Man hospitalized in ricin case has past of financial troubles

SALT LAKE CITY -- A hospitalized man who might have been made ill by the deadly toxin ricin was described by former neighbors Monday as an introvert who often moved around and who loved animals.

Roger Von Bergendorff, who has been at Spring Valley Hospital in Las Vegas since Feb. 14 -- unconscious, according to police and the FBI -- has had financial problems, filing for bankruptcy in 2000.

Authorities think they recovered all of the ricin in several vials found last week at the motel in Las Vegas where Bergendorff had stayed.

But they checked a home in Riverton where Bergendorff had lived with a cousin, Thomas Tholen, and three storage containers linked to Bergendorff.

The FBI said the searches yielded no health threats. Tholen declined to comment Monday when reached by telephone. He said he had not spoken with investigators.

Las Vegas police said that firearms, an "anarchist-type textbook" and castor beans were found in the motel room. The book was tabbed at a spot containing information about ricin.

As little as 500 micrograms of ricin, an amount about the size of the head of a pin, can kill a human, according to the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention. The only legal use for ricin is cancer research.

Von Roebuck, a CDC spokesman, said a sample of the substance arrived Monday for testing at the agency's Atlanta headquarters.

Bergendorff had lived in Riverton for more than a year before moving to Las Vegas about a year ago, former neighbor Tammy Ewell said. He spent the past three months in a camper belonging to a neighbor, John Walster.

Ewell described Bergendorff on Monday as an introverted man who wore down his hosts by living rent-free and taking advantage of their hospitality.

"He was just a quiet man who wasn't assertive enough to get a job, to put it kindly," she said.

She said Bergendorff was not social with neighbors and often did not return a friendly wave.

But while Bergendorff could be awkward around people, he loved animals, she said.

Public records showed that Bergendorff, 57, used at least six addresses between 1983 and 2007 in cities in Utah and California.

Bergendorff declared bankruptcy in San Diego in 2000, court records showed.

In 1993, a civil judgment was entered against him for an unpaid auto loan of about $13,000 in Orange County, Calif.