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by Mike Adams
the Health Ranger
April 28, 2011
from
NaturalNews Website
Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC)
researcher Poul Thorsen,
who famously headed up the "Denmark Study"
that many claim disproved any link between autism and vaccines, has
been indicted in Atlanta by a federal grand jury on charges of wire
fraud, money laundering and defrauding research institutions of
grant money.
Poul Thorson (below images) is a scientist who formerly worked for the CDC, and
over the last several years, he oversaw millions of dollars in grant
money that was used to conduct research to "prove" that vaccines
have no link to autism.
 
Dr. Thorson's research papers include the
famous "Danish Study" entitled
Thimerosal and the occurrence of autism -
Negative ecological evidence from Danish population-based data.
This paper concludes that thimerosal, the mercury-based preservative
used in vaccines around the world, has no statistically significant
link to autism. It is one of the key papers used by vaccination
proponents who argue that thimerosal is safe to inject into young
children.
That Poul Thorson's credibility is now being called into
question by a federal indictment of fraud and money laundering will,
of course, have ripple effects throughout both the vaccine
industries and autism support groups (more about that below).
Be sure to see our "Web of Alleged Fraud" chart below:
Follow the
money
According to the official announcement of the indictment, Thorsen
was awarded grant money by the CDC as far back as the 1990s. He
arranged for the grant money to be awarded to an entity in Denmark,
where he provided "input and guidance" for the research projects.
From 2000 to 2009, the CDC awarded $11 million in grant money to two
Denmark government agencies to study, among other things, the
possible link between vaccines and autism. In 2002, Thorsen moved to
Denmark and became the "principal investigator" for the grant money,
responsible for administering the research money that the CDC
awarded.
But here's where things get interesting:
According to the Dept. of
Justice, Thorsen began allegedly stealing grant money by submitting
fraudulent expense documents that were supposedly related to the
Danish study.
These fraudulent expense documents were given to the
Danish government,
Aarhus University and
Odense University Hospital,
the institutions involved in the research.
From February 2004 through June 2008, says the DOJ indictment,
Thorsen allegedly submitted over a dozen fraudulent invoices
requesting reimbursement for expenses that were fabricated.
Interestingly, these allegedly fraudulent invoices were signed by a
laboratory section chief at the CDC, indicating that someone inside
the CDC was either duped by Thorsen or potentially involved in the
alleged fraud.
What was Thorsen claiming in these allegedly fraudulent invoices
requesting reimbursement?
He claimed that a CDC laboratory had
conducted work in conjunction with the research and was owed funds
out of the grant money. These invoices were then handed over to
Aarhus University, where Thorsen held a faculty position.
Aarhus
then transferred,
"hundreds of thousands of dollars to bank accounts
held at the CDC Federal Credit Union in Atlanta," says the DOJ.
But here's the clever part:
Those bank accounts were not official
CDC accounts at all. They were allegedly private bank accounts
belonging to none other than Dr. Poul Thorsen.
Once the money was transferred into Thorsen's private accounts,
Thorsen,
"allegedly withdrew it for his own personal use, buying a
home in Atlanta, a Harley Davidson motorcycle, and Audi and Honda
vehicles, and obtaining numerous cashier's checks, from the fraud
proceeds," says the DOJ.
According to government documents, Dr. Poul Thorsen,
one of the key researchers in "disproving" any link between vaccines
and autism, allegedly defrauded the scientific research community of
over one million dollars (see above image.)
Aarhus
distances itself from Thorsen
More details are revealed through a statement issued in January by
Aarhus University, which sought to sever its ties with Thorsen.
It
says,
"Unfortunately, a considerable shortfall in funding at Aarhus
University associated with the CDC grant was discovered.
In
investigating the shortfalls associated with the grant, DASTI and
Aarhus University became aware of two alleged CDC funding documents
as well as a letter regarding funding commitments allegedly written
by Randolph B. Williams of CDC's Procurement Grants Office which was
used to secure advances from Aarhus University.
Upon investigation
by CDC, a suspicion arose that the documents are forgeries."
(http://www.rescuepost.com/files/thorsen-aarhus-1.pdf)
This letter goes on to state that Dr Thorsen was essentially
hoodwinking others into thinking he was still a faculty member at
Aarhus University:
In March 2009, Dr. Thorsen resigned his faculty position at Aarhus
University. In the meantime, it has come to the attention of Aarhus
University that Dr Thomsen has continued to act in such a manner as
to create the impression that he still retains a connection to
Aarhus University after the termination of his employment by the
university.
Furthermore, it has come to the attention of Aarhus
University that Dr Poul Thorsen has held full-time positions at both
Emory University and Aarhus University simultaneously.
Dr Thorsen's
double Full-time employment was unauthorized by Aarhus University,
and he engaged in this employment situation despite the express
prohibition of Aarhus University.
The federal
indictment against Thorsen
Today, Thorsen is facing 13 counts of wire fraud and 9 counts of
money laundering.
NaturalNews spoke with the Department of Justice
and confirmed that extradition proceedings are under way to bring
Thorsen to the United States from Denmark, although no particular
timetable for that extradition has been announced.
Thorsen now faces up to 260 years in prison from the wire fraud
charges, and up to an additional 90 years in prison for the money
laundering charges, plus a total of $22.5 million in possible fines.
In addition, the federal indictment also contains a so-called
"forfeiture provision" which seeks the forfeiture of the personal
property Dr. Thorsen allegedly purchased with money he stole from
the CDC's grant activities:
The case is being prosecuted by Assistant United States Attorneys
Stephen H. McClain and Michael J. Brown, both out of the
Northern
District of Georgia (Atlanta).
This Atlanta office has
a well-known reputation for going after crooks, regardless of the
political implications. This is the same office, for example, that
indicted Atlanta's own mayor for corruption
and tax charges in 2004.
The prosecuting attorney for that case, Sally Quillian Yates, is the
same attorney contributing to this case.
She said of Thorsen:
"Grant
money for disease research is a precious commodity. When grant funds
are stolen, we lose not only the money, but also the opportunity to
better understand and cure debilitating diseases. This defendant is
alleged to have orchestrated a scheme to steal over $1 million in
CDC grant money earmarked for autism research. We will now seek the
defendant’s extradition for him to face federal charges in the
United States."
Understand what is being alleged here:
That Thorsen stole taxpayer
dollars intended for medical research, then pocketed them in his own
private bank accounts and used the money to buy luxury items for his
personal use.
This is a man with a history of strong ties to the
CDC, research universities and medical journals.
This is a person
whose research has been widely quoted by the vaccine apologists who
say vaccines are safe. And now, in the midst of all this, how many
mainstream newspapers do you see covering Thorsen's indictment and
his ties to the CDC? Virtually none.
This is the great untold story of an alleged criminal ring operating
inside the CDC, with the purpose of falsifying research that would
"disprove" any links between vaccines and toxic side effects.
The upshot of
all this
What you read above are the facts of the case. What you're about to
read is my own opinion analysis as the editor of NaturalNews. While
I spoke with the U.S. Attorney's Office on these matters, what
you're about to read are my own opinions, not theirs.
For starters, given that,
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the Journal of the American Medical
Association (JAMA)
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the New England Journal of Medicine (NEJM)
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the
American Journal of Epidemiology,
...and many other medical journals
have published Dr. Thorsen's work,
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Will they retract his scientific
papers now that he has been indicted for fraud and money laundering?
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Or do the medical journals only retract papers only from those whose
research suggests that vaccines do, in fact, have a link to
intestinal disorders and neurological problems in children?
Remember, of course, that the conventional medical industry almost
couldn't wait to denounce Dr.
Andrew Wakefield's research, based on
only the flimsiest of allegations which don't even stand up to basic
scrutiny. And yet when one of their own "insider" scientists like
Dr. Poul Thorsen is indicted for fraud and money laundering, they
don't question the integrity of his scientific research in the
least.
In fact, the CDC is now publicly defending his research!
His research is
still openly cited on the CDC's own
website!
So don't hold your breath waiting for the medical journals to
denounce Dr. Thorsen's research.
His so-called "scientific findings"
are such an important cornerstone in the false "scientific" evidence
dispelling any link between vaccines and autism that they would
probably let his research stand even if he was convicted of rape,
murder and incest. No criminal is too criminal for the medical
journals, it seems - especially if his conclusions support the
vaccine industry.
Secondly, did you notice that the allegedly falsified invoices
submitted by Dr. Thosen to Aarhus University were signed off by a
CDC lab section chief? Someone inside the CDC, in other words, was
enabling Dr. Thorsen to allegedly engage in this fraud.
The question
is: Was this person a co-conspirator?
To answer all this, you have to keep one thing in perspective:
During the years of 2006-2008 when all this alleged fraud was
taking place, the vaccine industry was under increasing attack by
scientists who questioned their safety. The evidence linking
vaccines with autism and gastrointestinal disorders was becoming
increasingly evident and increasingly difficult to cover up.
Dr.
Julie Gerberding was at the help of the CDC, and she was no doubt
trying to impress her future employers at Merck, where she is now
the president of Merck's global vaccine division, having left the
CDC the very next year following Dr. Thorsen's alleged money
laundering scheme.
Question:
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Did the CDC actively enable and support Dr. Thorsen's
alleged fraud in order to "pay him off" for falsifying the research
that would supposedly disprove any link between vaccines and autism?
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And was this being masterminded by Dr. Julie Gerberding as part of
her effort to prove her loyalty to Merck, where she now runs the
global vaccine division?
Consider the ties here:
Dr. Poul Thorsen used to have a CDC email
address (pct9@cdc.gov). He was on the CDC payroll and spoke at CDC
events. He had a private bank account at the CDC Credit Union!
Dr. Thorsen had enough pull with the CDC to get his pet grant
project approved, even to the point of having the money wired
overseas to a university in Denmark where - guess what? - he just
happened to be a faculty member with "oversight" of where the money
went.
For Dr. Thorsen to have pulled off his alleged fraud, he would
have needed help from inside the CDC - from the "lab section chief"
who signed his invoices that were submitted to Aarhus University for
"reimbursement."
Those funds, of course, were then allegedly used by
Dr. Thorsen to purchase a home, cars and a motorcycle, among other
things.
Was Thorsen a
patsy for a larger scheme?
I see two possibilities here:
Every great scam needs
a fall guy, you see, and the vaccine industry's fraudulent
scientific cover-up of the truth about vaccine dangers is one of the
greatest scams ever pulled off in the history of human civilization.
The CDC has its fingerprints all over this case, as a former
employer of Thorsen, the source of the money (which is really
taxpayer money, of course), and even the source of the "lab section
chief" employee who allegedly helped make all this happen.
To believe that the CDC may have conspired with Dr. Thorsen is not
even a stretch. The CDC, as we've already shown, is deeply in bed
with the vaccine industry and the drug companies. That's why the
former head of the CDC is now the
president of Merck's vaccine division.
It's also why the
CDC urges everyone to "get vaccinated" at the first sign of a
seasonal flu or an emerging epidemic.
The pro-vaccine bias of the
CDC has been blatant for years.
Other CDC
scientists also involved in the fraud?
Writers Dan Olmsted and Mark Blaxill from the
AgeOfAutism
website have done additional research on this point, and they've
found some solid evidence that should raise questions about the
CDC's involvement in Thorsen's alleged fraud.
As they published
recently in an article entitled
Poul Thorsen's Mutating Resume:
In addition, several current CDC employees including Drs. Diana
Schendel, Marshalyn Yeargin-Allsopp and Catherine Rice were
affiliated with Thorsen's now-defunct research group.
Age of Autism
has obtained Internet-archived pages from the Web site of the North
Atlantic Neuro-Epidemiology Alliances (NANEA) that list the members
of the “Atlanta autism team” including Schendel, Yeargin-Allsopp and
Rice, all of whom have been in leadership positions in the CDC’s
autism epidemiology projects.
Schendel is described as NANEA’s
“coordinator at Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, Atlanta,
USA.”
This article goes on to say, by the way, that Thorsen was also
working with the American Psychiatric Association (APA) to alter the
definition of "autism" in the DSM-V (the
psychiatric industry's
bible of diagnosis and treatment).
The CDC, of course, has downplayed the whole thing. It released a
statement that attempted to characterize Poul Thorsen's alleged
fraud as a "fiscal" matter, not something involving his science, as
if to imply that a man can be a crook when it comes to his money,
but an angel when it comes to his science.
They said:
"CDC is aware of the allegations by Aarhus University against Poul
Thorsen, a Danish doctor who participated in CDC funded research.
For the past 10 years, CDC has had a cooperative agreement with the
Danish Agency for Science, Technology and Innovation (DASTI) and
Aarhus University in Denmark to conduct research studies on issues
such as cerebral palsy, autism, alcohol use in pregnancy and Down
syndrome.
Dr. Thorsen was one of many co-authors on these research
projects. All of these were subject to extensive peer review and we
have no reason to suspect that there are any issues related to the
integrity of the science.
The allegations that are fiscal in nature
against Dr. Thorsen are being looked into by appropriate
authorities."
(http://www.ageofautism.com/2010/03/copenhagen-police-investigating-autism-vaccine-researcher-dr-poul-thorsen-for-fraud.html)
But the other possibility in all this is that someone inside the CDC
wanted to protect the CDC's reputation from all the quackery and
fraud they saw happening there.
Perhaps they were clued in to Dr. Thorsen's alleged money laundering, and they were sick of it. Maybe
they saw Dr. Gerberding collect a multi-million-dollar salary from
Merck while the rest of the people were left behind at the CDC
collecting government wages. This is conjecture, of course, but it
seems reasonable to suppose that someone from within the CDC could
be the whistleblower on all this.
And if that someone reads this, we want to hear from you. Feel free
to leak internal documents to NaturalNews any time you want, through
our public feedback form.
We protect the identities of all our
sources and we are interested in seeing justice served. If there is
an element in the CDC that is knowingly engaged in criminal fraud
and conspiracy, that elements needs to be exposed and removed from
the CDC for the good of the entire institution. Otherwise, more of
this kind of news will only come out in the years ahead, and the
reputation of the CDC will only continue to plummet.
Don't think the world isn't noticing already: Just two years ago,
the CDC's reputation was relatively high even among natural health
practitioners. But after watching the CDC's behavior through these
last couple of flu scares, more intelligent people now fully realize
the CDC has become little more than a mouthpiece for the
pharmaceutical industry.
It was the CDC, after all, that helped hype
up
the Swine Flu scare that resulted in
billions of taxpayer dollars
being needlessly spent on vaccines which were mostly thrown away
unused after the scare passed.
The DOJ earns
street credit
The real hero in all this, it turns out, is the Department of
Justice (DOJ).
Rather than bowing to
the profit interests of the vaccine industry, the DOJ is going after
Dr. Poul Thorsen based solely on his alleged criminal behavior, not
based on politics or science. It's refreshing to know that some
elements of the federal government are actually doing good work.
I've seen this before from the DOJ in its indictments of various
pharmaceutical companies, and I continue to believe that the DOJ may
be the last remaining hope for justice at the federal level.
I did tell my contact at the DOJ, however, that they should watch
out for pressure from the vaccine industry.
There will be efforts
made, no doubt, to limit the exposure of this case to only Dr. Poul
Thorsen and not involve any other CDC employees or officials.
Honestly, in talking to the DOJ about this case, I think they vastly
underestimate the level of commitment the drug companies have to
their vaccine profit machine; meaning they also vastly underestimate
the tactics that are traditionally used by these companies to limit
their damage.
For example, most NaturalNews readers know full well that I've had
multiple threats placed on my life, I've been stalked, I've been
impersonated, and there have been assassination attempts made on
other leaders in the natural health movement who have
dared to
question vaccines.
What the DOJ doesn't know (but I hope they will
soon realize) is that
the drug companies will stop at nothing to get
their way:
They will poison your dog,
hack your website, threaten
your family, leave nasty notes in your mailbox, plant fake bombs
under your car and do whatever else it takes to get you to back off.
I know that DOJ prosecutors and attorneys will be reading this, so
let me share something with you that you need to know:
When you go
up against the pharmaceutical industry, you are doing battle with
what is essentially organized crime. We're talking a modern-day mob
here, and they will not hesitate to engaged in attempted bribery,
corruption or threats of violence to get their way.
If the DOJ
begins to uncover a deeper connection between Thorsen, the CDC and
the drug companies, beware of the backlash headed your way from both
the industry and even the top folks in D.C.
The depth of the fraud
and crimes being committed right now in the pursuit of vaccine
profits is nothing short of astonishing. We've reported on many here
at NaturalNews, and yet we've just barely scratched the surface of
the real story.
Even the vaccine pushers in the online world engage in precisely the
same kind of criminal behavior; fixing online polls, creating robots
to maliciously attack anti-vax websites, engaging in the widespread
posting of false information, and so on. This is, of course, a
reflection of the exact same psychopathic criminal-minded behavior
found inside the vaccine industry itself - an industry staffed by
sick-minded human beings who belong in federal prison, not running
research for the CDC.
As the editor of NaturalNews, I have publicly, on numerous
occasions, called for the Department of Justice to investigate the
CEOs of drug companies for fraud, racketeering and conspiracy.
While this indictment of
Dr. Poul Thorsen isn't all that, it's at least a step in the right
direction that may help uncover the truth about what really goes on
behind the scenes with taxpayer "research money."
How much
vaccine research is based on outright fraud?
It also raises the question:
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How many other
scientific researchers and grant money administrators are on
the take, pocketing taxpayer dollars that were intended for
research purposes?
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How many of
these people falsify their research data in order to keep
getting grant money injections into their private bank
accounts?
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Just how deep
does the collusion between the corrupt scientific community
and the fraudulent vaccine industry really go?
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And, of course,
what is the CDC's role in all this?
It has been one of the
top cheerleaders for the vaccine industry for at least the past
decade.
Now, we are learning
that a CDC section chief knowingly or unknowingly colluded with a
physician and researcher who has now been indicted for fraud and
money laundering. How high up the CDC does this alleged fraud really
go?
I don't know the answer to that. But it's not that complicated to
figure out, especially when CDC employees become
Big Pharma vaccine
employees, and vice-versa.
It's all a giant
government-corporate-medicine orgy where the scientific trust was
abandoned long ago in favor of Big Pharma profits.
By the way, I strongly recommend that you become a regular readers
of
www.AgeOfAutism.com which provides
outstanding reporting on these issues. Make that sight one of your
regular sources of information. You'll be amazed by what they are
able to report.
Sources
Armed Agents Invade Maxam Nutraceutics and
Steal Natural Health Products in Shocking FDA Raid
by Ethan A. Huff
staff writer
April 27, 2011
from
NaturalNews Websire
Amidst all the destructive activities taking place in our world
today that deserve attention, the US Food and Drug Administration
(FDA) has decided instead to make it a personal mission to destroy
the businesses and livelihoods of those trying to help people
through natural medicine.
On Thursday, April 14, 2011, dozens of agents from,
...conducted an unprovoked, full-scale raid on Hood
River, Ore.-based
Maxam Nutraceutics, a company that produces and
sells nutritional supplements primarily for AUTISM spectrum
disorders (ASD) and Alzheimer's disease.
Back in October 12, 2010, the FDA sent a warning letter to Jim Cole,
Founder and CEO of Maxam, notifying him that several of his
company's products were not labeled in accordance with the US Food,
Drug and Cosmetic Act. The letter also stated that Maxam had fifteen
days from the receipt of the letter to notify the FDA compliance
officer of the specific steps it planned to take in order to correct
the violations.
You can
view a copy of the FDA warning letter,
complete with the name of the FDA compliance officer to whom Jim and
his company were instructed to respond, and the FDA district
director who sent the letter.
Oddly enough, the vast majority of the "unapproved labels" in
question were not actually labels at all.
They were merely customer
testimonials about the products that had been accumulated over the
years from satisfied customers, and posted online alongside product
descriptions on Maxam's website. Nevertheless, the FDA considered
the testimonials to be marketing violations that automatically
rendered the products as drugs.
According to Jim, his company immediately responded to the FDA
letter by calling the compliance officer and telling her,
"it was
[the company's] intention to come into full compliance as quickly as
possible."
This included removing all the offending testimonials
from the company website after being told by the FDA compliance
officer that they were not permitted.
"I contacted a patent and copyright attorney, and he had written
[the compliance officer] a letter that it was our intention to come
into full compliance," said Jim, noting that his company responded
within two days of receiving the FDA warning letter, long before the
15-day deadline period.
"So we took down the testimonials, and we
thought that was good. And I hired an FDA copyright person [who]
went over all the offending verbiage through the website."
Jim cooperated with every demand that the FDA made of him, and was
convinced that all was well.
But apparently
the FDA had different
ideas when out of nowhere, the agency, along with the IRS and the
FBI, sent as many as 80 armed, SWAT-style agents to both Maxam
headquarters, the company's "Big Gym" training center, and even
Jim's daughter's house, to confiscate all the products, company
documents, and even personal files and computers.
"They took all our products, all our paperwork, all our files -
we've been doing this since 1992 and they pulled everything," said
Jim. "They brought in three big moving vans, they had their guns on,
their bullet-proof vests - they came prepared for war."
The armed agents also stole 27
TurboSonic machines, which is a
sound-actuated vibration plate device that Jim invented to stimulate
growth plates in the body, improve circulation, energize the
lymphatic system, and improve muscle strength.
The TurboSonic
machines were not even mentioned in the FDA warning letter.
"We also have a big Olympic training center up here called the 'Big
Gym' - they went into the gym, they took all the paperwork, all the
computer, hard drives, downloaded all of our servers, and trashed a
couple of our servers going out," added Jim.
"They took products
that were not on the list. I had an old bodybuilding line that went
back to 1992, they took all of that. They pretty much just had a
free-for-all."
According to Jim, the agents stole "hundreds of thousands of dollars
in products" as part of the raid, as well as personal files,
insurance policies, non-printed checks, and even unopened packages
of manila filing folders from an office supply store.
Clearly, the
FDA's intent was to terrorize and intimidate this small company
that, from all available accounts, did absolutely nothing wrong.
Maxam is currently "waiting for the dust to settle" as it pursues
legal action against the offending agencies. Until then, the world
must know about this terrible injustice and crime against humanity.
The FDA has clearly shown itself to be a terrorist organization that
has no respect for the rule of law, or for common decency.
To
perform a SWAT-style raid against a company that was doing
everything it could to follow the law and conduct business honestly
and legally is a travesty in this supposed "land of the free."
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