Archive for February, 2010

Today, the federal court dismissed the claims of the Indiana National Guardsmen in ‘McManaway et al v. KBR, Inc.’ pending in Evansville, Indiana. The Court found that the KBR defendants could not be sued in Indiana. We are disappointed by the ruling, particularly since so many of the veterans we represent are exhibiting symptoms of exposure to toxic sodium dichromate / hexavalent chromium. We will fight to hold KBR accountable for what happened to our Iraq veterans at Qarmat Ali. Doyle Raizner and co-counsel intend to refile the veterans’ claims in another federal-court jurisdiction as soon as possible. This development delays but does not deny justice for the Indiana Guardsmen in this case. The truth of what happened at Qarmat Ali will be told, and we believe it will be told in a federal court. The firm and co-counsel represent other veterans in Qarmat Ali-related cases pending in West Virginia and Oregon federal courts.

Article published today in The Oregonian by writer Julie Sullivan regarding the sodium dichromate exposure at Qarmat Ali. Ten Doyle Raizner clients in the Qarmat Ali litigation appeared at a press conference with Sen. Wyden in Portland, Oregon. The article can be found at: http://www.oregonlive.com/health/index.ssf/2010/02/wyden_extends_hand_to_help_ore.html

At a press conference in Portland, Oregon this morning, Senator Ron Wyden of Oregon called for legislation to protect soldiers exposed to sodium dichromate by Kellogg, Brown and Root (KBR) at the Qarmat Ali water treatment plant in Southern Iraq. Ten former Oregon National Guard troops were on hand ,and Spc. Larry Roberta spoke on behalf of this group of Doyle Raizner clients.

Along with members of the US Army National Guard, a large contingent of the British forces deployed in 2003 were also tasked with protecting KBR’s Qarmat Ali project near Basra, Iraq. Unfortunately, these men, primarily members of the RAF Regiment, were likewise wholly unprotected against the hazards of sodium dichromate-an anticorrosive chemical containing nearly pure hexavalent chromium, a carcinogen- even after its presence and dangers of unprotected exposure were known to KBR’s managers for months and months.

We are proud to represent Andy Tosh, a retired sergeant from the RAF Regiment now living in Lincolnshire, as he has joined the case of West Virginia veterans suing KBR for knowingly exposing them to the hazards at the site without protection. What appears clear from documentation provided to the British Forces is that at the same time KBR’s managers were documenting elevated chromium levels in the admittedly inadequate blood testing of KBR’s civilian employees, KBR’s managers apparently deliberately told British Forces exactly the opposite. Accordingly to an internal KBR memo dated August 8, 2003 “60 percent” of workers showing symptoms” was being found, while the KBR personnel in liaison with the British forces were telling them (accordingly to a British Forces fact sheet, “b. Biological monitoring test results to which we have been given access for contractors and American forces have been within normal limits.”). Andy Tosh and his fellow members of British Forces, part of the Multinational Forces serving in support of Restoring Iraqi Freedom, were entitled to and did rely on the knowing misrepresentations by KBR’s managers about the hazards they faced at the time of their exposures, as well as the serious health consequences they now face. It is simply not right that these men serving their country, in this case America’s staunchest allies in the United Kingdom, have the bear the consequences of these deliberate decisions by KBR’s managers.