Man who had ricin in room is conscious

Authorities are questioning the man, who has been hospitalized since Feb. 14.

LAS VEGAS (AP) — A man who may have been exposed to toxic ricin in his motel room a month ago has regained consciousness and was being questioned by investigators, authorities said Friday.

Roger Bergendorff, 57, remained in critical condition in a hospital, where he has been hospitalized and unable to speak since Feb. 14. Several vials of ricin powder were found in his room two weeks later after a friend went there to remove Bergendorff’s belongings.

Investigators were speaking with Bergendorff for the first time Friday, said Special Agent David Staretz, an FBI spokesman. Neither he nor Las Vegas police would provide more information.

Authorities hope Bergendorff can provide information about the discovery of the deadly powder, along with castor beans from which it is derived, at an extended-stay motel where he had been living several blocks from the Las Vegas Strip.

Officials have said they’ve found no contamination anywhere, and no link to terrorism in the discovery of the exotic toxin, which can be lethal in amounts the size of the head of a pin. Ricin has no antidote and is legal only for cancer research.

In court documents made public this week, police call ricin a “biological weapon” and say four “anarchists cookbooks” marked at sections describing how to manufacture ricin were found in Bergendorff’s room.

Friends and family members describe Bergendorff as an unemployed and unmarried graphic artist, a recovering alcoholic who loved his dog and cats and struggled to pay his bills while living in Huntington Beach, Calif., Reno, the San Diego area and a pickup truck camper near Salt Lake City. He moved in recent months to an extended stay motel several blocks off the Las Vegas Strip.

A younger brother, Erich Bergendorff of Escondido, Calif., said hospital officials told him Wednesday that his brother was awake and had been told that his beloved dog, Angel, was euthanized after the Humane Society found her starving and without water in his motel room.