The source said the person arrested was a woman of Canadian citizenship. (Representative)
Washington:
Authorities have arrested a person suspected of sending the deadly ricin poison in an envelope addressed to the White House but intercepted before it could be delivered there, a police source said on Sunday.
In response to a Reuters question asking for confirmation of media reports that a woman accused of sending the ricin-contaminated letter was taken into custody at the Canada-U.S. Border, the FBI’s Washington field office issued a statement saying: “An arrest has been made of an individual allegedly responsible for sending a suspicious letter.”
The statement added: “The investigation is ongoing.”
The law enforcement source, familiar with the case but speaking on condition of anonymity, told Reuters that the “suspicious letter” mentioned in the FBI statement was the same as the envelope found containing ricin.
The source also said the person arrested was a woman of Canadian citizenship.
The Royal Canadian Mounted Police said on Saturday that it had received a request for FBI assistance with the investigation and that the suspicious letter in question appeared to have been sent from Canada.
The RCMP added that an FBI analysis of a substance inside the envelope detected “the presence of ricin”, a highly toxic agent derived from castor beans.
Although natural, the toxin requires a deliberate act to convert it into a biological weapon, with exposure to an amount as small as a pinhead capable of causing death within 36 to 72 hours. No known antidote exists.
Initially questioned about the incident on Saturday, the FBI said it joined the U.S. Secret Service and the U.S. Postal Inspection Service in investigating “a suspicious letter received at a U.S. government mail facility “.
The envelope was intercepted at a U.S. government postal center before it could be delivered to the White House.
The Secret Service and the Royal Canadian Mounted Police both declined to comment on Sunday.
There have been numerous incidents involving envelopes sent with ricin to U.S. officials in recent years.
In 2018, a Utah man was indicted for making ricin-related threats against President Donald Trump, FBI Director Christopher Wray and other federal officials, with all letters “containing castor seeds. “.
Two people have been convicted and sentenced to prison in separate incidents for sending ricin-soiled letters to Barack Obama while he was president.
(Except for the title, this story was not edited by GalacticGaming staff and is posted from a syndicated feed.)
