter in Washington, D.C., was opened by Mark Glaze, the
director of Mayors Against Illegal Guns. He was working out of the
offices of The Raben Group, a Washington lobbying firm where he keeps an
office. Glaze happened to open the letter while sitting outside over
the Memorial Day weekend, said the firm's founder, Robert Raben.
"I'm
very concerned about our employees and co-workers and clients. I'm
sorry that we live in a world in which people do such awful things.
Thank God, right now, everybody's physically fine," Raben said by phone
Wednesday, adding that the firm would do whatever needed to ensure
safety.
A mayor's spokesman also speaking for the nonprofit said he had no comment.
According
to the Centers for Disease Control, ricin is a poison found naturally
in castor beans. Symptoms can include difficulty breathing, vomiting and
redness on the skin depending on how the affected person comes into
contact with the poison.
Bloomberg and Boston
Mayor Thomas Menino founded Mayors Against Illegal Guns, which now
counts more than 700 mayors nationwide as members. It lobbies federal
and state lawmakers, and it aired a spate of television ads this year
urging Congress to expand background checks and pass other gun-control
measures after the school shooting in Newtown, Conn. The background
check proposal failed in a Senate vote in April, and other measures
gun-control advocates wanted - including a ban on sales of
military-style assault weapons - went by the wayside.
Separately,
Bloomberg also has made political donations to candidates who share his
desire for tougher gun restrictions. His super PAC, Independence USA,
put $2.2 million into a Democratic primary this winter for a
congressional seat in Illinois, for example. Bloomberg's choice, former
state lawmaker Robin Kelly, won the primary and the seat.
