On August 24, Kerr-McGee and the family of Karen Silkwood settled the notorious, 10-year-old plutonium contamination suit for $1,380,000. Thus ended, legally speaking, a suit that illustrates the perversion of justice in contemporary America. In such media-selected cases, the judicial branch, no less than the legislative and executive, is subservient to the real power wielders
¾the mass media, who play the role of a lynch mob, but with halos round their heads.The simple facts of the Silkwood case were well described in two thoroughly researched articles by Nick Thimmesch ("Karen Silkwood without Tears," Sat. Ev. Post Nov. and Dec. 1979). She was an unstable woman who was unable to settle down with one sexual partner for long, who abandoned three small children (the youngest not yet two), who twice attempted suicide by overdosing with drugs, who was a heavy user of Methaqualone (a hypnotic sedative), and who had two car accidents by driving off the road in two weeks
¾the second one fatal. That her car was driven off the road by some sinister villain is baseless speculation, typical of Hollywood hype. (The car was hidden by her union; CBS, which showed it on TV, promised not to reveal its hiding place.)The numerous contamination tests made on her on the premises of Kerr-McGee, often at her own insistence, revealed no significant contamination. The plutonium found in her urine on one occasion was determined to have been put there after excretion. The entire case was based on the small, but potent amount of plutonium found in the bathroom of her apartment; it was never established how it got there, though on the basis of her history I would guess (as do other students of the case) that she smuggled it out from the plant.
But there was no need for evidence, for the media had made Silkwood into a saint and martyr. A $1 million/year lawyer was hired by the ever well-heeled antinuclear lobby. A suitable judge was installed: the first was forced to resign after he had
¾truthfully¾observed that the whole case did not amount "to a hill of beans," and the second for some other reason; the third and final judge disallowed evidence on Silkwood's drug abuse, and by narrowing the scope of the trial disqualified the defense that Silkwood was the source of her own troubles and was exploited by union interests. Instead of evidence, the trial produced support for a new principle: to establish a defendant's innocence, it is insufficient to prove that he obeyed the law. Under "strict liability," he can be convicted of anything he should have done¾in the malleable and retroactive opinion of a jury, ultimately molded once again by the media.Kerr-McGee was convicted for something that had not taken place on its property, and in spite of its undisputed proof of having taken all precautions prescribed by law. The Supreme Court let this fundamental injustice stand; it weaseled out on a murky technicality, which would have resulted in a new trial for the amount of damages only.
The rest is familiar: like the case of Agent Orange and numerous others presented by the media as a gallant fight of the martyred consumer against the profit-greedy corporations, Kerr-McGee settled not because it was guilty, but because it was cheaper to compromise than to continue the fight against the awesome might of the witch hunters.
And as in other cases, Silkwood's children will get less than half the loot; the rest will line the lawyers' pockets.
Compared with totalitarian countries, American justice is still superb; but why use totalitarians as a standard? Compared with the rest of the Free World, American justice is by now the poorest.
In no other country under the rule of law would it be possible to sentence a man for a first-time burglary, in which nothing was stolen and no resistance offered to the police, to 10 years in prison
¾as happened to Gordon Liddy (with Supreme Court approval); nor could a judge, as happened in that case, use extortion by piecemeal sentencing to force defendants into incriminating themselves.In few other countries under the rule of law can frivolous suits be filed by political activists without risk of bearing court and defendant's costs; in the US, the legalistic saboteurs, far from taking any risk, are rewarded by taxpayers' funds as "intervenors."
In most other countries under the rule of law it is the police and the prosecutor, not the victim of a crime and society at large, who are punished for illegally obtained evidence. But such evidence remains what it is: evidence.
And there is more
¾much more. Yet we keep hearing the repetitious story that American justice is the best in the world.Says who? Says the media lynch mob that has perverted it.
Yes, the rest of the free world is often following the US' bad example in letting its justice be perverted, too. But that is no reason to give up on restoring America as the country with liberty and justice for all.
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Vol. 14, No. 2
Newsletter: Access to Energy Newsletter Archive Volume: Issues Issue/No.: Vol. 14, No. 2 Date: November 29, 2004 04:54 PM Title: Justice and St. Karen
Copyright © 2004 - Access to Energy Newsletter Archive
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