Early Wednesday evening, federal agents in Tupelo, Mississippi, arrested Paul Kevin Curtis, the man suspected of sending ricin-laced letters to President Obama, Mississippi Sen. Roger Wicker, and a local judge.
They had an easy job finding Curtis, mostly because the poison letters bore the same signoff and initials he used in his many Facebook posts and Internet comments: “I am KC and I approve this message.” So obvious was the trail of digital breadcrumbs Curtis left behind, bloggers at Lady Liberty identified him hours before his arrest was announced.
His web presence paints the portrait of a very peculiar man.
He’s an Elvis Impersonator
The first thing that bears mentioning is that Curtis is an Elvis impersonator. And not just Elvis—a perusal of his YouTube channel reveals off-key renditions of Prince, Johnny Cash, Jerry Lee Lewis, and others.
Here’s a compilation video he made for his impersonator business, Tribute to the Stars.
And here he is singing “Little Red Corvette” to a class of eighth graders.
He’s Afraid for Your Organs
Other than impersonations, Curtis seems to have spent his time trying to bring attention to what he believed was a Mafia-run plot to harvest organs from the hospital where he briefly worked.
On a website believed to be run by Curtis, he writes that he’s trying to expose a “conspiracy to ruin my reputation” that began the day “I accidentally discovered a refrigerator full of dismembered body parts & organs wrapped in plastic in the morgue.” The site also promotes his ebook, called Missing Pieces, about an organ-harvesting ring.
On Tuesday, he posted this on Facebook:
I'm on the hidden front lines of a secret war. A war that is making Billions of dollars for corrupt mafia related organizations and people. (bone, tissue, organ, body parts harvesting black market) when we lay our loved ones to rest....we hope and pray their bodies are not violated but I am here to tell you, as long as the bone, tissue & organ harvesting indu$try is NOT REGULATED....on any level(s) whether it be local, state, federal or national...........your loved ones body parts are NOT $AFE. It's not fun for me to be the Me$$enger here. It was not fun in 1999 when I made accidental discovery and became a "Person of interest".
My mother wants me to SHUT UP. My brothers fear me. My sister hates me. My cousins have hostility towards me (they work in healthcare) I have lost most of my friends. I have spent more than $130,000.00 on legal fee's in 13.5 yrs. They burned down my home, killed my dogs, my cat, my rabbit, blew up my 1966 Plymouth Valent. They destroyed my marriage, they distracted my career, they stalked, they trolled, they came in to my home, took my computers, had me arrested 22 times and guess what? I am still a thorn in their corrupt anals! I will remain here until Jesus Christ decides its time for me to go. (ur welcome and amen. :)
On another site, ripoffreport.com, Curtis says he was hounded by hospital staff, police, and government officials after he asked about a refrigerator full of body parts in the morgue. He recounts a fight with an assistant district attorney (though the D.A. was working with Curtis in his capacity as an Elvis impersonator and not, apparently, as a government official):
On May 23, 2003, an intoxicated assistant district attorney pushed me backwards during a debate about corruption in northeast, MS. and then put a loaded 9 mm bereta to my head in front of my (then) wife and 2 sons, ages 7 and 9.
I didn't know at the time he was an assistant DA in Tupelo. All I knew was that the city hired him to play rythem guitar in a special new production that I developed including my older brother Jack. The show was gaining attention as we are the only brother duo Elvis Presley Tribute act in the world.
He’s Encountered Wicker Before
Curtis was aggressive about bringing attention to the organ-harvesting conspiracy, sending out “more than a million emails in one year,” according to his ripoffreport post. He also had an encounter with Roger Wicker, one of the recipients of the ricin letters.
I sent letters to State Representative Roger Wicker, Senator Trent Lott and Thad Cochran. I never heard a word from anyone. I even ran into Roger Wicker several different times while performing at special banquets and fundraisers in northeast, Mississippi but he seemed very nervous while speaking with me and would make a fast exit to the door when I engaged in conversation leading up to my case against NMMC.
He signed that post, “This is Kevin Curtis and I approve this report.”
Update: Wicker did indeed meet Curtis. A decade ago, he hired Curtis to entertain at a party he threw for a recently engaged friend. “He’s an entertainer. He’s an Elvis impersonator. He entertained at a party that my wife and I helped give for a young couple that was getting married. He was quite entertaining," Wicker said at a press conference today. “My impression is that since that time he’s had mental issues and perhaps is not as stable as he was back then."
