Background
In February 1958, James B. Stanley, a master sergeant in the Army stationed at Fort Knox, Kentucky, volunteered for what he thought was a chemical warfare testing program, but instead Stanley was secretly administered lysergic acid diethylamide (LSD) in a US Army plan to test the effects of the drug on human subjects (see Project MKUltra).
Stanley claimed that as a result of the LSD exposure, he suffered from hallucinations, periods of incoherence, and memory loss due to his unawareness of having taken the drug. He suffered severe personality changes that led to his discharge and the dissolution of his marriage.
Stanley filed a lawsuit under the Federal Tort Claims Act (FTCA) alleging negligence in the administration, supervision, and subsequent monitoring of the experimental program.
The United States Court of Appeals for the Eleventh Circuit held that the serviceman could assert his claims under the FTCA and refused to dismiss the serviceman's Bivens claims.
Read more about this topic: United States V. Stanley
Famous quotes containing the word background:
“Pilate with his question “What is truth?” is gladly trotted out these days as an advocate of Christ, so as to arouse the suspicion that everything known and knowable is an illusion and to erect the cross upon that gruesome background of the impossibility of knowledge.”
—Friedrich Nietzsche (1844–1900)
“They were more than hostile. In the first place, I was a south Georgian and I was looked upon as a fiscal conservative, and the Atlanta newspapers quite erroneously, because they didn’t know anything about me or my background here in Plains, decided that I was also a racial conservative.”
—Jimmy Carter (James Earl Carter, Jr.)
“I had many problems in my conduct of the office being contrasted with President Kennedy’s conduct in the office, with my manner of dealing with things and his manner, with my accent and his accent, with my background and his background. He was a great public hero, and anything I did that someone didn’t approve of, they would always feel that President Kennedy wouldn’t have done that.”
—Lyndon Baines Johnson (1908–1973)