BUILDING: Senate Offices Open After Anthrax Scare
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NC_A_9_A9_LA_1_01-23-02_we_1_CMYK 2002:01:22:21:06:30 LOS ANGELES TIMES THE NATION NA / WEDNESDAY, JANUARY 23, 2002 A9 BUILDING: Senate Offices Open After Anthrax Scare Continued from A1 It might have been the remains achieved,” Dr. Patrick Meehan of and a protective suit—left behind contaminated in an attack in which of the chlorine dioxide gas used to the CDC said at a news conference. by the cleanup crew—was dis- deadly spores were sent through decontaminate the place, or maybe “But as with any public health covered above a hallway ceiling the U.S. mail, killing five people. the thorough scrubbing delivered problem, we cannot eliminate any outside the Daschle suite, prompt- Left behind in the rush to get this weekend by work crews trying risk entirely.” ing another flurry of precautions. out were senators’ briefcases, com- to restore a building weeks in hi- Still, the staffers came back. The delay made Tuesday’s home- puter files, personal checkbooks bernation. Whatever it was, it was Daschle said he knew of no one in coming all the sweeter. and half-empty cups of coffee. The giving some people a headache and the Hart building’s 5,000-member “So this is a great day. It’s good Washington work force that serves others a sore throat, and some work force to resign out of safety to be back,” Daschle said. “It’s half the U.S. Senate was abruptly aides said they were less concerned concerns. But a twinge of ambiva- good to be confident that we can displaced, flung all over the Capitol about the anthrax than the stuff lence was in evidence. return to normalcy. And it is good complex. Republicans lent space to used to kill it. Sen. Joseph I. Lieberman (D- that the Senate is working again Democrats, and vice versa. Work- “You know anthrax is a strong Conn.) said he was going in “with with all eight cylinders.” ers made do with borrowed com- bacteria, so what took it out had to confidence and a prayer.” Daschle made the pronounce- puters and not enough phones. be strong too,” said Dan Kunsman, Sen. Harry Reid (D-Nev.) led his ment at noon as he officially re- Some wondered whether life here press secretary to Sen. Craig office entourage into the building claimed the building but not his in- would ever feel normal again. Thomas (R-Wyo.). Kunsman re- in a demonstration of his good fected office. Stripped of all furni- “Wooo-hoooo!” rejoiced Michele turned to the office to find a 12- faith, however measured. “It feels ture, the walls knocked down, it is Hall, communications director for week-old apple and banana that fine. This is good for government,” free of spores but will take weeks Sen. Tom Harkin (D-Iowa), as she looked nothing like they did. he said, adding later, “I think we to rebuild. walked back in, a trolley of boxes, are all waiting for the next shoe to After 45 minutes inside, a lot of files and a roll of wrapping paper in Officials Say Building drop.” people said they felt as though tow. “I cannot put into words how ‘Safe and Clean’ The worker sentiment was prob- they had never left. The phones good it is to be back. It feels like ably best described by the ebul- started ringing again. The cafeteria going into the dorms after summer Officials from the Environmen- lient Hall, who whooped for joy to churned out chili. vacation—except it smells a lot like tal Protection Agency and the Cen- be back herself but had no inten- But the day-to-day rituals re- a swimming pool.” ters for Disease Control and Pre- tion of letting her children visit mained small reminders that some- The smell was unmistakably ab- vention declared the building “safe any time soon: “They are 5 and 7, thing is different. Hall’s job de- normal, and people sniffed the air and clean,” although they would and they were concerned about me scription now includes opening the as they cleared the security X-ray not go as far as to say it was “risk- going back. I told them I felt safe— mail, a task now deemed too dan- machines, endeavoring to describe free.” but I won’t be bringing them back gerous for a volunteer or an intern it. “Extraordinary measures have here for a long, long, long time.” like the one who opened the Das- Reuters “It smells like bleach,” said one. been taken using the safest tech- The building’s reopening was de- chle letter Oct. 15. “My job went A Senate staff member moves back into the Hart Senate Office “Like a new plastic toy.” nology available to us . for the layed several times, most recently from mundane to life-threatening Building. “It’s that new car smell.” lowest possible risk that can be last week when a bag with gloves overnight,” she said. High Court Tightens Rules for Confining Sex Offenders By DAVID G. SAVAGE The 7-2 ruling clarifies the said they were confident they crimes. 5-4 vote in the case of Leroy Hen- to themselves or others. standard for defining who is a “sex- would be able to convince a jury State laws authorized officials to dricks, a Kansas pedophile. But until Tuesday, the court had TIMES STAFF WRITER ual predator.” that these dangerous offenders keep these sex criminals in custody Forced confinement of such of- not said what state prosecutors WASHINGTON—The Supreme Legal experts predicted that the must not be released, regardless of after they had served their prison fenders was not double punishment must prove to win a civil order that Court made it somewhat harder decision will allow some of the the higher standard set by the terms. for the same crime, Justice Clar- confines an inmate due to be re- Tuesday for states to lock up sex more than 1,200 men now being court. They were transferred from a ence Thomas wrote then, because leased from prison. criminals after they have served held in California and 15 other The “sexually violent predator prison to a prison-like treatment the inmates were being treated, Justice Stephen G. Breyer an- their prison time, ruling that states states to seek their release through laws” were an innovation of the center, sometimes located within not just incarcerated. nounced something of a middle- must prove these inmates have a new hearing. Currently, 301 peo- early 1990s. They were designed to the prison grounds. There they The court majority also said that ground position. both a mental disorder and a “seri- ple are confined as sexual preda- cope with serial rapists and child could be held indefinitely. the government has long had the It is important to distinguish be- ous difficulty” in controlling their tors in California. molesters who appeared to have an Five years ago, the high court power to commit mentally ill peo- tween ordinary criminals, who may behavior. But prosecutors in several states irresistible impulse to commit sex upheld these laws in principle on a ple who are judged to be a danger choose to commit crimes after they are released, from sexual preda- tors, he said. Criminals, whether they are bur- glars, drug dealers or rapists, Obituaries should be imprisoned and punished for their crimes but released once they have served their term, he said. This is so even if prosecutors VOICE: Peggy Lee, Stanley Marcus, 96; think an inmate is dangerous and is likely to commit further crimes. Sexual predators, he said, are in a different category. They are not Jazz, Pop Singer, Dies Shaped Fabled Store just criminals who have committed sex crimes; they also have been di- Continued from A1 there listening to me,” she recalled By PETER PAE buted in the 196Os with a pair of agnosed as suffering from a “seri- All There Is?”, Lee also was a years later in an interview with Beechcraft airplanes. ous mental illness (or) abnormality” TIMES STAFF WRITER gifted songwriter and arranger. Howard Reich of the Chicago Trib- The company was the first retail and show “a special and serious She also was the voice of Peg in une. “See, I was a big fan of his. Stanley Marcus, a Harvard MBA apparel store outside New York to lack of ability to control their be- the Disney film “Lady and the So here was Benny Goodman in graduate who turned a family-run advertise in national fashion maga- havior,” he said. Tramp” and won a $2.3-million law- the room . and Benny had a women’s apparel store into a pio- zines and in 1953 prompted Vogue State prosecutors must prove suit against the Walt Disney Co. to funny way of chewing on his neer of high-end retailing and ex- magazine to describe the store as both of these elements to a jury, recoup royalties from videocassette tongue and staring at you at the travagant gift-giving, died Tuesday “Texas with a French accent.” In- Breyer said, before the inmates can sales of that movie. same time. So when you were per- in Dallas. He was 96. deed, early Neiman Marcus cus- be incarcerated in a treatment cen- A fine actress, she was nomi- forming, you couldn’t really think The chairman emeritus of Nei- tomers included cowboys, Indians ter. nated for an Academy Award for that he loved it. man Marcus, a company synony- and women from rural outposts However, his opinion did not go her role as an alcoholic blues “Of course at the time, I didn’t mous with opulence and highbrow where land had yielded oil and as far as civil libertarians pre- singer in the 1955 film “Pete realize that I was really audition- tastes, was hospitalized Sunday newfound wealth.