Law Firms Sue Hanford On Behalf Of Indians Suit Against Government, Contractors, UW Claims Indians Deliberately Exposed To Radiation
A lawsuit filed Wednesday by two law firms alleges Indians were deliberately exposed to radiation released from the Hanford Nuclear Reservation as part of secret government radiological tests during the Cold War.
The suit filed in U.S. District Court here seeks to be classified as a class-action on behalf of individual Indians who lived near the southcentral Washington nuclear reservation.
The suit was filed by Chamberlain, Neaton and Johnson of Minneapolis and Baker, Donelson, Bearman and Caldwell of Memphis, Tenn.
A statement announcing the suit did not say what compensation was being sought. There was no answer after business hours Wednesday at either firm’s offices.
Named as defendants are the federal government and several former and current Hanford contractors, including DuPont Co., General Electric Co., Westinghouse Electric Corp., Rockwell International Inc. and the Battelle Pacific Northwest Laboratory.
The University of Washington also is named because of research the school conducted with Hanford officials.
The Department of Energy could not be reached for comment. There was no answer at the agency’s Hanford office after business hours Wednesday, and a phone message left at DOE-Hanford spokesman Guy Schein’s office was not returned.
The suit alleges that Indians have been subjected to systematic experimentation on the hazards of radiation exposure by the government and agencies such as the former Atomic Energy Commission, the Department of Defense and the Department of Energy.
Radiation releases dating to Hanford’s inception during World War II were orchestrated to monitor the effect of radiation exposure on vegetation, fish and humans, the suit alleged.
As a result of the releases, thousands of residents of towns and areas surrounding the 560-square-mile reservation north of Richland have suffered health problems including thyroid cancer, arthritis and reproductive disorders, the suit said.
Indians were particularly at risk from the releases because of their lifestyles, dietary traditions, religious expressions and cultural habits, the suit said.
Government officials were aware of the Indians’ unique situation and accordingly selected them as study subjects, the suit alleged.
Indians were studied without their knowledge or consent, in violation of their constitutional rights, and the government did not take steps to protect them from harm, the suit said.
“The government instead continued monitoring Native Americans as subjects of secret experiments to determine what ill effects could be detected over time from systematic exposure to repeated doses of radiation through their diet and way of life,” the statement announcing the suit said.
Recent government steps to monitor the health of Hanford “downwinders” fail to take into account the increased risk Indians face because of their diet and lifestyle, the suit said.
More than 20,000 people already are listed as plaintiffs in class-action lawsuits against the federal government that claim health damage from Cold War-era radiation releases at Hanford.
Declassification of thousands of government documents in recent years has brought to light information about several deliberate and accidental radiation releases from Hanford and other government nuclear sites.