The U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service has a web site for Rocky Flats National Wildlife Refuge

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August 13, 2009

Some of Rocky Flats' secrets almost spilled out when the late Judge Sherman Finesilver donated his papers to the Denver Public Library

In August 1989, U.S. District Court Judge Sherman Finesilver impaneled Colorado special grand jury 89-2, to sift through evidence seized during unprecedented June 6, 1989 FBI raid on the Rocky Flats Nuclear Weapons Plant, sixteen miles upwind from Denver. It was the first time a federal agency had raided a federal facility, one created for the sole purpose of manufacturing plutonium triggers for nuclear bombs. The grand jurors would be sifting through evidence seized during that raid, listening to the agents who'd conducted it, hearing testimony from the whistleblowers who'd leaked information to the feds that indicated environmental crimes might have occurred at the plant - and might still be occurring. A ton of missing plutonium. "Pondcrete" spilling poisons into the ground. Secret incinerations at night. In April 1992, U.S. Attorney Mike Norton came up with a deal for Rockwell: The company would plead guilty to five felony and five misdemeanor violations of environmental laws and pay an $18.5 million fine - less than the bonuses the DOE had paid Rockwell for running the plant. Outraged by the deal, the grand jurors wrote a report outlining how justice had been denied and asked Finesilver to release it. Instead, he signed off on the settlement and ordered the report sealed. It was - but excerpts appeared in the September 29, 1992 issue of Westword, the secrets spilling out like the toxic sludge at the plant itself. And in January 1993, Finesilver finally released a redacted version of the report. The grand jurors never gave up on their goal of telling the whole truth, though. Rancher Wes McKinley, who served as foreman of the grand jury for two years, ran for Congress in hopes of being able to do so with immunity. In 1996, many other grand jurors filed a motion with U.S. District Judge Richard Matsch asking that they be released from their oath of secrecy and allowed to speak. Their request is still pending.

Before he passed away in 2006, Finesilver and his wife donated more than 180 boxes to the Denver Public Library, with the stipulation that they be kept closed until 2009. Librarian Roger Dudley said "When I began going through the grand jury materials, I ran across various forms of the grand jury report that were clearly marked as 'not for public release,' and wanted to find out if there was a time limit on such materials in order to restrict them," Dudley recalls. "I wanted to protect the library from liability." After calling around, he finally reached Gregory Langham, clerk of the U.S. District Court, who came down with an attorney to look through two boxes. Later, Langham returned to the library with a judge and examined still more documents, then wrote a letter requesting that certain items be returned to the court - including everything involving Rocky Flats. "Which we did," Dudley says.

Source: Patricia Calhoun, Judge Finesilver almost gave the Rocky Flats grand jury a big twentieth birthday present; Twenty years ago, the Rocky Flats grand jury started its search for justice. It hasn't ended yet, Denver Westword News, Aug 13, 2009

* [2006-04-28] Rocky Flats Workers Encouraged By Panel Decision
cbs4denver

* [2006-04-27] Board postpones decision on benefits for Rocky Flats workers
Ann Imse, Rocky Mountain News

* [2006-04-26] Udall and Salazar seek delay in Rocky Flats ruling
Ann Imse, Rocky Mountain News

* [2006-04-25] Rocky Flats Union Prepares for Fight as Federal Government Pushes to Deny Sick Workers Compensation
United Steelworkers Of America (pdf-44K)

* [2006-04-24] Rocky Flats radiation to be reviewed
UPI

* [2006-04-21] Rocky Flats visitors could receive warning
John Fryar, Canon City Daily Record

* [2006-04-07] eTrial Communications Inc. Supports Rocky Flats Trial
PR Newswire

January 31, 2006

* Rocky Flats celebration shows example of unreasonable ethics regulations

October 2003

Radiation protection - stakeholder involvement case study

The Rocky Flats controversy on radionuclide action levels was selected by the OECD Nuclear Energy Agency (NEA) to be developed as a case study on stakeholder involvement processes and experiences regarding radiological protection. The case study was used as an input to the Third Villigen Workshop (held in Villigen, Switzerland, on October 21-23, 2003). NEA has made a report on the workshop freely available at www.nea.fr

[Source: Nuclear News, "RECENTLY PUBLISHED: Stakeholder Participation in Radiological Decision Making: Processes and Implications", September 2004, p. 9]