By Susan Brinkmann, OCDS
Staff Journalist
The death of a 30 year-old lab technician at Northeastern University this past weekend has terrorism experts concerned about easy access to deadly chemicals at most American universities.
The Boston Globe is reporting that Emily Staupe, a former lab tech at Northeastern University, was found dead in her home Sunday morning along with a plastic bag filled with crystallized cyanide. Staupe’s famliy told police she had recently lost her job at Northeastern. Police are trying to determine if Staupe smuggled the poison out of the University lab while she still worked there.
Jim Walsh, director of security studies at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology, told the Globe the university will have to review how it deals with disgruntled former workers.
“This will cause Northeastern to review its policies for dismissing employees,” Walsh said. “I’d be surprised if there’s not an investigation.”
A Northeastern spokeswoman, Renata Nyul, declined to comment on the matter other than to express the university’s sympathies.
“The Northeastern community mourns the tragic and untimely loss of Emily Staupe,” the school said in a statement. “Our thoughts and prayers are with Emily’s family and friends during this difficult time. As there is an ongoing investigation of Emily’s death, it is inappropriate to comment further at this time.”
However, experts say the woman’s tragic death shines a light on a weak spot in America’s security – that of universities where access to deadly biological chemicals is much too easy.
“This should be a wake-up call,” said Neil Livingstone, terrorism expert and president of ExecutiveAction. “What if her name were Mohammed Atta [a leader of the 9/11 plot] instead? If she’d been a bad guy and gotten hold of a significant amount of cyanide . . . who knows? Cyanide is a good weapon of assassination or for killing a small number of people.”
Livingstone said colleges and universities are targets of al-Qaeda and other terrorist groups who are looking for chemical weapons to use against American targets. This is because universities typically don’t screen their students and are often careless about who has access to dangerous chemicals, he said.
“There isn’t adequate screening of who has access to chemicals or biological weapons,” Livingstone said. “They’re reluctant because of ‘academic freedom’.”
But Walsh told the Globe most incidents of dangerous chemicals stolen from university labs are used by the thief against themselves.
“It’s the jilted lover, the disgruntled employee, it’s the suicide not the suicide attack,” he said.
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