Full Trial Ordered On Safety, Stability Of Neutron Products

["Michael C. Baker" <mcbaker@lanl.gov>]

FYI ... Mike ... mcbaker@lanl.gov

>Full Trial Ordered On Safety, Stability Of Neutron Products
>By Fern Shen, Washington Post, June 17, 1999; Page B05 
>
>A Montgomery County Circuit Court judge ruled yesterday that state
>officials' questions about Neutron Products Inc.'s financial stability and
>safety record should be explored at a full trial rather than a one-day
>hearing and cleared the way for the controversial maker of nuclear medical
>projects to resume production.
>
>But Judge Paul A. McGuckian, who rejected the state's request for a
>preliminary injunction that would have stopped its core activities and
>prohibited Neutron from receiving additional radioactive material on site,
>said he believes the state will win at trial.
>
>McGuckian said that if he issued an injunction against Neutron it would
>likely drive the company out of business and render moot a trial on the
>merits of the case. Explaining his decision, McGuckian said from the bench
>that immediate action was not necessary against Neutron because the state's
>request for an injunction "is not directly related to issues of public
>health" but is "essentially about money."
>
>Yet McGuckian did limit the company's activities, pending a full trial, to
>the level it maintained during the 12-month period ending April 13. That
>was the day the state cracked down on Neutron and ordered it to shut down
>the part of the business that creates the radioactive sources for medical
>therapy and food irradiation.
>
>McGuckian, who did not set a trial date, gave the two sides 10 days to work
>out the details of the agreement.
>
>The lawyer representing the state declined to comment yesterday, but Rena
>I. Stinzor, the attorney for neighbors of the facility, said McGuckian's
>decision means that Neutron will probably be barred from "any extraordinary
>importation of waste" during the period before the trial.
>
>"We will be back in operation soon," said Jackson A. Ransohoff, president
>of Neutron, based in Dickerson. "We are champing at the bit."
>
>State regulators have cited Neutron repeatedly over the past 10 years for
>safety and procedural violations. In a 1988 incident, a company vice
>president whose clothes were contaminated with radioactivity set off alarms
>in a New York nuclear plant that he was visiting. Maryland officials
>testified during the hearing on a preliminary injunction that state
>radiological health staffers have conducted 39 inspections and 19
>investigations of Neutron since 1985 and found 192 violations.
>
>Though refusing to shut down Neutron, McGuckian noted that the Maryland
>Department of the Environment is likely to win at trial on the merits of
>its argument that Neutron violates the state law requiring it to have
>$750,000 in financial assets to pay for decommissioning the core part of
>its facility.
>
>"The state has a legitimate concern that without the money set aside, the
>public will be eventually responsible for cleaning up the site," McGuckian
>said.
>
>More pressing, McGuckian said, is the undue hardship the state's
>restrictions would pose on the 40-year-old Montgomery County company, which
>would "clearly devastate the company's ability to do business" and result
>in "significant loss of personnel and cash flow."
>
>Neighbors of Neutron said they were disappointed that McGuckian did not
>grant the state's request to severely curtail Neutron's activities. But
>they said they were pleased with his acknowledgement that the state has a
>strong case.
>
>"That's very encouraging -- he said he sees the state winning on the
>merits," said Carol Oberdorfer, president of the Dickerson Community
>Association.
>
>Oberdorfer noted that Neutron is still barred from performing cobalt melts,
>as a result of a judge's order in a 1996 lawsuit. Neutron is under orders
>to build a structure to enclose the courtyard where it has conducted these
>melts -- the process that generates the most radioactive waste of any
>activity at the facility.
>
>Members of the Dickerson group packed the courtroom Tuesday, listening to
>hours of testimony that might have seemed dry to an outsider, but elicited
>chuckles, hisses and even tears at one point, among this group of long-time
>opponents.
>
>Yesterday, after court adjourned, the two sides remained as far apart as
>ever. Asked by a television reporter about a state expert's testimony that
>Neutron's closest neighbors are receiving the equivalent of eight extra
>X-rays annually, Ransohoff had a quick reply.
>
>"The only thing they have to fear is that they are not getting enough"
>radiation, he said, as the eyes of opponents widened in surprise. "There is
>some evidence to suggest that low doses of radiation stimulate the immune
>system." 
>
>--------------
>
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