File Photo The government's case against Bruce Ivins remains open after officials last August declared the Fort Detrick scientist and leading anthrax researcher at the post's U.S. Army Medical Research Institute of Infectious Diseases the sole suspect in the 2001 anthrax attacks.

Eight years ago her husband, Thomas Morris Jr., died after breathing anthrax spores from contaminated mail at the Brentwood Postal Facility in Washington.

A year ago she attended a meeting at FBI headquarters, where Director Robert Mueller told Morris that her husband's killer had been identified.

"I've been thinking a lot about that word closure," she said. "I don't think that's the right definition for me."

The government's case against Bruce Ivins remains open after officials last August declared the Fort Detrick scientist and leading anthrax researcher at the post's U.S. Army Medical Research Institute of Infectious Diseases the sole suspect in the 2001 anthrax attacks that killed five people and injured 17.

Ivins, 62, died from an apparent acetaminophen overdose July 29, 2008. Shortly after his death, the FBI presented a case against Ivins based largely on circumstantial evidence.

"In my mind it's over and done with," Morris said. "I know one thing for sure: My husband is not coming back, Mr. Ivins is not coming back, and we have to settle for the outcome."

But vital questions still persist as doubters wait to learn how the FBI concluded that Ivins, who by many accounts was a hardworking researcher and an affable man who was active with his family, church and community, was responsible for the attacks that paralyzed the country shortly after the Sept. 11 terrorist attacks.

Answers to those questions and a better view of how the FBI proceeded with its investigation could be forthcoming.

"We expect (the case) to be closed very shortly," said Dean Boyd, a Department of Justice spokesman. "I'm not prepared at this time to give you an exact date."

For Ivins' family and former colleagues who have maintained his innocence, a closed case will mean the FBI is putting faith in circumstantial evidence and a scientific fact-finding process that brought investigators to a flask of anthrax spores under Ivins' control, but accessible to more than 100 people.

"We don't convict beakers in this country," said Rockville attorney Paul Kemp, who represents the Ivins family. "We prosecute, convict or acquit human beings."

He said no lawsuits have been filed by the family, but legal action is conceivable.

"They're still angry, and they are upset, and they want to maintain their privacy," he said.

A year of questions

In the past year, the FBI has released little additional information about Ivins' alleged role in the anthrax mailings.

In early August, Department of Justice officials unveiled search warrants and other documents establishing Ivins as their primary suspect.

Ivins, who was described by one colleague as having a fragile personality, may have been extremely distressed by an FBI inquiry. He swallowed enough Tylenol to poison himself before any charges were filed.

The last year of his life had been punctuated by mental instability as reported by police and a counselor, and alienation from his workplace of 21 years.

He had lost his lab access. In November 2007, as a result of an FBI search, Ivins was denied entry to the highest-level containment labs where the most dangerous pathogens are handled. In March 2008, he lost access to all labs after not immediately reporting a spill of anthrax spores. Sixteen days before he overdosed, Ivins was escorted from Fort Detrick by Frederick police and taken to the hospital for a psychological evaluation. He was barred from the post after that.

Ivins' mental health counselor, Jean Duley, filed a peace order against the scientist. Duley said she was fearful Ivins would hurt her and others.

"I think it would change anybody's behavior if there was a federal agent car sitting outside your house 24 hours a day, seven days a week," said Gerard Andrews, a former colleague of Ivins.

Also in the past year bureau scientists also in the past year had discussed the scientific process they used to genetically match the anthrax found in the letters sent to news agencies and Senate offices to the flask of RMR-1029, a batch of anthrax under Ivins' control.

The same scientific methods will become the subject of an FBI-requested study by the National Academy of Sciences set to begin later this summer.

The $880,000, 18-month review will be funded by the FBI. The project will look at genetic studies used to identify the source of the anthrax found in the letters, how and where the anthrax spores were grown, how the spores and bacterial DNA were collected and what role cross-contamination may have played.

The academy, in its own statement, said it will not consider the value of the scientific evidence as it relates to any specific component of the investigation, prosecution or litigation. The study will not be used to establish the guilt or innocence of any person, the academy said.

Former colleagues of Ivins question the purpose of the academy's study.

"It very likely came from that flask, but who cares, hundreds of people had access, if not more. Dozens of labs were sent that sample," said Andrews, former director of the bacteriology division at USAMRIID from 2000 to 2003. He supervised Ivins for about five years.

Andrews, now an assistant professor at the University of Wyoming, called the academy study "essentially meaningless."

"They're basically going to say the science was robust enough," he said.

The science will not uncover physical evidence directly linking Ivins to the production of the powderized anthrax spores and won't explain how the FBI ruled out other people and labs who had access to the RMR-1029 spores, Andrews said.

The FBI built its case on 16 points, including Ivins' mental health issues and long hours he worked in the lab before the mailings.

But no direct physical evidence was recovered that would have connected Ivins to the Princeton, N.J., mailbox where the letters were dropped, no anthrax was found in his cars or home, and no eyewitnesses saw him produce, package or mail the envelopes.

The FBI leaned most heavily on a scientific method never before used in a criminal investigation. More than 1,000 samples of Ames anthrax, a strain identified in the letters, were obtained from 16 government, commercial and university labs. Eight of the samples were genetically matched to the RMR-1029 spore batch.

Jeff Adamovicz, head of the bacteriology division after Andrews left in 2004, said the fact that samples obtained by the FBI were voluntarily submitted weakens the case significantly.

He is also certain other labs possessed RMR-1029.

Dangerous pathogens, known as select agents, are regularly sent between both public and private labs that are registered with the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention. Shipments from USAMRIID are recorded on an internal form and with the CDC, Adamovicz said.

"The FBI knows full well the distribution of that strain," said Adamovicz, who left USAMRIID in 2007.

He said he has no evidence to suggest any specific person or entity is responsible for the attacks, but wanted the FBI to fully explain how they ruled out two sites where RMR-1029 was likely to have been produced and shipped: U.S. Army's Dugway Proving Ground in Utah and Battelle Memorial Institute in Ohio.

"They've been focused on USAMRIID since day one," he said.

The Army this month released a document showing Ivins' record of RMR-1029, where he kept a log of when and the amount of spores, in liquid form, he took from the flask.

The record shows the 1000 ml of spores was created in October 1997 with anthrax from Dugway Proving Ground and the USAMRIID bacteriology division. The report show Ivins accessed the strain between September 1998 and November 2003.

Large portions of the document, which include entries next to the amount used, are redacted.

Adamovicz, who is still unable to believe his friend and colleague was guilty, is continuing to study the government evidence.

He said he was bothered by the way the Department of Defense "rolled over so easily" by neglecting to defend its own facility when Ivins was identified as the FBI's sole suspect.

Current employees of USAMRIID are barred from speaking publicly about the case, a spokeswoman said.

Critics have found no shortage of ways to rebut the FBI evidence and possibility that Ivins produced the deadly, weaponized anthrax spores.

Russell Byrne, one of Ivins' former colleagues, is a former director of the bacteriology division. He likened the scenario to someone using their own gun to kill somebody and leaving it on their desk.

He said there was no genetic evidence found in any of the USAMRIID lyophilizers, a machine that would have been required to dry the spores into a powder.

The fact that three division chiefs dispute the FBI evidence should be enough to question the validity of the case, said Byrne, who left the institute in 2003.

"You guys knew a lot about Bruce," Byrne said. "But you didn't know him."

Finding answers

Victims of the attacks hope the case is settled, but some remain skeptical.

"The evidence in my own mind wasn't enough to support a conviction," said Leroy Richmond, a worker at the Brentwood postal center who was hospitalized after coming in contact with anthrax-contaminated mail.

"I really have some doubts."

Richmond said he still suffers from memory loss and fatigue as a result of the infection. He has since retired from the Postal Service.

After the 45-minute FBI presentation he and other victims and families sat for last summer, he said he was concerned at the amount of evidence that was circumstantial.

"I think it will be questionable even after they say we've done all the investigation we need," Richmond said.

Mary Morris, the wife of Richmond's former co-worker Thomas Morris Jr., said she was satisfied with the case.

She said she does not want to find herself asking questions with no answers.

"Otherwise it will drown you, it will swallow you up," she said.

But at least one congressman wants answers to questions that, at the moment, have no answers.

Rep. Rush Holt, D-N.J., submitted the Anthrax Attacks Investigation Act in March. The bill aims to establish a national commission, similar to the one formed for the Sept. 11 terrorist attacks.

The letters were mailed from Holt's district.

"I think the families of the victims deserve it, all of the people affected: letter carriers, the residents of central New Jersey, people in Washington deserve to have a case that is really closed," Holt said.

"Not just a lot of loose ends or some surmises or some assertions."

The bill remains stalled in the House Judiciary Committee.

"I wish it were moving faster than it is legislatively," he said. "I think the public deserves answers."