Trinity Kaseke
10/11/2016
Chemistry and Crime
Professor. Harris
Ricin Poison Year after year the term "death" is slowly moving away from being associated with blood baths by means of gunshots or knife stabbings, but instead is becoming "internally" induced through the easiest way possible, poisoning. "Ricinus communis" is a flowering plant that originated from northeastern Africa and the Middle East in a form of a castor-bean or oil plant, which belongs to the Euphorbiaceae. "Ricinus’ means ‘tick’ because the skin of the castor beans looks like a tic. But there is a tick named iloxedes ricinus because its skin looks like a castor bean" (PoisonGarden.co). For many years it has been used for medical purposes, but some people and animals have…show more content… Its structure consists of hemagglutinins and two toxins (RCL III and RCL IV). The toxins are made up of an A polypeptide chain and a B polypeptide chain, which are joined by a disulfide bond. The B portion of Ricin binds to glycoproteins and glycolipids that terminate with galactose on the exterior of cell membranes. Ricin is then transported inside the cell by endocytosis. Once inside the cytosol of the cell, the A portion of the molecule binds to the 60S ribosome, stopping protein synthesis causing a single molecule of Ricin to kill a cell" (faqsRicin.org). After a person has been poisoned the process has to do with millions of the molecules of Ricin bind to carbohydrates on the surface of the cell and chaperone the toxin inside. Most of these never make it to the cytoplasm, but one is enough. A disulfide linkage between the chains is broken, and the A chain travels through the cytoplasm, inactivating 1500 ribosomes per minute and ultimately killing the cell"…show more content… According to CNN, Huffington Post and NBC news a 36 year old Texas actress sent an envelope containing remains from crushed castor beans, which were referred to as "very low concentrations" of Ricin by the FBI as she was hoping that the United States president would inhale the toxin substance. The way she pulled it off was by purchasing castor beans online as well as a castor bean pounder because the remains are the toxic elements she needed to process Ricin, which is how she managed to produce biological Ricin similar to the example shown in class pertaining Vicks inhaler as it contains some elements of Methylamine, making it illegal to open up. Although this plot was intercepted it opened doors for criminals to learn from Shannon Richardson's mistake by attempting to perfect what she failed to do, which was done 6 months later by James Everett Dutschke, a 41-year-old martial arts instructor who practically used the same method Shannon used with the castor bean pounder and mailing the remains to president Obama, which became another failed attempt. According to CBS news two years before the assassination attempts on president Obama, "the USA's Department for Homeland Security (DHS) had issued a warning in 2010
