DR llp is proud to represent Andy Tosh, 1st Member of British forces at Qarmat Ali to join suit against KBR

Along with members of the US Army National Guard, a large contingent of the British forces deployed in 2003 were also tasked with protecting KBR’s Qarmat Ali project near Basra, Iraq.   Unfortunately, these men, primarily members of the RAF Regiment, were likewise wholly unprotected against the hazards of sodium dichromate-an anticorrosive chemical containing nearly pure hexavalent chromium, a carcinogen- even after its presence and dangers of unprotected exposure were known to KBR’s managers for months and months.

We are proud to represent Andy Tosh, a retired sergeant from the RAF Regiment now living in Lincolnshire,  as he has joined the case of West Virginia veterans suing KBR for knowingly exposing them to the hazards at the site without protection.  What appears clear from documentation provided to the British Forces is that at the same time KBR’s managers were documenting elevated chromium levels in the admittedly inadequate blood testing of KBR’s civilian employees, KBR’s managers apparently deliberately told British Forces exactly the opposite.

Accordingly to an internal KBR memo dated August 8, 2003  “60 percent” of workers showing symptoms” was being found, while the KBR personnel in liason with the British forces were telling them (accordingly to a British Forces fact sheet, “b. Biological monitoring test results to which we have been given access for contractors and American forces have been within normal limits.”).

Andy Tosh and his fellow members of British Forces, part of the Multinational Forces serving in support of  Restoring Iraqi Freedom, were entitled to and did rely on the knowing misrepresentations by KBR’s managers about the hazards they faced at the time of their exposures, as well as the serious health consequences they now face.  It is simply not right that these men serving their country, in this case America’s staunchest allies in the United Kingdom, have the bear the consequences of these deliberate decisions by KBR’s managers.

Sgt Tosh in Iraq, 2003