-Caveat Lector- http://www.cbn.org/newsstand/stories/990909.asp The Blood Trail: Part II By Dale Hurd September 9, 1999 Sunday, September 12,1999 -- In the 1970s and -80s, the Arkansas prison system, under Bill Clinton's watch, was selling inmates' blood plasma for big money. Official dollar figures are low -- less than a million dollars per year. But some believe that, based on the market price of plasma, the number of inmates, and how often they were allowed to give blood, the plasma program may have generated several million dollars per year. The program was run by an outside medical contractor, Health Management Associates, which was headed up by one of the Governor's close friends. Health Management Associates had problems -- a lot of them. An outside audit found that HMA was employing doctors who had lost their licenses. At least one had been a drug addict. One inmate was allowed to give blood 15 minutes before he died from kidney failure. Some inmates were paid for their plasma with drugs. Inmates say they were allowed to run the bleeding program with minimal and sometimes no supervision. John was an inmate at Cummins Prison in Grady, Arkansas, and participated in the prison plasma program. "Most of the time you had just inmates running the place. You had the free people that were sitting in offices and stuff in there that they had, but most of the time you mostly had inmates, period, running it." John Schock thinks he contracted hepatitis C through the prison plasma. It destroyed his first liver and he had to have a transplant. Schock said inmates could legally bleed once a week, but some donated much more than that. "You could pay and make arrangements with another inmate because inmates done most of the paperwork and running stuff around there, you know, and [you could] get your name back on the list and go in Saturday and Sunday." HMA was investigated in 1981, -82, -83, and -86. In 1982, The Food and Drug Administration cited HMA for overbleeding inmates, bad record keeping, and allowing medically unqualified inmates to bleed. It shut down the bleeding center at Cummins Prison after plasma infected with hepatitis B was shipped to Canada and given to hemophiliacs. It was cited again in 1986. But that wasn't the end of the bleeding program, thanks to the intervention of the Arkansas governor. And tainted prison plasma from Arkansas was distributed in Canada, the U.S., and other nations. Michael Galster accuses Bill Clinton of organizing a pay- off scheme to keep a multimillion dollar plasma operation in business that resulted in the deaths of an estimated one thousand Canadians. Arkansas State Police looked into the bribery rumors and their reports show a number of prison officials had heard of a payment scheme. The Arkansas blood scandal is part of a larger public health catastrophe In Canada in which 42 thousand Canadians are believed to be infected with hepatitis C, and thousands more with HIV, thanks to poorly screened plasma in Canada. The White House dismisses allegations that then Governor Clinton knew about the tainted blood. Yet there's one indication that someone in the White House did. In January, Linda Tripp was giving this sworn deposition about FBI files in the White House when she was asked about encrypted files on the computer of Deborah Gorham, secretary of the late Deputy White House Counsel Vincent Foster. In her answer, she mentions something that she obviously thought was strange. "The word 'encrypted,' if I used it at all, did not have to do with FBI files. It had to do with another issue on Deb Gorham's machine when it was located in the west wing, prior to its being moved. And what I had told Lucianne Goldberg at the time was that what had been alarming to me was when I tried to enter data from a caller that I was working with on a tainted blood issue, that every time I entered a word that had to do with this particular issue, it would flash up either the word 'encrypted' or 'password required' or something to indicate the file was locked. " It could mean White House officials were tracking the tainted blood scandal, because they knew it could seriously damage the Bill Clinton. It is what some call "the blood trail." And the blood trail leads all the way from Arkansas to Canada, where a story that most Americans have never heard of has dominated the front pages. Because in Canada it has involved billions of dollars in lawsuits and political fortunes, as well. The scandal threatens to ruin the political career of the man dubbed as the next Prime Minister of Canada: the Liberal Party finance minister, Paul Martin. Martin served on the board of directors for a company that helped distribute the prison plasma. His problems only worsened when it was alleged the Canadian government shredded documents and erased tapes to hide his role. Canada's Krever Commission has documented the Arkansas blood connection, and the Royal Canadian Mounted Police has launched a massive investigation in Canada and the U.S. into what caused a national health catastrophe. But in Washington, it's a different story. The Justice Department, which did not return our call, is not believed to have shown any interest in the Arkansas prison plasma scandal. Michael Galster, who worked in the Arkansas prison system and discovered sick and diseased inmates were giving blood without being tested, blew the whistle on the program. At a February press conference at the National Press Club, Galster called on the Justice Department to investigate, but says he's been "totally ignored." But there remains a trail of crime to show that parties in the U.S. or Canada or both want to make sure this story goes away. In 1993 just months after an official inquiry into the blood scandal was launched in Canada, tainted blood files in the offices of the Red Cross in Quebec City burned in an arson fire. This year, three months after Galster's press conference at the National Press Club, came two more criminal acts. On that same night, May 19, just hours apart, criminals struck in Montreal and in Pine Bluff, Arkansas. In Montreal, a thief entered the offices of the Quebec Hemophilia Society, stealing files on the blood scandal from this box, and taking a computer and phones. Pierre Desmarais is the Society Executive Director: "Nothing now will surprise me, so I don't even want to be paranoid about this whole issue. But we never know. But I cannot say for a fact that it was related to the blood scandal, but if it is, somebody was really afraid of something." A few hours later, in Pine Bluff, Arkansas, an arsonist burned down most of Michael Galster's prosthetic clinic. Then in July, in an incident that may or may not be related, the lap top computer of a Toronto lawyer for the Canadian hemophiliacs who is investigating Bill Clinton's role in the tainted blood scandal was stolen. Linda Tripp said there were encrypted blood files on the computer of Vince Foster's secretary. In July 1993, Foster's body was found in Fort Marcy Park, Virginia, just outside of Washington, in what was officially ruled a suicide. During the time Foster died, a Commons committee in the Canadian Parliament had called for a major public inquiry into how Canada's blood supply became contaminated. And Foster was reported to be very upset about the issue. Galster says that when Foster worked in Arkansas, Foster approached him in the legal role of defending Health Management Associates, the company that ran the prison blood program. Foster asked Galster to help bail HMA out of a malpractice suit. Galster thinks Foster was still cleaning up HMA's messes after he went to the White House. When the scandal exploded in Canada, Galster believes the blood trail caught up with Foster. Blood scandals have rocked several nations. Some have forced officials to apologize. Other scandals have sent officials to jail. Now it could be America's turn. The surviving Canadian hemophiliacs are preparing a five billion dollar lawsuit against those responsible in the United States. That would most certainly include the state of Arkansas as well as Louisiana, which had a similar blood program. The Food and Drug Administration may also be sued, and the lead counsel for the Canadian hemophiliacs, David Harvey of Toronto, will be seeking a deposition from Bill Clinton on what his role in the program was. "We want to know, from Bill Clinton on down, who was involved in these decisions, how the decisions were made, what information they had, and why it is that Cummins [Prison] was allowed to continue as a blood source, even after all the dangers became obvious." Plasma from the Arkansas prison system was not only shipped to Canada, it was shipped around the world, including the U.S. It's not known how much of it was tainted. But the Arkansas prison plasma program continued through the worst years of the AIDS epidemic, until 1994. Galster and others believe thousands may have died from it. "If Mr.Clinton as governor during those years had not allowed this contract to be renewed and had stopped it, as he was warned to do, this would have never lived past 1982, and thousands of lives would have been saved." The Canadian victims and family members we talked to all hold Bill Clinton at least partially responsible for the tainted prison blood that found its way to Canada. Some want retribution. Others, like Denise Orieux, who lost one son to Arkansas blood while another has been infected, would simply like an apology from Clinton. "I'm sure Mr. Clinton wasn't going out of his way to kill people. He wasn't thinking that way. I don't think he's that kind of a man. But he is capable of saying I made a mistake and I'm sorry." James Krepner contracted HIV and hepatitis C from the prison plasma: "This is not a proud moment in Arkansas history and it's certainly not a proud moment in Bill Clinton's history. The reality is he allowed a program to function, to export blood, which killed many of my friends here in Canada." Michael McCarthy, who is infected with incurable hepatitis C from Arkansas prison plasma and has seen one Uncle die from the plasma while another uncle is sick, says, "I'd like Bill Clinton to spend one day in my shoes, or one of my friends shoes who are dying from HIV or Hep C, and realize the ramifications of his inability to act in a safe and responsible manner as governor of Arkansas when he could have shut down this program." And, McCarthy adds, "People will go to their graves knowing that [Clinton] paid a part in their death. So how do you sleep at night now, Bill?" Kathleen "Those who profess to favor freedom, and yet depreciate agitation, are men who want crops without plowing up the ground. Power concedes nothing without a demand. It never did and it never will. Find out just what people will submit to, and you have f ound the exact amount of injustice and wrong which will be imposed upon them; and these will continue until they are resisted with eithe r words or blows, or with both. The limits of tyrants are prescribed by the endurance of those whom they oppress. A despotic tyrannical system could not exist without the ignorance of the people, and all that is necessary for the triumph of evil is to have good men do nothing." - Frederick Douglas DECLARATION & DISCLAIMER ========== CTRL is a discussion and informational exchange list. Proselyzting propagandic screeds are not allowed. Substance�not soapboxing! These are sordid matters and 'conspiracy theory', with its many half-truths, misdirections and outright frauds is used politically by different groups with major and minor effects spread throughout the spectrum of time and thought. 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