April 23, 2013

"Ricin Suspect Released from Jail: Was He Framed?"

"Two sources had earlier confirmed to Fox News that the FBI was looking into the possibility that he might have been framed as part of a grudge against him from someone in his neighborhood. A detention hearing for Paul Kevin Curtis that was scheduled for Tuesday has also been postponed."

ADDED: Let's look back to reports after the arrest, which came when people were very keyed up about murderers/terrorists on the loose after the Boston bombing:
If guilty, Curtis didn't cover his tracks very well. The arrest was based on information gathered "very early on," an official tells The New York Times. Presumably that information includes Curtis' use of his actual initials, KC, in the letter.

In fact, Curtis left enough breadcrumbs that a conservative website, Lady Liberty 1885, apparently fingered Curtis hours before the FBI announced his arrest, just through internet sleuthing. Curtis' Facebook posts include both the sign-off used in the ricin letters to Wicker and Obama — "This is KC and I approve this message" — and, according to Lady Liberty, the same quote: "To see a wrong and not expose it, is to become a silent partner to its continuance."
In retrospect, these clues work as evidence of framing. Take someone's Facebook catchphrases and put them in the letter....

41 comments:

ndspinelli said...

He's still Rupert Pupkin, framed or not.

edutcher said...

It's happened before.

furious_a said...

Even if you amend the headline from "Arrested", to...

"Troubled Elvis Impersonator Framed in Plot to Send Poisoned Letter to President"

...it still doesn't break the Top Ten headlines from last week.

Rabel said...

Was the black velvet the clue?

Original Mike said...

How hard is it to make ricin? Seems like a lot of trouble to go through to frame somebody.

Ross C. Goodman, Esq. said...

Maybe the media, or the public itself, convicted him even before finding out if he really did.

SteveR said...

Original Mike..just by that comment you are next to be framed. Watch out

sakredkow said...

It was just a case of poison love.

mccullough said...

Nick Kristoff was unavailable for comment.

Lem the artificially intelligent said...

They bagged the wrong crock pot.

Amartel said...

Nick Kristoff was unavailable for comment. Due to hiding from reality.
Richard Jewell was unavailable for comment. Due to being dead.

tiger said...

Which leads to my original observation:

HOW did they find him in less than two days?

Did he put his address on the envelop?

Do they tape EVERYONE EVERY DAY at EVERY post office in the ENTIRE US
just in case something like this happens?

I'm still waiting for an answer.

Lem the artificially intelligent said...

How hard is it to make ricin?

In a crock pot? not hard at all.

Larry J said...

Original Mike said...
How hard is it to make ricin?


According to some military intel specialists that I work with, it's actually pretty difficult to make ricin from caster seeds, at least in a concentration strong enough to be deadly. They doubted it was real ricin at all or just very weak stuff.

If the guy was framed, I hope they find who did it and throw the book at him, then sue his sorry ass into poverty.

sakredkow said...

Do they tape EVERYONE EVERY DAY at EVERY post office

Why not? Doesn't your grocery store? Your pharmacy. Probably your car wash.

Original Mike said...

"In a crock pot? not hard at all."

Well, Minute Ricin, sure.

sakredkow said...

Crack pots with crock pots.

sakredkow said...

Do they tape EVERYONE EVERY DAY at EVERY post office

Why worry? They won't be around much longer.

Scott M said...

So the foreign Muslims weren't framed, but this first-worlder white guy was?

That's not going to go over well at Friday's prayers this week.

sakredkow said...

Good one ScottM

SteveBrooklineMA said...

"Grant said lab analysis shows the poison in the letters was in a crude form that could have been created by grinding castor beans in a food processor or coffee grinder."

http://www.breitbart.com/system/wire/DA5RC8380

John henry said...

My understanding is that the testing they do doesn't even test for ricin per se. They test for residue from castor beans or plants which can grow wild in some parts of the country.

If there was some castor pollen that got on the letter somewhere, that might trigger the test.

Remember it was apparently very, very, weak. They tested 3 times. One test was positive, the other negative and one inconclusive.

Seems like a pretty weak thread to arrest someone on. Though I suppose that since it is the president and given what else was happening, it is not too unreasonable.

John Henry

Drago said...

I'm waiting for the Obama admin to send susan rice out to announce that the only reason the Boston bombings occurred was because of the Elvis impersonator sending ricin to DC.

B said...

In a crock pot? not hard at all.

Nope. Its not at all easy to process ricin, which is why I had my doubts all along about the story. Given its incredible toxicity, if it were easy to process you'd hear a lot more about it.

Pressing the castor bean and heating the pulp just gets you castor oil which has a thousand and one uses, notably as a laxative. The concentration of the ricin protein is negligible in the seed pulp and what is there is denatured and rendered permanently harmless when the pulp is heated to extract the oil.

You need to go through some non-thermal extraction and concentration steps to get enough ricin to poison/kill a person from pressing castor beans and it takes a fair amount of beans to do so. A chemist or very knowledgeable person could do so in a kitchen I suppose but its not at all easy nor safe.

Browndog said...

If ricin were easy to make, any number of politicians and quarreling neighbors would be dead by now.

Last I heard of a ricin poisoning, was the Tokyo subway terror attack.

JAL said...

"Grant said lab analysis shows the poison in the letters was in a crude form that could have been created by grinding castor beans in a food processor or coffee grinder."

Whooa baby. No cuppa at that house!

As for Tokyo -- I think that was Sarin gas. Ricin is the stuff used in London with a jab as the guy went by from someone's umbrella ... or maybe it was just a needle.

Anonymous said...

Whoa. A weird story getting weirder.

Yeah, it was sarin gas in the Tokyo subway attack.

Ricin ... sounds like someone needs help from our favorite chemistry teacher turned meth cook in Breaking Bad.

FedkaTheConvict said...

What I heard earlier today is the the man that was arrested is a Mensa member and well known online troll. He apparently has a rival who is also a Mensa member, Elvis impersonator, and a fellow troll. Apparently an online argument got out of hand and his rival is alleged to have framed him using excerpts from his Facebook rants.

Methadras said...

FedkaTheConvict said...

What I heard earlier today is the the man that was arrested is a Mensa member and well known online troll. He apparently has a rival who is also a Mensa member, Elvis impersonator, and a fellow troll. Apparently an online argument got out of hand and his rival is alleged to have framed him using excerpts from his Facebook rants.


If that is the case, then whoever set him up should be seeing a shit ton of prison time, a civil action whereby lots of money should be awarded to this victim, and lastly his MENSA membership should be revoked for being a grade A dumbfuck.

bagoh20 said...

Maybe prosecutors and public defenders should trade jobs once in a while to avoid tunnel vision.

FullMoon said...

Walter White diverting attention of DEA away from New Mexico?

Does he have the gravitas to pull it off?

.....just sayin'

Gene said...

I am surprised they let him go just because they found out he was innocent. Prosecutors generally go after the first poor dumb schmuck they find schlepping down the street and they never apologize and they never drop the charges even when DNA proves it was someone else or the suspect can show hotel receipts and security camera photos to prove he was in another country at the time.

Anonymous said...

So, no jailhouse rock then?

Someone's gonna party like it's 1999

William said...

This action is so atypical of Elvis impersonators that I immediately suspected a frame up. Have they checked the fragments of the pressure cooker for ricin residue? This is the kind of crime and frame up that screams Islamic radicals. If we lose trust in our Elvis impersonators, then the terrorists have won, and that is the victory that they are aiming for.

William said...

This action is so atypical of Elvis impersonators that I immediately suspected a frame up. Have they checked the fragments of the pressure cooker for ricin residue? This is the kind of crime and frame up that screams Islamic radicals. If we lose trust in our Elvis impersonators, then the terrorists have won, and that is the victory that they are aiming for.

Lem the artificially intelligent said...

Sarin and Ricin... crock pots and Chechens.

I'm going to go with the crock pots and Chechens Alex.

rcommal said...

I, myself, take framing seriously. Apart for and from other reasons, have I not been here at Althouse from close to the start, after all?

rcommal said...

Living freely through writing: heh.

Behaving badly when bored: heh.

Still: yeah.

rcommal said...

Constant, endless, daily repeaters and petitioners in/to stultifying levels: meh.



rcommal said...

Laugh out loud, you bet I do.

DADvocate said...

If a letter ever had the catch phrase "Garage is an idiot" it'll narrow it down to a few hundred Althouse commenters. The FBI seems to arrest first and ask questions later.