I have been trying to wrap my head around the new court papers that were just filed on June 7, 2010 in San Francisco Federal Court, the case VVA versus the CIA, DOD and the Army it added a few more defendents today, the Secretary of the Veterans Affairs.
The lawyers have tracked down a LOT of information since they originally filed the lawsuit in Jan 2009, they have found documentation that proves the extent of the experimentation, all of the agencies involved, including the supposedly gem called DARPA, it seems that one of the doctors that worked for them was doing septal implants in humans in the 1960s, like the ones he put in a Bull used in bull fighting rings, and cats etc. a Doctor Jose Delgado not to mention the US Army prisoners they bombed and killed in Australia in 1944. I found a lot of it hard to beleive, and I have been questioning our government and the CIA and DOD for a long time.
I have a really hard time in the words "Duty, Honor and Country" right now. I enlisted in the Army in 1973, it was expected in our family, all of the men have served in the Army going back to 1775. My grandfather served from 1861-1865 my father served in the 7th Calvary from 1914-1916, him and my Umcle Gideon both served with D Troop stationed in Douglas, Arizona, they went on the 1916 Mexican Punitative March, when General Pershing led an expeditionary force after Pancho Villa.
Maybe it's my fault for being naive. We fought the Nazi's because they were wrong and committing crimes against humanity, the Japanese and their Unit 731 that committed many of the same type of human experiments that the Germans did in the concentration camps.
Now June 7, 2010 court papers show that our own government killed American soldiers who were prisoners for crimes in Australia, they gave them a chance to volunteer for an experiment to get out of prison in exchange for taking part in the "project" oops the bombs dropped on them killed them all. No pardons for them.
104 On or about January 21, 1944, DEFENDANTS carried out a mission to test the effects of mustard gas bombs on American prisoners who had volunteered for the assignment on the understanding that they would be released from prison after it was concluded. These volunteers were placed in underground fortified bunkers on an island off the coast of Australia. In an effort to cover their tracks, DEFENDANTS used Australian pilots in American Air Force planes to conduct an air strike on the fortified bunkers, hoping to gain information to plan the invasion of Pacific Islands held by Japan. The secret mission was headed by Lt. Col. Jess Crowther of the 5th U.S. Air Force. The prisoners were killed in the bombing, and DEFENDANTS suppressed or destroyed information concerning the mission and its results.
A movie writer could not write this many bad plot lines into a movie, yet these are all things done by our own government.
This following quote is from a famous American General James Doolitlle he bombed Tokyo I admired him until today after I read this in the court papers.
"Report on the Covert Activities of the Central Intelligence Agency," which urged:
If the United States is to survive, long-standing American concepts of "fair play" must be reconsidered. We must . . . learn to subvert, sabotage, and destroy our enemies by more clever, more sophisticated, and more effective methods than those used against us. It may become necessary that the American people will be acquainted with, understand and support this fundamentally repugnant philosophy.
(James H. Doolittle, et al., Report on the Covert Activities of the Central Intelligence Agency (Sept. 30, 1954) at 2-3.)
He made that statement a year before I was born when the CIA was first getting permission to do human experimentation.
No we do NOT have to do things more repugnant than our enemies, why? Do we have to become the most evil people on earth the survive? I don't think so, I believe in justice, fair play, I used to believe in the American way, but the stuff I am reading in the court papers are not anything we were ever taught in school.
If they weren't true it would be a bad B movie, the hard part is we are making the same mistakes again today while we allow GITMO, we are not holding people accountable for the "enhanced interrogation methods" that President George W. Bush was bragging about water boarding KSM and how he would do it again if necessary.
Where do we draw the line on what is acceptable and what we will allow? Congress won't do anything, the Supreme Court allows Feres decision to stand, if any court case ever showed why a law should be changed it is this court case. If the government can kill, abuse and maim it's own military members with no recourse available to them, then it's time to CHANGE the law, it's time for the Supreme Court to over turn the 1950 Feres Decision that gave the government agenices approval to do whatever it wanted to active duty service members and veterans in government hospitals.
There have been decades if abuse, it's time for it to end.
You can read more about this and Gordon Erspamer here at Larry Scotts VA Watchdog.org
It's time for the courts to say enough........
sorry here is where they added the Secretary of the VA and why.....
FIFTH CLAIM FOR RELIEF BY VVA AND ALL INDIVIDUAL PLAINTIFFS
AGAINST DVA AND SECRETARY SHINSEKI
(Declaratory and Injunctive Relief)
- Plaintiffs reallege and incorporate herein by reference as though fully set forth, each and every allegation contained in Paragraphs 1 through 231 of this Complaint, subject to this Court’s rulings in its January 19, 2010, Order Granting in Part and Denying in Part Defendants’ Motions to Dismiss and Denying Defendants’ Alternative Motion for Summary Judgment.
Defendant Department of Veterans Affairs
- Defendant DEPARTMENT OF VETERANS AFFAIRS ("DVA") is the federal agency responsible for providing service-connected death and disability compensation ("SCDDC") and free, priority health care for our nation’s veterans (and their survivors) who become disabled or die in their service to our country. The Veterans Benefits Administration ("VBA") is the branch of DVA responsible for the administration of veterans’ benefits, including SCDDC, while the Veterans Health Administration ("VHA") is responsible for providing free health care to disabled veterans on a priority basis. Defendant ERIC K. SHINSEKI is the United States Secretary of Veterans Affairs, and is named herein solely in his official capacity.
- In approximately 2005-06, the DVA became involved in outreach activities and notification concerning veterans who had participated in the chemical and biological experiments program. DVA divided the exposed veterans relevant to this action into two groups. First, based upon information received from DOD, the DVA ultimately identified approximately 4,495 veterans who had been exposed to mustard agents and lewisite (mustard gas) ( the "Mustard Gas Group"). Second, DVA received or compiled a database of 10,528 veterans who were exposed to other chemical or biological substances at the Edgewood Arsenal (the "Chemical/Biological Weapons Group"). As known by the DVA, the DOD list received by the DVA omitted the names of all veterans exposed before 1954, which likely numbered in the tens of thousands.
- Neither the DVA nor other Defendants have made even a semblance of a comprehensive effort to identify or notify veterans exposed to chemical and biological weapons at other locations than the Edgewood Arsenal. Likewise, the DVA has not compiled any information concerning veterans who were the subject of brain implants or mind control experiments. Moreover, the DVA has made no effort to contact survivors of dead veterans, who would be eligible for Dependency and Indemnity compensation ("DIC") if the death of the veteran’s spouse were service connected. As a result, Defendants’ notification program began with a truncated list of names representing only a small fraction of the veterans exposed to chemical weapons, biological weapons, and mind control experiments and even a smaller fraction of persons potentially eligible for SCDDC, including DIC.
- Of the 4,495 veterans in the Mustard Gas Group, the DVA concluded that almost half (2,120) were dead; as to them, the notification efforts ceased, despite the survivors’ potential eligibility for DIC. Of the remaining 2,375 veterans in the Mustard Gas Group, the DVA has found addresses of only 371, or 15.6%. As of September 2009, the DVA had received 1,518 SCDDC claims by veterans based upon mustard gas exposure, 142 of which were still pending. The DVA’s 2009 report does not reveal how many of the remaining 1,376 mustard gas claims were granted, but a VBA data summary from January 2006 reported that 11 SCDDC claims in the Mustard Gas Group had been granted, or approximately 0.8%. VBA abandoned any further efforts to notify Mustard Gas Group veterans in 2009, and, as noted above, has never notified survivors of veterans whose deaths were or may have been service connected of their potential eligibility of DIC.
- Of the 10,528 names of veterans that DVA received from DOD concerning the Chemical/Biological Weapons Group, the DVA has notified only 3,218, or 30.6%, and appears to have made no effort to expand the original group of veteran names based upon defects, gaps, or omissions in the original list. Moreover, it appears that the DVA has made no effort to notify veterans with "possible exposures" or to identify military personnel exposed to toxic agents during "protective suit physicals" at Edgewood unless the soldier had actually sought aid at the "Toxic Aid Exposure Station." The DVA has received 87 SCDDC claims from veterans in the Chemical/Biological Weapons Group, of which only 2, less than 3%, have been granted. It is unclear whether the DVA has continued or abandoned efforts to notify veterans whose names are actually listed in the Chemical/Biological Weapons Group.
- The notification letters sent by the DVA to veterans enclose so-called "Fact Sheets" and Answers to "Frequently Asked Questions". The notification letters and other materials sent by DVA, together with other information prepared or circulated as part of the DVA outreach efforts, contain a series of misrepresentations of material fact and other information intended and calculated to discourage veterans from applying for SCDDC or seeking health care from the VHA. Among these misrepresentations and other statements were the following: (a) falsely representing that the chemical and biological weapons tests had begun in the mid-1950s, a misstatement intended to justify the decision not to notify participants tested before 1954 and to hide the fact that such tests did not conform to the Nuremburg Law; (b) falsely representing that scientific studies had been conducted showing that exposed veterans did not have any significant adverse health effects and that "available evidence and follow-up" studies had been conducted which "[did] not support significant long-term physical harm among subjects exposed to acutely toxic amounts of [these] agents other than mustard gas and Lewisite;" (c) falsely representing that the doses and safety of the test substances had been pre-confirmed in animal tests and that doses were increased only where there was "a low risk of serious side effects;" (d) falsely representing that the participants in the tests had received low doses; (e) falsely representing that the participants in the tests had voluntarily consented to them and the consent was informed because the Army had "provided study information to each volunteer;" (f) falsely representing that the tests were defensive in nature and purpose; (g) describing the drugs administered as "common approved pharmaceuticals," and that long-term health effects from psychochemicals were limited to LSD; (h) the omission of known, material information about the adverse physical and mental health effects of the chemicals and biological substances derived from earlier studies or incidents involving humans, past studies of industrial accidents, animals studies, and other sources; (i) falsely representing that the tests were conducted in "great care" and that details were recorded as to the date and type of study, the specific chemicals used, the amount of each chemical, the observed health effects, and any treatment provided, and that all participants had received treatment for all adverse health effects; (j) placing an undue and disproportionate emphasis on the inclusion of placebos and benign substances, particularly given the average number of tests of different chemicals each veteran was exposed to; (k) omitting information concerning DIC claims that could be brought by survivors of veterans who participated in the chemical and biological weapons tests; (l) withholding data concerning the incidence of diseases or conditions experienced by veterans that had been exposed to chemicals and drugs in experiments and the known dangers of interactions between or among different chemicals or substances administered to veterans; and (m) falsely representing that no specific medical tests or evaluations were available for the types of exposures experienced by veterans and emphasizing that medical examinations only were available from the DVA, and that the fact of notification did not suggest eligibility for health care or compensation, when in fact the DVA knew or should have known that some of the veterans receiving notice were eligible for one or both. The FAQs also represent that the DOD does not conduct any human experimentation involving chemical agents today, although appears to contradict itself in a later sentence where it states that the DOD continues to test agents that protect against chemical weapons, which implies that chemicals are still being administered to service personnel in order to test the protective agents. Moreover, the DVA has failed to adequately obtain exposure and test information available from the Army and DOD concerning the identity, properties, doses, mode of exposure, and other fundamental information relating to service connection, and to train adjudicators and medical personnel to fairly evaluate and process SCDDC claims based upon exposure to substances used in chemical and biological weapons or the program of mind-control experimentation.
- Defendants have actively concealed the DVA’s actual participation in the chemical and biological weapons program. Defendants have recently produced documents in discovery that reveal that the Army, DOD, and CIA procured from DVA some of the substances, including samples of drugs and chemicals, that the Army and CIA used to conduct experiments on military personnel or veterans. The adverse information that made such substances unsuitable for treatment or use were the exact same properties that made them attractive as candidates for use in chemical or biological weapons, yet the DVA either failed to advise the other defendants of the known or suspected risks or failed to ensure that those known or suspected risks were disclosed to the military personnel whom the DVA knew would be tested with the substances. Defendants never shared any information about known or suspected risks with the subjects of the experiments. DVA assumed an independent obligation of full disclosure and notification to the military personnel exposed to substances that it provided to Defendants, which is a continuing duty that DVA has continued to breach. Plaintiffs have been unable to obtain information from Defendants as to what substances were actually supplied by DVA, and which were used on the Individual Plaintiffs or other class members.
- Moreover, during the long period of time that the DVA has been involved in deciding whether affected veterans obtain free, priority health care and SCDDC, as well as conducting the outreach activities described above, the DVA has been conducting its own experiments using human subjects (veterans) that involve many of the same chemical and biological weapons that were the subject of the Army and CIA programs, and many of which also failed to comply with the Official Directives. For example, the DVA has tested LSD-25 on veterans dating back to at least the late 1950s. Based upon recent VHA filings concerning its Research Laboratory Hazardous Agents Control Program, the common chemicals/drugs tested by the DVA and the other Defendants include BZ (3-quinuclidinyl benzialate), Lewisite, LSD, mustard gas, phosgene, sarin, soman (GD), tabun (GA), VX (nerve gas), and others. Tests conducted in VHA research facilities also include a long litany of biological agents such has botulism, anthrax, ebola virus, brucella, and many others.
- The Fifth Amendment due process clause guarantees that decision makers respecting eligibility for health care and SCDDC be neutral and unbiased, and that they lack an interest in the subject matter of their determinations or some undisclosed conflict of interest. The DVA’s decisions described above, including the interminable delays in providing and misleading contents of the notice, the incomplete rosters of veterans selected to receive notice, the small percentage of veterans located, the nature of the information imparted to exposed veterans, and the shockingly low success rate on claims are all reflections, manifestations, or the results of bias and the violations of the due process rights of Plaintiffs and members of the proposed class.
- Plaintiffs are entitled to a declaration from this Court stating that the notification procedures and efforts by the DVA are inadequate, that Defendants’ compliance with their notification obligations has been unreasonably delayed, extending at this point in time to at least 33 years, and that decisions made by the DVA respecting entitlement to SCDDC and/or eligibility for free and/or medical care based upon service connection are null and void due to violations of the due process clause of the Fifth Amendment to the U.S. Constitution.
- Plaintiffs are also entitled to a preliminary and permanent injunction forbidding defendants from continuing to mislead "volunteers" or their survivors concerning the nature and extent of the testing program, health effects, and the other representations described above, and from continuing to use biased decision makers to decide their eligibility for free, priority health care and for SCDDC, including DIC. Plaintiffs also request that this Court enter an order directing the DVA to propose a plan to remedy denials of affected claims for SCDDC and/or eligibility for medical care based upon service connection and to devise procedures for resolving such claims that comply with the due process clause, which involve, at a minimum, an independent decision maker, all to be submitted to the Court for advance approval.
SIXTH CLAIM FOR RELIEF BY VVA AND ALL INDIVIDUAL PLANTIFFS AGAINST DVA AND SECRETARY SHINSEKI
(Declaratory and Injunctive Relief Under the Administrative Procedure Act § 706(1))
- Plaintiffs reallege and incorporate herein by reference as though fully set forth, each and every allegation contained in Paragraphs 1 through 243 of this Complaint, subject to this Court’s rulings in its January 19, 2010, Order Granting in Part and Denying in Part Defendants’ Motions to Dismiss and Denying Defendants’ Alternative Motion for Summary Judgment.
- DVA has an obligation pursuant to its own regulations to resolve all doubts that arise in the adjudication of a veteran’s SCDDC claim in favor of the veteran. 38 C.F.R. § 3.102. The regulation explicitly provides that "[t]he reasonable doubt doctrine is also applicable even in the absence of official records." Id. DVA’s explicit policy for rating SCDDC claims for service members who participated in the testing of chemical and biological agents during service, including the DIC claims of survivors, violates the reasonable doubt doctrine. DVA’s rating procedures, set forth in Veterans Benefits Administration ("VBA") Training Letter 06-04, provide that where a medical examiner determines that "the effects of exposure are unknown," that exposure "could be a contributor," or that exposure "may have a relationship" to a veteran’s disease or disability, that such determinations are "insufficient justification for a grant of service connection" (emphasis added). Yet, the lack of information regarding the doses and effects of exposure is due solely to Defendants’ failures adequately to record, study, or disclose the effects of veterans’ exposures to chemical and biological agents, and the other acts and failures to act alleged above.
- DVA has also affirmatively undertaken the obligation, in conjunction with the other DEFENDANTS, to locate and notify all test participants regarding their exposures. This obligation is pursuant to DVA’s promises to Congress and to the public, and is reflected in DVA’s own internal policies, correspondence, and memoranda. Yet, as set forth above, DVA has succeeded in notifying only a small fraction of the "volunteers," despite starting out with a computer list generated by the other DEFENDANTS. Also, as set forth above, the notices sent to those "volunteers" by DVA were inadequate in multiple respects. DVA has thus unlawfully withheld and unreasonably delayed notice to the vast majority of "volunteers."
- Plaintiffs are entitled to a declaration that DVA’s rating procedures and standards for deciding chemical and biological weapons claims violate the rule of reasonable doubt. Plaintiffs are also entitled to an injunction compelling the DVA to apply the reasonable doubt doctrine to Plaintiffs and all "volunteers" whose conditions may be related to their participation in testing, or where the effects of their exposure are unknown, and thus may be the cause of their disabilities or diseases. Plaintiffs are also entitled to an injunction forbidding DVA from refusing to notify Plaintiffs and all "volunteers" of the details of their participation in human experimentation programs and provide them with full documentation of the experiments done on them and all known or suspected health effects.
PRAYER FOR RELIEF
WHEREFORE, Plaintiffs pray for judgment against DEFENDANTS as follows:
- On the First Claim for Relief, for declaratory relief as prayed for above.
- On the Second Claim for Relief, for a preliminary and permanent injunction as prayed for above.
- On the Third Claim for Relief, for declaratory relief in favor of the Organizational Plaintiffs as prayed for above.
- On the Fourth Claim for Relief, for declaratory and injunctive relief as prayed for above;
- On the Fifth Claim for Relief, for declaratory and injunctive relief as prayed for above.
- On the Sixth Claim for Relief, for declaratory and injunctive relief as prayed for above.
- On all claims for relief, for Plaintiffs’ reasonable attorneys’ fees and costs incurred herein pursuant to 28 U.S.C. § 2412 and any other applicable law.