‘Insufficient evidence’ for Porton Down prosecutions

The inquiry into the deaths of service personnel used as research subjects at Porton Down has concluded that there is insufficient evidence to proceed with criminal prosecutions.

In 1999 Wiltshire Police instigated a major inquiry codenamed Operation Antler to examine the circumstances of the deaths of servicemen used as guinea pigs in research studies.

The police inquiry uncovered potential criminal liability amid “grave concerns” due to the actions of some former research scientists at the top-secret government weapons research facility.

However, legal opinion determined that insufficient evidence has been uncovered by the inquiry to take legal action.

The inquiry was commenced following claims made by a former serviceman who alleged that he had been involved in experiments to do with the common cold. He alleged that another serviceman had been killed by nerve gas and that the experiments had nothing to do with the common cold.

Subjects claimed that substances had been dripped onto their skin. In particular it was alleged that Aircraftsman Ronald Maddison died in May 1953 as a result of a nerve gas testing programme. A review of the inquest was being sought by police and was provisionally scheduled to take place later this year.

As the case potentially involved up to 250 servicemen, across a 50-year period, from 1939-1989, Wiltshire Police were initially allocated £850,000 funding by government to conduct the inquiry by a 13-strong team, including a military policeman, into the Service Volunteer Programme at Porton Down.

Wiltshire Police said that their initial inquiries had given them “grave cause for concern” and selected 25 cases for further investigation, eight of these were sent for examination by the Crown Prosecution Service. Over 700 ex-service personnel and their relatives contacted police in regard to the inquiry.

As part of the inquiry detectives appealed for a copy of the original notice posted regarding the research, although none was ever handed in, many service personnel recalled seeing the notice.

The finding of the CPS has outraged many veterans of the Porton Down testing who believe that their human rights were infringed as they thought they were involved in research into the common cold and not testing what they allege to have been "Nazi-style" testing of biological and chemical warfare agents.

(SP)