Federal Grand Jury Research Articles

In wake of dropped case, prescribers may be less likely to be prosecuted

In 2019, a federal grand jury indicted a pharmaceutical distributor, Ohio-based Miami-Luken Inc., two former officials, and two pharmacists with conspiring to distribute controlled substances. But in August 2022, the Department of Justice dismissed four of the indictments and vacated the previously entered guilty plea for the fifth. The reason was because of the U.S. Supreme Court decision in Ruan (see Supreme Court rejects standard underlying prosecutions of opioid prescribers, ADAW July 11, https://onlinelibrary.wiley.com/doi/10.1002/adaw.33491), which determined that in order to be found guilty of distributing controlled substances illegally, prescribers needed to be proven to have an intent to do so.

“If That Be Treason, Let Them Make the Most of It!”: Olin Downes, the Spanish Civil War, and Civil Liberties in the United States

“If That Be Treason, Let Them Make the Most of It!”: Olin Downes, the Spanish Civil War, and Civil Liberties in the United States

Charles Lieber indicted on fraud charges

Charles M. Lieber, an expert in nanoscience and former chair of Harvard University’s Department of Chemistry and Chemical Biology, was indicted by a federal grand jury on June 9. The grand jury for...

9/11 Truth and the Silence of the IR Discipline

International Relations (IR) scholars uncritically accept the official narrative regarding the events of 9/11 and refuse to examine the massive body of evidence generated by the 9/11 truth movement. Nevertheless, as calls for a new inquiry into the events of 9/11 continue to mount, with the International 9/11 Consensus Panel and World Trade Centre Building 7 Evaluation inquiries having recently published their findings, and with a U.S. Federal Grand Jury on 9/11 having been announced, now would be an opportune moment for IR scholars to start taking the claims of 9/11 truth seriously. A survey of the 9/11 truth literature reveals that the official 9/11 narrative cannot be supported at multiple levels. Two planes did not bring down three towers in New York. There is no hard evidence that Muslims were responsible for 9/11 other than in a patsy capacity. Various U.S. government agencies appear to have had foreknowledge of the events and to have covered up evidence. Important questions regarding the hijacked planes need answering, as do questions about the complicity of the mainstream media in 9/11. IR scholars avoid looking at evidence regarding the events of 9/11 for several reasons. They may be taken in by the weaponized term, “conspiracy theory.” A taboo on questioning the ruling structures of society means that individuals do not wish to fall outside the spectrum of acceptable opinion. Entertaining the possibility that 9/11 was a false flag requires Westerners to reject fundamental assumptions that they have been socialized to accept since birth. The “War on Terror” has created a neo-McCarthyite environment in which freedom to speak out has been stifled. Yet, if IR scholars are serious about truth, the first place they need to start is 9/11 truth.

Espionage, the First Amendment, and the Case Against Julian Assange

In May 2019, a federal grand jury returned an eighteen-count criminal indictment against WikiLeaks founder Julian Assange. 1 Charges include conspiring to obtain national defense information, obtai...

Ex-Monsanto scientist indicted

A federal grand jury in St. Louis has indicted former Monsanto researcher Haitao Xiang for stealing crop productivity algorithms with the intention of handing them over to a Chinese government research institute. After Xiang quit his job in June 2017, he downloaded the algorithms to a micro-SD card, according to the indictment. He then purchased a one-way ticket to China; federal officials stopped him at the airport and seized the card. If convicted, Xiang faces up to 15 years in prison and a $5 million fine on each of several espionage charges, and up to 10 years for each of several trade secret theft charges.

Suboxone maker indicted for fraud, with focus on pill‐film patent switch

The maker of Suboxone — Indivior, formerly (until 2014) Reckitt Benckiser Pharmaceuticals (RBP) — has been indicted by a federal grand jury for its machinations to ensure that it kept market share for its product. The indictment, released by the federal Department of Justice (DOJ) April 9, charges that Indivior illicitly schemed to increase prescriptions of its Suboxone Film by deceiving prescribers and insurance companies into thinking it was safer than other drugs, including its own tablets, which were about to lose patent protection. Instead of having to compete with generics, Indivior worked to transfer all its tablet Suboxone patients to film, on which it held the patent.

Ex-Eastman employee charged with trade-secret theft

A federal grand jury has indicted an American materials scientist and a Chinese national for stealing trade secrets related to formulas for bisphenol A–free coatings. The technology was developed by several companies and a major customer as part of an effort to replace food and beverage can linings made with BPA-containing epoxies because of concerns about the human health effects of BPA. The American, Xiaorong “Shannon” You, is a PhD polymer scientist and 25-year industry veteran who worked for Coca-Cola and Eastman Chemical, the companies confirm. They are identified as “Employer #1” and “Employer #2” in the indictment. During You’s employment at Coca-Cola as principal engineer for global research, the beverage company had a confidential research collaboration with six unnamed firms to develop non-BPA coating technologies. The indictment says she was one of a limited number of employees with access to trade secrets from all six companies. Before she left

Two plastics execs indicted

A federal grand jury in Indianapolis has charged two former executives of Evansville, Indiana–based Lucent Polymers with fraud. The indictment alleges that the two executives, former CEO Keven Kuhn...

<i>In re</i> Government Attorney Client Privilege: A Categorical Rule to Settle the Issue

The attorney client privilege is an evidentiary principle and a longstanding creature of common law. The privilege is meant to encourage open and honest communication between lawyer and client, and protects the disclosure of those communications. The privilege promotes the administration of justice by allowing individuals to confidentially communicate with skilled attorneys and receive sound legal advice. The privilege is not without limitations though, and should be applied narrowly due to its power to prevent the production of evidence in criminal cases. Government attorneys and employees remain uncertain about whether the attorney client privilege will apply to their communications when faced with a criminal grand jury subpoena. The U.S. Court of Appeals for the First Circuit had a chance to weigh in on the issue in 2018 for the first time, but left more questions unanswered. The First Circuit rejected the application of a categorical rule that the Rhode Island government could not assert the attorney client privilege in response to a federal grand jury subpoena. Instead of applying a categorical rule, the court addressed a number of factors to determine the applicability of the privilege. The First Circuit court went so far as to say that the government attorney client privilege analysis may hinge on who the target or subject of the grand jury investigation is. The First Circuit is the fifth circuit court of appeal since 1997 to address the application of the attorney client privilege to government attorneys when faced with a grand jury subpoena stemming from a criminal investigation. Each circuit took their own analytical approach to decide the issue, creating a split in the five circuits reasoning and holdings. This Note explores the reasoning and factors used by each of the circuits in deciding whether or not to uphold the privilege. After considering those factors, this Note argues that there should be a categorical rule that neither a state nor the federal government may invoke the attorney client privilege in response to a criminal grand jury subpoena. To justify this conclusion, this Note outlines how current government attorney client privilege case law and the policy underpinnings of the privilege itself dictate that a categorical rule is appropriate.

"A Bunch of Tough Hombres": Police Brutality, Municipal Politics, and Racism in South Texas

"A Bunch of Tough Hombres":Police Brutality, Municipal Politics, and Racism in South Texas Brent M. S. Campney (bio) "Everybody knew the McAllen police were a bunch of tough hombres, especially the Boys on C shift," reported the Dallas Morning News on March 29, 1981. "Working the midnight-to-8 a.m. shift along the border is like being at war, the cops said. You have to be tough. The Boys on C shift worked at being tough." Many of the "Boys" wore black T-shirts with gold letters bearing "the legend, 'C Shift Animals.' They even had their own slogan: 'Kick…and Ask Questions Later.'" Only days earlier, the public had become aware of their misdeeds, revealed in six years of booking room videos recorded by the McAllen Police Department (MPD) and subpoenaed by a civil rights attorney. On these videos Anglo and Mexican American officers alike confirmed suspicions that they had beaten, kicked, and abused prisoners—in virtually all cases, working-class Mexican Americans.1 Station KGBT in nearby Harlingen played television footage of the beatings, bringing a flood of outrage. "One woman, like many of the callers, was almost in tears when she thanked us over and over again for showing such terrible things going on," noted a representative of the station. "She said as soon as she got through talking to us, she was going to call the McAllen police to demand an answer [as to] why those things had happened."2 She was not alone. "The police switchboard was lit up for hours after the tapes were shown on TV," declared James C. Harrington, the attorney for the American Civil Liberties Union (ACLU), which had secured the videos and released them to the media.3 As investigators probed the scandal, some pointed to the mayor—already locked in a heated, racially tinged political race with Ramiro Casso, a Mexican American challenger—as an enabler. On May 3 the News reported that "the federal grand jury investigation of accusations of [End Page 787] brutality by McAllen police has broadened to include the possibility of a cover-up of the incidents by Mayor Othal Brand and other city officials."4 This study tells the story of the 1981 MPD scandal, its impact on the ongoing municipal election between an Anglo incumbent and a Mexican American challenger, and its role in unifying Mexican Americans in South Texas during a period in which they were beginning to seize the reigns of local and regional power. Historians such as David Montejano, Marc Simon Rodriguez, and Brian Behnken have incorporated the issue of police brutality into their scholarship on the Mexican American civil rights movement during the post World War II period. In his discussion of Colorado, for example, Rodriguez found that between "1962 and 1964, police brutality became a significant issue for Mexican Americans in Denver and was the spark that ignited community activism. Several young men had had interactions with the police, and what should have been no more than minor skirmishes led to the young men's deaths."5 Nevertheless, historians have focused on particularly egregious incidents in places like East Los Angeles and Dallas rather than on the issue of police violence more broadly. This study places police violence at the center of the story and addresses its significance in enforcing repression, promoting resistance, and transforming local and regional power relations.6 The study proceeds in five sections. In the first it details the history of police violence against Mexican Americans in Texas and in the Lower Rio Grande Valley (hereafter, the Valley) in the 1970s. In the second section it examines the role in these events of Othal Brand, the so-called Onion King, who owned one of the most powerful agribusiness interests in Texas and served as the mayor of McAllen. In the third it analyzes the MPD scandal, the roots of which dated back to the early 1970s. In the fourth it explores the mayoral campaign, election, and election runoff, all of which not only highlighted the police scandal but underlined racial and class divisions in this South Texas city. In the final section it considers the historiographical implications of its findings. To tell...

Lab chemicals supplier charged with illegal shipments

A federal grand jury has indicted lab chemical supplier AK Scientific, based in Union City, Calif., and its owner, Peiwen Zhou, for smuggling and illegally shipping hazardous chemicals. According to allegations contained in the indictment, Zhou told his employees to purchase hazardous chemicals (using false names) from suppliers in China. The indictment also charges that Zhou told employees to ship chemicals to customers in the U.S. and abroad without labeling them as hazardous. Reached via e-mail, an AK spokesperson describes the company’s hazardous materials shipment program as “industry leading.” He adds that “AK Scientific looks forward to working with the government to reach a just and reasonable conclusion.” If convicted, Zhou faces 20 years in prison and a $250,000 fine on the smuggling charge alone. AK faces hundreds of thousands of dollars in fines and several years of probation. The indictment alleges, for instance, that AK smuggled 25 kg of

Taxing audit markets and reputation: An examination of the U.S. tax shelter controversy

From 2002 to 2007, the nation's largest CPA firms faced allegations of illegal activity related to the sale of tax shelters: EY, KPMG and PwC paid fines; KPMG was investigated by a federal grand jury; and EY faced a criminal inquiry. These shelter events occurred shortly after the 2002 collapse of Arthur Andersen, when policy makers were concerned about audit market concentration. This is the first paper to provide a chronological summary of how the tax shelter controversy started and ended. We investigate the stock market reaction to tax shelter news developments between 2003 and 2005 to make inferences about the market's view of audit competition and CPA firm reputation. Our results are consistent with market concern over large audit firm concentration, evidenced by large negative returns for clients of all audit providers upon the KPMG grand jury investigation announcement. We also find that tax shelter activities impact both the reputation of the accounting profession and the individual CPA firms marketing tax shelter products.

Proposal to Establish the Federal Civil Grand Jury System in America:Effective Civic Oversight of Federal Agencies and Government Personnel

French jurist and philosopher Alexis de Tocqueville once declared that trial by jury is the instrument of the sovereignty of people and contributes to insure the best administration of justice in the government. However, the U.S. Government has never created an effective civic investigative institution to directly check and monitor the function of government agencies and their personnel. This paper then examines the possible establishment of a federal civil grand jury system in America. The proposal to institute the civil function of the federal grand jury is extremely important and timely, especially given the fact the former CIA IT consultant and whistleblower Edward Snowden recently exposed massive illegal surveillance of hundreds of millions of people in the U.S. and around the globe by the National Security Agency (NSA) and other intelligence sources in the federal government. Today, the criminal function of the grand jury system at both state and federal levels has been firmly established by the Fifth Amendment to the U.S. Constitution. Nonetheless, the civil function of the federal grand jury has lost its ability to inquire into non-criminal matters, to investigate political corruption or state inefficiencies, or to issue official reports on their civil investigation of officers and agencies in the federal government. Similarly, the overwhelming majority of the individual states have also lost much of their civic oversight role of the grand jury. Today only handful of states, including California and Nevada, continue to require the annual empanelment of the grand jury to conduct the civil investigation of the actions of local governments and their officials. The paper begins with the historical genealogy of the grand jury system in England and the U.S. and chronicles citizens’ historical struggles against the government’s abuse of power and authority. The second section examines the important socio-legal function of civil grand juries in California and their democratic impact on citizen empowerment in local communities. Finally the paper provides a set of recommendations and proposals to establish the federal civil grand jury system in the U.S.

Unannounced Visits From Environmental Regulators, Part 2: What to Do When Your Employee Receives a Federal Grand Jury Subpoena

In part 1 (Unannounced Visits From Environmental Regulators, Part 1: Planning Ahead With an REIIP; February 2012) of this two‐part series, we discussed how facility directors and managers can plan ahead for unannounced visits by environmental regulators. If you read that article and followed its recommendations, you have already contacted counsel and developed a regulatory inspection and investigation policy (REIIP). For those who may have gotten a bit of a late start on your REIIP, this article will help.

Mandatives: Lessons on raising/control diagnostics

Mandatives:Lessons on raising/control diagnostics Michael Barrie and Christine Pittman 1. Introduction At first blush, mandative infinitival constructions (1) in English (Quirk and Greenbaum 1973) take on the appearance of control constructions based on traditional raising/control diagnostics. (1) a. Mary ordered John to peel the grapes. b. John commanded Mary to wash the star fruit. c. Mary obliged John to slice the papaya. d. Mary permitted John to core the apple. There are a number of important differences between mandatives and control predicates. First, unlike most control predicates, mandatives do not allow a partial control reading (Wurmbrand 2001:241, 247). (2) a. John ordered Mary to go to the opera (*together). b. Susan obliged Fred to *meet/*gather/wait in the lobby. This is surprising since mandatives do not fit neatly in Landau's (2000) class of control verbs that do not allow partial control, namely modals, aspectuals, and implicatives, which take so-called tenseless infinitives. We employ a variety of traditional diagnostics (mostly derived from Perlmutter and Soames 1978) to show that the mandatives instead pattern with raising-to-object verbs. Crucially for the analysis we lay out, the subject of the embedded clause is not θ-marked by the matrix verb. However, we argue that these predicates have an additional requirement. This usually leads to the interpretation of an implicit (pragmatically determined) goal of mandation (i.e., an orderee). This goal of mandation is often equivalent to the embedded subject (thus the appearance of control) but is not necessarily the embedded subject, as we illustrate below. [End Page 131] The remainder of the squib is organized as follows. Section 2 argues that mandatives such as order, command, and oblige are raising-to-object predicates. Section 3 presents a suggestion for the argument structure of mandatives. Section 4 is a brief conclusion. 2. Mandatives Are Raising-To-Object Verbs This section examines the standard diagnostics for raising versus control showing that they give mixed results for mandatives. We argue that the requirement that mandatives have an implicit goal of mandation interferes with some of the standard tests. Once these interfering factors are controlled for, the diagnostics clearly show these predicates to be raising verbs. 2.1 Non-thematic subjects Mandatives are usually thought to pattern with control verbs and not with raising-to-object verbs in terms of their ability to occur with non-thematic subjects. The following examples show that weather-it is not permitted in control constructions, but is permitted in raising constructions, respectively. (3)*John persuaded it to snow. (4) John expected it to snow. On the surface, mandatives seem to pattern with control (3) and not with raising-to-object (4). (5)*John ordered/commanded/required/permitted it to snow. However, non-thematic there shows a different pattern. Again, expletives are not permitted with control constructions but are available in raising constructions. (6)*John persuaded there to be fruit available at the reception. (7) John expected there to be fruit available at the reception. (8) John ordered/required/commanded/permitted there to be fruit available at the reception. Example (8) shows that the expletive there is available to mandatives. The following examples were found on various websites using Google.1 Similar data can easily be found with other mandative verbs. (9) There is no known evidence however that Arnold Palmer (the "King") ordered there to be any harm done to him. (imademymark.blogspot.com/2005/04/tiger-woods-is-god.html) (10) In the 5th century Bishop Memertus of Vienne ordered there to be processions of prayer on these days . . . (nottinghamchurches.org/seasons/pentecost.htm) (11) The local Commissar had ordered there to be no fraternising with the British . . . (www.war-experience.org/collections/sea/alliedbrit/gsmith/default.asp) [End Page 132] (12) When President Nixon, in a secret memo later made public by NBC, ordered there to be no federal grand jury into the shootings at Kent State . . . (www.may4archive.org/plainview.shtml) (13) . . . and so the local landowner ordered there to be a disputation. (www.ling.upenn.edu/~beatrice/humor/royte.html) The question now is why (5) is ungrammatical. The proposal that mandatives contain an obligatory and implicit goal of mandation...

Dark Days in the Newsroom: McCarthyism Aimed at the Press (review)

Reviewed by: Dark Days in the Newsroom: McCarthyism Aimed at the Press Gwyneth Mellinger Dark Days in the Newsroom: McCarthyism Aimed at the Press. By Edward Alwood. Philadelphia: Temple University Press. 2007. Over the past half-century, McCarthyism’s paranoia about communist infiltration of the movie and television industries, higher education, government, and the military has been examined for the national pathology that it was. Absent from these previous analyses of McCarthyism’s patriotic excesses were the attacks on newspaper journalists who were suspected of communism, and the cowardly response of many publishers and professional organizations that were supposed to represent the interests of the Fourth Estate. Edward Alwood supplies this missing chapter in Dark Days in the Newsroom, a meticulously researched historical study that focuses on the congressional inquisition led in 1955 by Mississippi Senator James Eastland. As chair of the Senate Internal Security Subcommittee, Eastland specifically targeted journalists who had been active in the Newspaper Guild, but his insinuations of wrongdoing fell disproportionately on the newsroom of The New York Times, whose editorial page [End Page 174] frequently differed with him on such issues as the Brown v. Board of Education ruling and the McCarran Immigration Act. The stigma of Eastland’s subpoenas ended dozens of newspaper careers; the testimony of witnesses destroyed friendships and reputations; and journalists’ defiant assertions of constitutional protection under the First and Fifth Amendments brought contempt citations, lengthy court battles, and, in some cases, jail sentences. Alwood’s study makes three significant contributions. First, through a far-reaching and painstaking analysis of FBI records, many obtained through the Freedom of Information Act, Alwood brings into the public domain new information about McCarthyism’s conspiracy against the press and the FBI’s complicity. Relying as well on congressional archives, interviews, and the correspondence and records of key journalists, Alwood’s investigation yields a comprehensive record of this largely forgotten democratic crisis. Second, in providing constitutional context for this analysis, Alwood demonstrates the grave implications of the attacks on journalists’ freedom of thought and association. In this narrative, those who acquiesced to McCarthyism’s intimidation are as deserving of our sordid fascination as the patriotic bullies who abused their congressional power. Heading this list are the newspaper editors and publishers who fired journalists for daring to claim a First or Fifth Amendment protection against the Eastland Committee’s demand for their testimony. Alwood emphasizes that McCarthyism’s power lay in its ability to cow principled people and reduce them to self-serving cowards. Finally, by juxtaposing his historical analysis with discussion of the 2005 federal grand jury investigation into the Valerie Plame leaks and the subsequent jailing of reporter Judith Miller, Alwood reminds us that the Constitution remains a tenuous shield against government assault on civil liberties. As long as journalists have no specific legal protection against the subpoena, the Eastland inquisition cannot be viewed as an aberration. The sole weakness in Alwood’s book is in his failure to develop all of his characters. His portrait of James Eastland, the main villain in this tale, is particularly thin, which seems odd, given the wealth of material available on this bombastic white supremacist. Eastland’s personality, which was stamped on his politics, and the context provided by his long record of opposition to civil liberties for huge segments of humanity deserves better play. Gwyneth Mellinger Baker University Copyright © 2009 Mid-America American Studies Association

Media Coverage and a Federal Grand Jury: Publication of the Secret Watergate Transcripts (1973)

Although scholarship about press coverage of the Watergate scandal has mostly been viewed through a journalistic frame—focused on debate about the true role of investigative reporters in precipitating President Richard Nixon's resignation—a more apt frame may be a legal one involving the clash between the media's First Amendment rights and the judiciary's Sixth Amendment responsibilities. As the Nixon administration attempted to cover up its crimes from the federal grand jury investigating the scandal, journalists tried to expose that wrongdoing by revealing confidential grand jury evidence. This article focuses on the single most extensive leak of secret grand jury information to the press during Watergate: syndicated columnist Jack Anderson s publication of verbatim grand jury transcripts of sworn witness testimony in Spring of 1973. Using oral history interviews and documents released after appeals under the Freedom of Information Act, the author reconstructs and analyzes a little-known but dramatic chapter in journalism history that continues to have relevance today.

If You Build It, They Will Speak: Public Stadiums, Public Forums, and Free Speech

ROOT, ROOT, ROOT Baseball and freedom of speech are American icons, latter a central element of former. (1) During seventh-inning stretch fans reiterate ancient injunction to root, root for home (2) scoreboard, organist, and players encourage fans to make noise and to actively participate in game. Somewhere in crowd is a man in a rainbow wig carrying a John 3:16 sign. (3) The Wave, in which fans in successive sections of park stand and raise their arms in unison, expresses some message, although I do not understand what that is or why anyone feels a need to express it. (4) Fans engage in what I term speech. (5) Cheering speech is about teams, players, coaches, officials, team executives, or other fans. It supports, opposes, cheers, jeers, praises, criticizes, heckles, and even taunts. It can be in support of one's own players and team, be against opposing players and team (a distinct message), or even be critical of one's own players and team. It can be about events field or about baseball in a broader social context. Cheering speech can be oral, symbolic, or written signs, banners, clothing, and body parts. It can be positive, negative, and everything in between. It can be in good taste or bad, clean or profane, provocative and clever or otherwise. And it will be loud. First Amendment protection for cheering speech comes from two directions. First, speech about baseball is important in its own right. Baseball is a societal force, a symbol of American society, psyche, and aspirations. (6) Baseball is American culture--low culture perhaps, but culture nonetheless, with pervasive and meaningful appeal. (7) As federal grand jury investigating 1919 Black Sox Scandal stated, baseball is American institution, having its place prominently and significantly in life of people. (8) Cheering speech is protected as expression that builds a culture on all areas of human learning and knowledge. (9) From other direction cheering speech has political content; it often is pure political speech matters of public import made in particularized context of a baseball game. Political speech of criticizing U.S. president becomes cheering speech if done when president appears at ballpark to throw out first pitch. Cheering speech is protected for its connection to and role in larger public discourse. IF YOU BUILD IT Ballparks are part of mythology of baseball; these are green cathedrals in which religion of baseball is observed, with such timeless nicknames as Friendly Confines and the House That Ruth Built. (10) Major League Baseball franchises have entwined themselves in political process through public financing of places in which games are played. (11) From late 1980s until 2004 no fewer than twenty ballparks were either built or renovated exclusively or partially for Major League Baseball teams (eleven between 1999 and 2004), with approximately two-thirds of funds from public coffers. (12) impetus for this massive public undertaking often is an existing team's threat to leave city; other times it is an attempt by a city to attract a new or existing team. (13) Major League Baseball insists that essential to fielding a competitive team is a new, retro, nostalgic, postmodern, baseball-only park located in a downtown area and with seats close to field. (14) Teams demand additional new park creates to be profitable off field and to have money to compete for high-priced superstar players who will enable team to be successful field. (15) result is a public-private partnership in stadium financing, with public putting a large amount of money up front and team garnering nontraditional revenues generated by special features of modern ballparks. …

W.R. GRACE EXECS FACE INDICTMENT

A FEDERAL GRAND JURY IN Montana has issued a criminal indictment against WR. Grace and seven current and former Grace executives for knowingly exposing residents of Libby, Mont., to asbestos and concealing the danger. This is the first time a major company's executives have faced jail terms for asbestos charges. If found guilty, the company could be fined twice the $140 million profits made in the mining operations or twice the losses suffered by the victims. The Grace executives could be sentenced to five to 70 years in prison if convicted of all 10 charges in the indictment. According to the Justice Department, asbestos contamination from the vermiculite mine operations run by W.R. Grace from 1963 until 1990 sickened at least 1,200 residents in the Libby area. Beginning in the 1970s, the indictment states, Grace's internal studies indicated health problems from asbestos at its vermiculite mining operation, but Grace concealed that information from the community. ...