A scientist detained at Miami International Airport because of a suspicious item in his luggage had once been charged with illegally transporting bubonic plague, a senior law enforcement official said. No dangerous material was found on 70-year-old Thomas Butler after he was detained Thursday night, the official said Friday. Butler had been acquitted of the charges of transporting the potentially deadly germ in 2003. Butler cooperated fully after he arrived on a flight from the Middle East, said the official, who requested anonymity because he wasn't authorized to release the information. Most of the airport was shut down Thursday night after officials found a suspicious metal canister in Butler's luggage. A Homeland Security spokesman said at first it looked like a pipe bomb, but no explosives were found. The senior law enforcement official said that a Transportation Safety Administration inspector noticed an odd container as Butler was going through Customs after arriving on a flight from the Middle East. Those facts caused the inspector to run Butler's name in a database and discover that he had been tried on the plague charges in 2003. Officials decided to evacuate the airport and detain Butler. Tests showed that Butler, the container and his other belongings did not contain any hazardous biological material or explosives. He was released Friday morning. A Miami-Dade police bomb squad spent hours scouring the airport. Between 100 and 200 passengers were evacuated from four of the airport's six concourses. Airport roadways and a hotel near the airport's international terminal were closed down. Police and airport officials described the shutdown of the concourses as a public safety precaution. Butler is a professor at Ross University in Dominica on a teaching assignment in Saudi Arabia, said another government official who also requested anonymity to discuss the ongoing investigation.
