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| | | “First, as to his history.” | |
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< | In 2003, Tom Butler, 61, was a distinguished professor of medicine at Texas Tech University, in Lubbock, Texas, where he lived with his wife and their four children. Dr. Butler had served as a military physician for three years in Vietnam, specializing in infectious disease, specifically the bubonic plague. Dr. Butler worked among the poor in Tanzania, Bangladesh, and Calcutta and is noted for his role in developing oral rehydration therapy as the standard treatment for diarrhea. His innovations have saved millions of lives worldwide. A shy, introverted man, he had led a rather Spartan existence since moving to Lubbock in 1987, sending his children to public schools and riding a bike or driving a beat-up Chevy Nova to work at the university. | >
> | In 2003, Tom Butler, 61, was a distinguished professor of medicine at Texas Tech University, in Lubbock, Texas, where he lived with his wife and their four children. He had served as a military physician for three years in Vietnam, specializing in infectious disease, specifically the bubonic plague. Dr. Butler worked among the poor in Tanzania, Bangladesh, and Calcutta and is noted for his role in developing oral rehydration therapy as the standard treatment for diarrhea, an innovation which saved millions of lives worldwide. | | | | |
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< | The Event
On the morning of January 14, 2003, Dr. Butler notified Texas Tech campus safety officers that 30 vials of Yersinia pestis (which causes bubonic plague) were missing from his lab at the university. To this day no one is sure what happened to the vials. They may have been stolen or destroyed, either accidentally or intentionally, by Dr. Butler himself or by someone else. Because of the dangerous nature of the materials, and because of nationwide fears of bioterrorism, university officials notified the FBI. Within hours, 60 FBI agents had landed in Lubbock. The missing plague made headlines and had created an uproar, and the agents were determined to figure out what had happened. | >
> | On the morning of January 14, 2003, Dr. Butler notified Texas Tech campus safety officers that 30 vials of Yersinia pestis (which causes bubonic plague) were missing from his lab. To this day no one is sure what happened to the vials. They may have been stolen or destroyed, either accidentally or intentionally, by Dr. Butler himself or by someone else. Because of nationwide fears of bioterrorism, university officials notified the FBI. Within hours, 60 FBI agents had landed in Lubbock. The missing plague had made headlines and created an uproar, and the agents were determined to figure out what had happened. | | | Modern Magic: Pneumograph, Galvanometer, Cuff | |
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< | At 1:45 a.m. on Wednesday, January 15, an FBI agent hooked Dr. Butler up to a lie detector and began interrogating him. Never imagining that he himself was a suspect, and eager to help locate the missing samples, Dr. Butler cooperated with investigators and waived his right to counsel. The machine had its own ideas: when Dr. Butler said he was not “involved in the removal of the 30 vials of bubonic plague from the lab,” the Lafayette Thermal Polygraph determined he was probably lying. At this point, Butler, who had been awake for 18 hours, became the government’s leading suspect. The FBI searched his car and, at 3:30 a.m. accompanied him to his house, which they also searched. Butler slept for approximately two hours before the ordeal continued. | >
> | At 1:45 a.m. on Wednesday, January 15, an FBI agent hooked Dr. Butler up to a lie detector and began interrogating him. Never imagining that he himself was a suspect, and eager to help locate the missing samples, Dr. Butler cooperated with investigators and waived his right to counsel. When Dr. Butler said he was not “involved in the removal of the 30 vials of bubonic plague from the lab,” the Lafayette Thermal Polygraph determined he was probably lying. At this point, Butler, who had been awake for 18 hours, became the government’s leading suspect. The FBI searched Butler's house at 3:30 a.m., then left him to sleep for approximately two hours before the ordeal continued. | | | | |
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< | At noon, Agent Green, the polygraph operator of the night before, told the doctor that all possible alternatives had been ruled out: Butler himself must have accidentally destroyed the vials. Butler recalls that he was promised immunity and told that everyone could walk away (and that serious public fears would be allayed) if he would simply sign a sworn statement that he had been mistaken, and that he had accidentally destroyed the vials himself. Exhausted, confused, Butler did just that, and was promptly arrested for lying to the FBI. | >
> | At noon, Agent Green, the polygraph operator of the night before, told the doctor that all possible alternatives had been ruled out: Butler himself must have accidentally destroyed the vials. Butler recalls that he was promised immunity and told that everyone could walk away (and that serious public fears would be allayed) if he would simply sign a sworn statement that he had been mistaken, and that he had accidentally destroyed the vials himself. Exhausted and confused, Butler signed, and was promptly arrested for lying to the FBI. | | | Freedom of the Individual and the State
In addition to the charge for lying to the FBI, as if he had reported the vials stolen as part of an elaborate hoax, Dr. Butler was charged with 68 additional offenses, ranging from fraud, embezzlement, and tax evasion to illegal transportation of plague bacteria. The charges carried a maximum sentence of 469 years in prison and $17 million in fines, but prosecutors offered him six months if he would plead guilty. Believing he had done nothing wrong, Dr. Butler refused. The National Academy of Sciences, the Institute of Medicine, and four Nobel Laureates wrote in his support, asserting that all of the practices of which Butler had been accused (the government focused on Butler’s international transportation of specimens and his compensation for outside research) are standard in the medical research community. In spite of a competent defense and widespread support, some of the charges stuck, and Butler was sentenced to two years in federal prison. | |
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< | Dr. Butler’s case is not unique; a prosecutor always exercises some degree of judgment in determining whom to pursue and how, a decision which is invariably informed by politics. As former federal prosecutor Andrew McCarthy noted in an interview about the case with CBS News, “This is a time when it’s important to get the message out to the world that we’re serious about dealing with components of weapons of mass destruction.” His statement elides the irony that in its effort to demonstrate its competence to combat a bioterrorist threat, the government’s show trial merely succeeded in halting the work of a scientist leading the search for better ways to fight weaponized disease. | >
> | Dr. Butler’s case, while rare in the world of Nobel Laureates, is by no means unique in our justice system; a prosecutor always exercises discretion in determining whom to pursue and how, a decision which is invariably informed by politics. In this case, the goal was sending a hard-line message about weapons of mass destruction; in the more mundane case it's a similar message about the war on drugs or about a D.A. being tough on crime. Nor are the strong-arm tactics used on Butler unique. Perhaps the only really outstanding things about his case were the facts that he had (and could afford) a zealous defender, and that he belongs to an elite professional community which rallied in his support, and even those advantages couldn't save Butler from experiencing the enormity of the state's coercive force. It's hard to imagine how the more typical defendant in such a case, represented by an overworked public defender, would fare any better. | | | Coda
The local defender who represented Dr. Butler at trial died this month. He is remembered here in terms which would make most lawyers proud. | |
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Yes, it's a bad story of
something that happened to a doctor of skill and character that
happens to tens of thousands of people every year in the US. Your
emphasis on this story and its circumstances gives the impression
that this sort of thing happens because of the 200 FBI agents and the
bioterrorism panic. All sorts of crimes are solved like this all the
time. What happens to university professors and white doctors also
happens to working class people who aren't pink-complexioned. More
often, because in general they're much more vulnerable. Here the
fight was exceptionally well-conducted by a determined if overmatched
lawyer. Usually the fight is thrown.
So the part that I miss
most about this essay is the absence of a conclusion. Are you
telling the story of something that happened to a privileged fellow
crushed by an episode of exceptional stupidity? Or are you
mentioning an unusually gilt-edged edition of the same old same old?
What your story stands for is the essay's point, and you're not
saying. | | | \ No newline at end of file |
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