Porton Down Man'Unlawfully killed'

The death of a 20-year-old RAF engineer who underwent gas tests at Porton Down military base has been ruled as unlawful killing.

Leading Aircraftman Ronald Maddison, from Consett, Co Durham, took part in secret nerve gas tests at the base in Wiltshire in 1953.


He died after having drops of Sarin put on his arm in what he and others thought were harmless experiments.

Human volunteers took part in the nerve gas tests between 1939 and 1989.

An inquest jury sitting at Trowbridge reached the verdict after 64 days of evidence.

www.sky.com...

Well done for posting that Tom. Sky are a bit wrong on the start dates of human experimention at CDEE Porton Down. Servicemen were experimented on at Porton long before 1939.

Nerve gas death was 'unlawful'

Ronald Maddison died after an experiment at Porton Down
The inquest into a young airman who died 51 years ago in secret nerve gas tests has ruled that his death was unlawful.
Ronald Maddison, 20, from County Durham, died after being exposed to sarin at Porton Down in Wiltshire.

The original inquest in 1953 ruled that Leading Aircraftman Maddison's death was caused by misadventure.

In 2002, the High Court quashed that verdict and ordered that a new inquest should be held.

The jury concluded that the cause of Mr Maddison's death was "application of a nerve agent in a non-therapeutic experiment".

An MoD spokesman said: "The Ministry of Defence notes the jury's findings and will now take some time to reflect on these.

"We will be seeking legal advice on whether we wish to consider a judicial review.

"We don't believe the verdict today has implications for other volunteers. However, we will consider the implications."

The original inquest was held behind closed doors "for reasons of national security".

Operation Antler

Mr Maddison's family has claimed that he was tricked into taking part and was told he was helping to find a cure for the common cold.

Mr Maddison was exposed to 200 milligrammes of sarin which was dropped on to a piece of uniform material which was wrapped around his arm.

The second inquiry was prompted after ex-serviceman Gordon Bell complained to Wiltshire Police that he had been duped into similar tests.

The constabulary then launched Operation Antler which looked at experiments which used chemical and biological agents at government research centre Porton Down between 1939 and 1989.

The operation found that the coroner at the original inquest was "not apparently provided with all the potentially available material".

The outcome could lead to legal action by the veterans of Porton Down - They claim they were duped into taking part in similar dangerous trials.

The hearing, at Trowbridge Magistrates' Court, lasted six months.


news.bbc.co.uk...

zero lift

Well I have to admit I never thought any story containing the town where I was born and now live would ever make it onto ATS!

What makes this a bit more personal and stranger is the fact that Mr Maddisons brother is a mate of my dad's (his brother's nickname is 'streak' BTW...I have no idea why!)
I know the family have been campaining about this through various channels for years, and at one point it seemed like they would never get any resolution on Mr. Maddisons death.

I'm pleased for them all that they can now at least start to move on and all the other victims for porton downs human experiments (and their relatives) get the justice that they want. It's just a shame that it took this long.


Wayne..

unbelievable, they acrually tested nerve gas on volunteers. Even if he had of survived he probably wouol have had some permanent damage. Did the US conduct similar experiments ?

It's the rabbits I feels sorry for. Poor little fellas.

Yarnos wrote

Did the US conduct similar experiments ?

Some of the thousands of Chemical and Biological experiments that were done on US armed forces are listed on these links. The second link shows a chart that contains downloadable pdf files of details of the experiments.


deploymentlink.osd.mil...

deploymentlink.osd.mil...


zero lift

zero lift,

Did you work there once upon a time?

Tom

Tom Quinn wrote

zero lift, Did you work there once upon a time?

:

Nah, I don't think they'd have me.

For the last 7 years I've been researching the history of Porton Down experiments that were conducted in public areas of the UK from 1949-Now.

The reason? In February 1997, The Sunday Telegraph reported that residents in Dorset had been exposed to massive amounts of live bacteria during Porton biological warfare experiments that were conducted during 1963-1964. Further admissions by Porton Down have revealed that large swathes of the UK, Dorset in particular, was used as a giant BW laboratory by Porton Down between 1949-1975.





Check out some of these ATS threads for the full story.


www.abovetopsecret.com...

www.abovetopsecret.com...

www.abovetopsecret.com...
www.abovetopsecret.com...

www.abovetopsecret.com...

www.abovetopsecret.com...

And if you live in the UK, and either have a Sky Television satellite system or can receive ITV West, you can see two upcoming TV programmes which feature me banging on about these experiments. The first one is broadcast tomorrow, 18 November.

For further Porton programme details click here

So Tom, the answer is no, I never worked at Porton Down.

Instead, they came to where I live and sprayed the hell out of me and other Dorset residents from 1953-1975.

Although yesterday, I was reminded by the Parliamentary Under Secretary of State for Defence and Minister for Veterans, Ivor Caplin, that my invitation to visit Dstl Porton Down and inspect the Archives was still open.


zero lift

Originally posted by zero lift
Tom Quinn wrote

zero lift, Did you work there once upon a time?

:

Nah, I don't think they'd have me.



zero lift

Cheers I will look out for it.

I have cable but hopefully will get someone to tape it for me.


Tom