Asbestos HUB

W.R. Grace Criminal Trial Update April 2009

Posted: 21 Apr 2009 03:52 PM PDT

Kathleen Kennedy, a former epidemiologist for the National Institute of Occupational Safety and Health (NIOSH), testified during the W.R. Grace trial on April 14, 2009, that W.R. Grace stymied government efforts to study the health effects of Libby vermiculite.

When workers at a plant in South Carolina were diagnosed with "bloody pleural effusions" in their lungs, and it was determined that those workers had been exposed to Libby vermiculite, an investigation was launched.

"The primary purpose was to find out if there was a health hazard caused by the exposure to vermiculite so that workers could be protected if that was the case," Kennedy said.

When Kennedy and her research team contacted Grace, however, they were met with resistance from top officials, she said.

"They told us that they did not want us to do it," she said. "They did not give us any documents."

To make things even more interesting, defense lawyers representing W.R. Grace & Co. claim perjury by a government witness and prosecutors' failure to turn over favorable evidence "irreparably tainted" the biggest environmental criminal trial in U.S. history, saying said government misconduct made it impossible for Grace and five former executives charged in the asbestos contamination of Libby, Montana, to get a fair trial.

That evidence appears to be in the form of one Robert Locke, a former Grace executive who leaped the fence and is now a key prosecution witness. Defense lawyers asked U.S. District Judge Donald Molloy in Missoula, Montana, to throw out the testimony of Robert Locke.

The defendants, all former executives at W.R. Grace, are charged with conspiring to expose Libby residents to asbestos-contaminated vermiculite, a mineral mined in Libby, and used in insulation and gardening, and to obstruct government investigators. All have pleaded not guilty.

The defense claims prosecutors had an improperly close relationship with Locke and other witnesses and that Locke's three days of trial testimony last month should be stricken from the record.

Read the full story on how Grace officials stymied efforts to study vermiculite’s effects.

Read more complaining by W.R. Grace defense counsel. Hey, they’ve got to try, right?

Watch Tom Lamb report on Asbestos News Minute.