of anthrax suspect commits suicide

Anthrax Suspect Commits Suicide: Bruce E. Ivins, 62, commited suicide by taking massive dose of a prescription Tylenol mixed with codeine. Ivins was about to be charged by the Justice Department for the anthrax mailings that traumatized the nation in the weeks following the Sept. 11, 2001, terrorist attacks.

A top U.S. biodefense researcher apparently committed suicide just as the Justice Department was about to file criminal charges against him in the anthrax mailings that traumatized the nation in the weeks following the Sept. 11, 2001, terrorist attacks, according to a published report that was confirmed by CBS News.

The scientist, Bruce E. Ivins, 62, who worked for the past 18 years at the government's biodefense labs at Fort Detrick, Md., had been told about the impending prosecution, the Los Angeles Times reported for Friday editions. The laboratory has been at the center of the FBI's investigation of the anthrax attacks, which killed five people including 94-year-old Ottilie Lundgren of Oxford, Conn.

Ivins died Tuesday at Frederick Memorial Hospital in Maryland. The Times, quoting an unidentified colleague, said the scientist had taken a massive dose of a prescription Tylenol mixed with codeine.

Tom Ivins, a brother of the scientist, told The Associated Press that another of his brothers, Charles, told him Bruce had committed suicide.