Criminal Minds Episode 5: Home Grown Terrorists

HOME GROWN TERRORISTS

CLOUD OF DEATH It was noon time. Oblivious to all, a sinister masked man in black was releasing some powdery stuff from a test tube in broad daylight. The airborne stuff, blown by the wind, was wafting its way towards a park. The lethal stuff had a deleterious effect on the blood circulatory system ten (10) hours later. Ten p.m. A living nightmare. Those who had inhaled the air laden with the bacteria sought help from pharmacies or were sent to hospital emergency rooms. Early the next morning, the NCI team was briefed by an officer from the Centre for Korea Disease Control and Prevention on the 72 Seoul residents who had been hospitalised. The death toll was 17. An epidemic seemed imminent with no containment in sight. All victims had been in that specific park at noon the previous day. The centre had their first casualty at 10 p.m.   Yoo Min Young, NCI’s media liaison officer, added that they found anthrax, a highly infectious bacterium, in the victims’ blood. Kim Hyun Joon was surprised because anthrax had been used as a biological weapon to cause fatal infections in humans. ASSESSING THE EVIDENCE The officer further explained that the initial symptoms were similar to those of a cold. If the situation deteriorated, the patients could die. There had not been such previous cases in South Korea. But Japan had experienced a similar situation twice – on 27 June and 2 July in 1993. The Japanese cult group, Aum Shinrikyo headquarters cultivated the anthrax bacteria and sprayed aerosolized liquid anthrax in Tokyo. Lee Han was a vast storehouse of knowledge. He reminded them that after the 911 incident in the USA, panicky people suspected that the white powder in the letters which were delivered to them contained the deadly anthrax bacteria. He added that terrorists experimented with more virulent variants of the virus that could be inhaled through the respiratory system. Inhalation of the deadly anthrax bacteria could kill, if not treated immediately. The young genius knew his stuff and could reel off data and information at a moment’s notice.  It was impressed upon them that cutaneous anthrax was not as dangerous; the fatality rate caused by the sores was lower. The symptoms would develop quickly after exposure. The spores, which multiple rapidly, produce deadly toxins.  Once the toxins are trapped inside the lungs, there is no way of detoxing them. The overwrought and agitated Nana Wang asked nobody in particular, ‘Would every infected person die?’ She must have missed the point as the question had already been answered. Yoo Min Young advised them that for the sake of national security, there was a press ban on the sensitive issue for 24 hours.   The victims are reported to be suffering from acute lung infection. Kim Hyun Joon protested strongly the truth must be communicated to the patients but he was reminded by Team Leader Kang that one cannot imagine the panic that will sweep across the country if the information about the lethal microbe leaked out. The persnickety geek, Lee Han could not help but flaunt his intelligence with his philosophical quote. Perhaps he just wanted to bring Kim Hyun Joon around to their point of view. ‘According to social psychologist, Gustave Le Bon, everyone’s reason and consciousness are annihilated in the public by group consciousness.’ He was referring to crowd behaviour. He meant that individuals in crowds lose their ability to think and act rationally. The frenzy of the crowds is contagious like a disease. One can imagine the scenario. It would be difficult for the government to control the panicky, paranoid population if they knew about the anthrax attack. The country would be like a house of cards blown down by the wind that carried anthrax. Pandemonium would ensue. Kim Hyun Joon challenged the wisdom of withholding the truth from the dying victims. He was scandalised that to prevent chaos, the victims would not be told of their tragic situation. The danger caused by panic outweighs the right to the truth. But, that was the grim reality. Team Leader Kang rationalised that the best way to solve the problem was to find the source of the anthrax as quickly as possible. The findings would be critical to their investigation and the health situation. Was transparency important to Ha Sun Woo? She leapt to the defence of the Team Leader and urged Kim Hyun Joon to stop making a fuss.  The man gave her a look that could have frozen her. It was difficult to control his thinly-veiled feelings. One could sense that he felt strongly that full disclosure of the diagnosis including bad news was important to the critically-ill patients. The rising tension within him was difficult to suppress. Reality was quite complex. The disease had manifested itself and many affected people might succumb to the disease. The sudden increase of those with acute lung disease had paralysed all emergency centres in Seoul. People might fall like flies. In another part of the city, a mysterious masked person was asking an unknown scientist for more anthrax bacteria to be cultured and the man had responded he  was almost ready with another batch of cultures.

MAKING JUDGEMENTS ON WHAT LIKELY HAPPENED Meanwhile, Team Leader Kang was in a meeting with the NCI Chief Director. He wanted the serious crime investigation to be held at the NCI headquarters as he felt that national terrorists might be involved in the terrorist attack.  He was certain that no overseas terrorists from North Korea or IS (Islamic State) were involved. He supplied a list of possible suspects working in the Ministry of National Defence, the Blue House (the official residence of the President), and related newspapers for investigation. He was warned by the Chief Director that if things went awry, he would be wholly responsible.  An emergency meeting was organised within 30 minutes for the NCI to profile the terrorists. Meanwhile, Kim Hyun Joon and Ha Sun Woo visited the emergency medical centre to interview the victims and collect some more data.  Ha Sun Woo questioned a female victim and urged her to recall the incident at the park. The frail patient managed to inform them that she saw a man in black.  Her speech became slurred, a sign that her condition was rapidly deteriorating but Ha Sun Woo relentlessly prodded her to impart more information. Kim Hyun Joon, in a compassionate move, discouraged the other profiler from her persistent questioning. With a gentle touch on her shoulder, he nudged her to stop. The pair worked well with each other despite their different personalities, being a check and balance on each other so that the other did not carry their investigations to extremes.  He wondered again whether it was right to keep the anthrax infection a secret from the patients’ family. The lady profiler felt that it was wiser to ferret out the unsubs who were responsible for the crisis and find the vaccine to save the victims. PROFILING At the NCI headquarters, when all the relevant government officials had been assembled, Team Leader Kang started the profiling of the anthrax criminal. Team Leader Kang felt that personal reasons propelled the unsub to choose a public place, that is, a public park to release the bacteria. Dr Lee Han suggested the idea that the unsub had to be a dreamer as dreamers believe in the importance of their work. The unsub believed that his nightmare vision of bacteriological attacks, which had occurred elsewhere, might also materialise in South Korea. People around him might have thought of him as unstable, paranoid and secretive. Nobody would wish to be close to him. He would have worked overtime the last few weeks to create variants of the anthrax bacteria in his own laboratory. It is highly probable that he had written a book about biological warfare. But he might have become angry that no one was interested in the implications of bacteriological warfare. Those assembled were advised that time was short and that they should provide details if they knew of someone who fitted that profile. Reporters pressured the Media Liaison Officer, Yoo Min Young for more information about the closure of the park. She did not field their volley of questions but wisely deflected them.

RECONSTRUCTING THE CRIME SCENE Kim Hyun Joon and Ha Sun Woo went to the park to comb the area for clues and collect data to help solve the mystery. Who was that evil unsub who had proclivity to such a deadly crime? The lady profiler, in her mind’s eye, went through all the data that they had obtained from the crime victim earlier whereas the male profiler wanted to understand the psychology of the criminal. To catch a criminal, he had to think like one. He had to put himself in his shoes. Kim Hyun Joon then walked up to an elevated part of the park and made some intriguing meteorological observations. The wind was blowing North-east at the time of the incident. The unsub must have stood there. Given appropriate wind conditions, when the unsub released the anthrax powder, the cloud of anthrax spores would have been carried by the wind to the park. His observations fuelled the strong suspicion that the outbreak of the disease was caused by the release of an aerosol of anthrax from that position. Most of the victims went to the place for a walk and were blissfully unaware of the lurking danger. Kim Hyun Joon’s mind was swirling with questions and he asked Ha Sun Woo a pertinent question ‘Do you think the suspect felt the excitement, the thrill of the kill?’ She didn’t think that he was a sadistic killer as he would have a committed crime that would have allowed him to witness the terrified victim’s reactions straightaway. Kim Hyun Joon noticed a man dressed in black who was wearing a mask and sneakers. He also had a backpack. All these were dead giveaways that he was the criminal.  The NCI had not even revealed to the public that the hospital patients were victims of airborne anthrax bacteria, so why was he wearing a mask? He probably wore sneakers for a quick getaway. Kim Hyun Joon's sixth sense told him that he was their wanted man. They put on a pretence of looking around and did not want to give him the impression that they were targeting him.