Envelope with white powder sent to Arizona gubernatorial candidate headquarters

[alhoon]

https://www.yahoo.com/news/suspiciou...194504594.html

The gist: Saturday, an envelope or two containing suspicious white powder were sent to Kari Lake's headquarters. They were discovered by a staffer, the office remains closed, the envelopes were sent to professionals for analysis and nobody has been hurt.


However, even if that is (as I suspect) a mean prank, it does causes disruption to the campaign of that candidate and causes significant expenses to the authorities. I would also guess the staffers that found it were quite stressed and concerned over their health.


My question is: Do you think this prank was just because that candidate is deeply unpopular with some elements of the electorate or it is an attempt to cause disruption and intimidation to her staffers - or serve as a warning that unless Kari Lake moderates her tone, things would turn ugly?
In any of those cases, what do you think the response of the state should be?

In my opinion, it is a prank with plans to cause mischief. It is still a blow under the belt though and the perpetrators should face the consequences of their actions even if they are (as I suspect) a couple of stupid 16 years old that put flour in an envelope or something.

[conon394]

In my opinion, it is a prank with plans to cause mischief. It is still a blow under the belt though and the perpetrators should face the consequences of their actions even if they are (as I suspect) a couple of stupid 16 years old that put flour in an envelope or something.

No matter serious or a stupid stunt If delivered means by the US mail the perpetrators certainly set themselves up for serious penalties - unless you really mean it and are up for long term consequences don't use the US mail service. The reference to the Anthrax mailings is unmistakable and of course probably vastly unlikely as real - but you just cost a lot of time and effort by a government agencies ... that is not good.

[Coughdrop addict]

An actual terrorist would want everyone to know they did it and why, otherwise what's the point. And while a certain part of me wants to claim false flag as revenge for all the times her party has done do, there is no evidence yet that Lake or her staff did it themselves to get sympathy.

Regardless, whoever did is about to find out that this is going to be treated as if they showed up brandishing a fake gun. "It's just a prank bro." wouldn't work then and it won't work this time.

[alhoon]

I agree there should be consequences and I think it's malicious prank / sabotage.
But there should be mitigating factors.
On one hand, there should be lenience when a couple of teens do some foolish prank.
On the other hand, how can you be SURE that this is flour or sugar when you see it? Would you risk it? Nope, you would not. For that 1% chance that it is something really deadly, you would need to be sure. So, even if you are 99% sure it's a prank, you SHOULD follow procedure and do the entire, time consuming, expensive investigation.

[Coughdrop addict]

On the other hand, how can you be SURE that this is flour or sugar when you see it?

Try baking with it?

[conon394]

An actual terrorist would want everyone to know they did it and why, otherwise what's the point

Nobody claimed credit for the Tylenol tampering back in the the day. And the guy they tapped for the Anthrex letters was mum (outside of the anonymous letters in mailings).

[Heathen Hammer]

Depends on what was actually in the envelope. Seems rather off they are taking it all the way to Quantico and FBI doing the investigating, given agency's reputation for partisanship and corruption.

[conon394]

Quantico and FBI doing the investigating, given agency's reputation for partisanship and corruption.

Err WTF? toward who.

In any case where would you send it. Who has the better labs - just drop it at the Walmart pharmacy?

[Heathen Hammer]

Are you now saying that Quantico is the only place in USA that has a chemistry lab?

[Coughdrop addict]

Depends on what was actually in the envelope. Seems rather off they are taking it all the way to Quantico and FBI doing the investigating, given agency's reputation for partisanship and corruption.

The FBI is not partisan or corrupt for pursuing charges against a guy who stole something that didn't belong to him and refused to return it after 18 months of trying lower-impact methods to elicit their return. The fact that the FBI are willing to pursue a criminal case against such a high-profile target, the same as they would you or I, actually tells us quite the opposite!

[conon394]

Are you now saying that Quantico is the only place in USA that has a chemistry lab?

Your are being obtuse. You need more than a chemistry lab. In the worse case potential situation you are possibly dealing with a anthrax or similar pathogen. You can't analyze what you don't have an assay for . The FBI obviously has the means to do wide ranging analysis and also is a crime lab thus going to follow proper procedures. And finally if the package was actually delivered by mail its a potential federal crime and thus the feds get to use their lab.

[Heathen Hammer]

The FBI is not partisan or corrupt for pursuing charges against a guy who stole something that didn't belong to him and refused to return it after 18 months of trying lower-impact methods to elicit their return. The fact that the FBI are willing to pursue a criminal case against such a high-profile target, the same as they would you or I, actually tells us quite the opposite!

"The fact that Praetorian guard stabbed the previous emperor in the back and installed a new one that's favorite by patricians tells us how Praetorian guard is actually the good guys!"

But seriously, giving possible suspects evidence is silly.

Your are being obtuse. You need more than a chemistry lab. In the worse case potential situation you are possibly dealing with a anthrax or similar pathogen. You can't analyze what you don't have an assay for . The FBI obviously has the means to do wide ranging analysis and also is a crime lab thus going to follow proper procedures. And finally if the package was actually delivered by mail its a potential federal crime and thus the feds get to use their lab.

Again, given how feds could be potentially the suspects here, giving them full access to evidence is sus.
Should have given samples to different labs, including some foreign ones.

[conon394]

Again, given how feds could be potentially the suspects here, giving them full access to evidence is sus.
Should have given samples to different labs, including some foreign ones.

Err yes sure based on your conspiracy ramble why not - what are you talking about?

"The fact that Praetorian guard stabbed the previous emperor in the back and installed a new one that's favorite by patricians tells us how Praetorian guard is actually the good guys!"

This relevance how. Do really you just have some good perl or python code that given a key word just makes stuff up?

[Heathen Hammer]

Err yes sure based on your conspiracy ramble why not - what are you talking about?



This relevance how. Do really just some good perl or python code that given a key just makes stuff up?

I'm not entirely sure what you are even saying here, like it is actually difficult to read, especially the whole "do really just some" part. Can you translate this into actual English?

[conon394]

I'm not entirely sure what you are even saying here, like it is actually difficult to read, especially the whole "do really just some" part. Can you translate this into actual English?

early in the morning gaped a couple words. Point was what conspiracy are you frothing about? How are the feds suspects?

[Coughdrop addict]

And it's now leaning towards being fake:

An envelope that had been reported by the campaign of the Republican candidate for Arizona governor as containing a white powder was thrown away before it could be analyzed, and no powder was found in two other letters the campaign turned over to authorities, officials said. An analysis by the state public health lab of the two subsequent letters sent to Kari Lake's campaign office showed “there was no powder present and no harmful substance in either of the envelopes, but the two letters contained additional derogatory and vulgar statements," Phoenix Police spokesperson Donna Rossi said in an overnight statement.


Lake's campaign security chief Scott Masino said in a statement provided Saturday that the first envelope containing a “white powdery substance along with a hateful letter” was tossed into the trash by a campaign volunteer who did not report it to security until the bin had been emptied.