Artvoice Daily

Artist and UB professor Steve Kurtz was cleared of charges for mail and wire fraud today in federal court. U.S. District Judge Richard Arcara ruled that criminal charges brought against him by federal prosecutors were “insufficient on[their] face.”

As readers will recall, Kurtz’s College Street home was raided by FBI agents wearing spacey-looking white biohazard suits only hours after his wife, Hope, died of a heart attack in May of 2004. Buffalo police who responded to Kurtz’s 911 call alerted the FBI that they’d found bacteria cultures and other strange items in the house.

Kurtz had obtained the cultures and other biological materials for use in his artwork that criticized the government’s food policies.

Artvoice has covered Kurtz’s case at several critical junctures. The last time was last year’s interview with Kurtz by AV editor Geoff Kelly on the release of a film about his case, “Strange Culture.”