The State - News from June 12, 1986

A supermarket chain removed cigarettes from sale at two of its San Jose stores--and offered refunds to anyone who returns cigarettes purchased there in the past two weeks--after anonymous letters warned they had been laced with sodium cyanide to terrorize “stinking scum smokers.” The FBI and San Jose police were investigating the letters, which were received by three television stations and two newspapers, and FBI spokesman John Holford said his organization was “taking it very seriously. We’re not going to treat this in a ho-hum manner.” Bill Wade, senior vice president of the Alpha Beta Corp., said preliminary examination of cigarettes pulled from the shelves showed no signs of tampering, and there had been no reported incidents of poisoning among customers at the two stores.