PORTLAND, Ore. (AP) — A federal magistrate in Portland, Ore., has ruled that a lawsuit by Oregon Army National Guard veterans against contractor Kellogg Brown & Root can proceed.
They were among hundreds of U.S. soldiers in Iraq who were potentially exposed to a toxic chemical.
The Oregon soldiers and others were protecting KBR workers at a water-treatment plant in Iraq beginning in May 2003 when they say they were exposed to sodium dichromate, which contains hexavalent chromium.
In 2009, 26 Oregon Guard veterans sued KBR, claiming its managers downplayed or dismissed the presence of the chemical. KBR denies wrongdoing.
