On June 30, 2008, a settlement agreement was reached between Dr. Steven Hatfill and agencies of the U.S. Government. Dr. Hatfill had sued the FBI and the Department of Justice for violations of the Privacy Act, claiming that they had given members of the media confidential information about him from confidential government files. The Department of Justice admitted no wrong doing but agreed to pay Dr. Hatfill $5.8 million to settle all claims against the government. Dr. Hatfill agreed. The True Believers who were and who remain firmly convinced that Dr. Hatfill is the anthrax mailer are pointing out that the settlement does not prove Dr. Steven Hatfill's innocence. The fact that America's system of laws is based upon the principle that a person is innocent until proven guilty means nothing to a True Believer. Other True Believers who feel just as strongly about their beliefs that Dr. Hatfill did NOT send the anthrax letters see the Hatfill settlement as proof that their own personal beliefs about who sent the letters are correct. For example, those who believe that Saddam Hussein or al Qaeda sent the anthrax letters endlessly argue that they knew all along that Dr. Hatfill was innocent, because they know beyond any doubt that Saddam Hussein or al Qaeda sent the anthrax letters. Facts mean absolutely nothing to those who truly believe. They can rationalize anything. They have their own facts -- very selectively acquired with absolutely no objectivity. They start with a firm belief and then accumulate facts which they can twist and distort to prove that their beliefs are true. And if you dispute them or try to show how the facts dispute them, they will tell you that you are closed minded. In the end, it will all boil down to a single question: Can you conclusively prove to them -- beyond any doubt -- that they are wrong? If you cannot, then, to them, that is proof that they are right. If you tell them that proving the negative is impossible and that you also cannot prove that aliens from outer space didn't send the anthrax letters, they will just shake their heads and tell you that you are hopelessly closed-minded and unable to see the truth. I've also been contacted by many people who seem absolutely convinced that someone else -- not Dr. Hatfill, not al Qaeda, not Saddam Hussein -- sent the anthrax letters. One person even has a web blog where her "person of interest" is described. I've had dozens of such people contact me over the years, identifying dozens of such "suspects" Not all are True Believers, and, while proof might possibly convince a few of them that they are wrong, without the arrest of the actual anthrax mailer, such proof is hard to come by. And I cannot argue the merits of their beliefs without going into detail on the merits of my analysis as to who I think most likely sent the anthrax letters. With one exception, none of us want to do as those conspiracy theorists did with Dr. Hatfill and publicly identify another "person of interest" who may be totally innocent. But there is one exception -- besides Dr. Hatfill -- who many True Believers are totally willing to name every chance they get. Dr. Philip M. Zack (& Dr. Marian K. Rippy) On December 19, 2001, The Hartford Courant printed an article titled "Turmoil In A Perilous Place" which described how an Egyptian-born, naturalized-American citizen and former USAMRIID employee named Dr. Ayaad Assaad had been questioned by the FBI as a result of a letter which had been sent to the authorities describing Dr. Assaad as a "'potential terrorist' with a grudge against the United States and the knowledge to wage biological warfare against his adopted country." The FBI told Dr. Assaad that they had no reason to believe what was in the letter, and, after the brief interview, they let him go. But when interviewed by the reporters from the Courant, it turned out that Dr. Assaad had his own theory about who had sent that letter about him. Since the letter was mailed before it was known that someone had sent anthrax through the mails, "My theory is, whoever this person is knew in advance what was going to happen [and created] a suitable, well-fitted scapegoat for this action," Assaad said. "You do not need to be a Nobel laureate to put two and two together." He connected it all to events which occurred before Easter of 1991, just after the Gulf War ended, when some USAMRIID scientists sent an incredibly childish letter to Dr. Assaad. The letter contained a lewd poem that was 8-pages long. The Courant describes it this way, The poem reads: "In [Assaad's] honor we created this beast; it represents life lower than yeast." The camel, it notes, each week will be given "to who did the least." The poem also doubles as an ode to each of the participants who adorned the camel, who number at least six and referred to themselves as "the camel club." Two -- Dr. Philip M. Zack and Dr. Marian K. Rippy -- voluntarily left Fort Detrick soon after Assaad brought the poem to the attention of supervisors. Although there were "at least six" people involved, the only names mentioned are Dr. Zack and Dr. Rippy. So, in some people's minds that means that Dr. Zack or Dr. Rippy must or may have been behind the letter about Dr. Assaad, which, in turn, they believe was very likely sent by the anthrax mailer (although the FBI didn't think so). The timing of the letter is the only real reason for such a belief. The day following that first Courant article, the same authors produced another. On December 20, 2001, the Courant published an article titled "Anthrax Easy To Get Out Of Lab." The article says, All of the scientists interviewed by The Courant over the past week said it would be virtually impossible for an outsider to get into a ``hot zone'' lab and steal a biological agent such as anthrax. But they agreed that someone already inside the institute could have taken vials of anthrax without much trouble. Then, a month later, the same authors wrote an article titled "Anthrax Missing From Army Lab." Published on January 20, 2002, the article begins with this: Lab specimens of anthrax spores, Ebola virus and other pathogens disappeared from the Army's biological warfare research facility in the early 1990s, during a turbulent period of labor complaints and recriminations among rival scientists there, documents from an internal Army inquiry show. The article then describes something which, to some, appears very sinister: The 1992 inquiry also found evidence that someone was secretly entering a lab late at night to conduct unauthorized research, apparently involving anthrax. A numerical counter on a piece of lab equipment had been rolled back to hide work done by the mystery researcher, who left the misspelled label "antrax" in the machine's electronic memory, according to the documents obtained by The Courant. But far less sinster to others: "In January of 2002, it's hard to say how many of those were missing in February of 1991," said Vander-Linden, adding that it's likely some were simply thrown out with the trash. And who was the "someone" who entered the lab late at night? The article says: Documents from the inquiry show that one unauthorized person who was observed entering the lab building at night was Langford's predecessor, Lt. Col. Philip Zack, who at the time no longer worked at Fort Detrick. A surveillance camera recorded Zack being let in at 8:40 p.m. on Jan. 23, 1992, apparently by Dr. Marian Rippy, a lab pathologist and close friend of Zack's, according to a report filed by a security guard. Okay. Even though this happened nearly 10 years before the anthrax attacks, it's enough for some people to see a potential suspect in the anthrax attacks. And it doesn't make any difference that the anthrax spores used in the attacks were created no more than two years before the attacks. According to The New York Times on June 23, 2002: Scientists have determined that the anthrax powder sent through the mail last fall was fresh, made no more than two years before it was sent, senior government officials said. Dr. Zack's name also shows up very clearly in a lengthy article on Salon.com dated January 26, 2002, which begins with this question: Who tried to frame Dr. Ayaad Assaad, a former biowarfare researcher at the Army lab? Was it the same person responsible for last fall's anthrax mail terrorism? Accusations are often disguised as questions. However, the article also shows that Dr. Zack was almost certainly a long way away from the mailbox in Princeton, NJ, at the time of the anthrax mailings. The 4th section of the Salon.com article says, Zack left USAMRIID in December 1991, first heading to the Army's Walter Reed Institute, then going to the private pharmaceutical company Eli Lilly, and then to a company in Colorado acquired by St. Louis' Nexstar Financial Management. So, at the time of the anthrax attacks, Dr. Zack was evidently living in Colorado. While there's nothing in the media about where Dr. Rippy was, some research indicates that she was most likely in Minnesota. But, it was Dr. Zack who became the focus of theories by most people who saw a connection between those incidents from 1991 and the anthrax attacks of 2001. Zack may have been in Colorado, and the anthrax may have been made recently, but there was still one reason for some True Believers to suspect Dr. Zack. Neo-Nazis versus Dr. Philip M. Zack There are a large number of True Believers who have no problem stating that they believe Dr. Philip Zack is or could be the anthrax mailer. And their beliefs are about as illogical as the beliefs that Dr. Hatfill or al Qaeda sent the anthrax letters. These people, who appear to be mostly neo-Nazis, have singled out Dr. Philip Zack as their suspect, and they are very vocal about it. They first started contacting me with their beliefs back in 2002. Since a little research showed there was no solid reason to suspect Dr. Zack, my thinking back then was that it was best to just ignore the people pointing the finger at him, since there's no way to change the mind of a True Believer -- particularly a neo-Nazi True Believer -- and putting Dr. Zack's name on my web site would just give the neo-Nazi beliefs more visibility, which is what they want. (As with other True Believers, a few have even felt the need to threaten me because I argued against their beliefs.) Why do neo-Nazis believe so strongly that Dr. Zack is the anthrax mailer. Simple. One neo-Nazi web site that points at Dr. Zack can be found HERE. It says, " Prime Suspect is a Zionist " and, Jewish microbiologist Dr. Philip M. Zack may be behind the deadly anthrax contaminated letters that were mailed to NBC's Tom Brokaw, Senator Tom Daschle and others, according to FBI sources. Another can be found HERE. It says, The fact that the Anthrax Letters were NOT sent by an Arab Muslim but by a Jewish gentleman with the intent to FRAME an Arab Muslim strongly suggests that the entire sequence of recent events has been one gigantic frame-up, Another can be found HERE. It says, If the FBI were truly interested in finding and apprehending the Anthrax Killer, theyd be investigating Philip Zack, a Jewish American that once worked at Fort Detrick Maryland Another can be found HERE. It says, Dr. Zack left Fort Detrick in December 1991 amid allegations of unprofessional conduct. The Jewish scientist and others were accused of harassing their co-worker. Another can be found HERE. It says there is "Overwhelming Evidence Implicating Philip Zack." From my point of view, the "evidence" is far from "overwhelming" and the author's key item of "evidence" is made clear in this sentence: ' Doctor Zack', a Zionist, who was a key suspect and worked at USAMRIID, a military lab at Fort Detrick, Maryland. And how do all these web sites know that Dr. Zack is a "Zionist": The answer can be found HERE. It says, Well, some research into the name "Zack" reveals that it is a fairly common jewish surname, derived from the Old Testament "Zacharias". Dr. Zack is jewish, and given his obvious, fanatical hatred of Arabs - we can safely deduce that he is a hard core Zionist. The same reasoning using the same words can be found HERE, HERE, HERE, and HERE. They call all "safely deduce" that Dr. Zack is a "hard core Zionist." However, there's one BIG problem with their safely deduced reasoning: Dr. Philip Zack is a Catholic On the morning of April 11, 2008, someone who truly believes that al Qaeda sent the anthrax letters sent me a clipping from the July 28, 1974, issue of The Zanesville, Ohio, Times Recorder. Here is the section of that clipping which refers to Dr. Zack:

