Orlikow v. United States — The Nine Patients of Subproject 68
nodeIntelligence & Surveillance
Nine Canadians sued the CIA over what was done to them at a Montreal hospital, and the court had to invent a way to let them.
Who they are
The nine plaintiffs in Orlikow v. United States, patients of Dr Ewen Cameron at McGill's Allan Memorial Institute while the CIA was funding him.
What they do
The court records that the CIA approved Cameron's grant as MKULTRA Subproject 68 and that it ran from 18 March 1957 to 30 June 1960.
How it works
What the funding application asked the CIA to pay for, in its own words: "'particularly intensive' electroconvulsive shock, sensory isolation, and drug induced continuous sleep for many days", including 'the use of chemical agents, including LSD, to depattern the individual'. The money came through a CIA front set up in 1955, the Society for the Investigation of Human Ecology. The court states plainly: 'It is undisputed that the plaintiff did not have knowledge of the alleged experimental nature of Dr. Cameron's techniques.'
Why it matters
To let the case proceed at all the judge had to reach for the rule covering injuries that are 'inherently unknowable at the time' they happen — a legal category that exists for harm you cannot know was done to you.
The engine's record — word for word
[Report #191] Nine Canadian plaintiffs, patients of Dr Ewen Cameron at the Allan Memorial Institute, McGill, during the CIA grant period. The court, verbatim: 'On March 4, 1957, the CIA approved the Cameron grant as MKULTRA Subproject 68 for the period of time from March 18, 1957 to June 30, 1960... The nine plaintiffs in this action were patients of Dr. Cameron during the grant period. Each was subjected to at least one aspect of the procedure outlined in the application grant. It is undisputed that the plaintiff did not have knowledge of the alleged experimental nature of Dr. Cameron's techniques.' The techniques as set out in the application submitted to the CIA's front organisation, quoted by the court: "'particularly intensive' electroconvulsive shock, sensory isolation, and drug induced continuous sleep for many days. The application requested funds to improve the technique of heteropsychic driving and to investigate the range of physiological functions which can be changed by these procedures. Among the studies proposed was the use of chemical agents, including LSD, to depattern the individual." Cameron described his own work as the 'gateway through which he might pass to a new field of psychotherapeutic methods' (Psychic Driving, 112 Am.J.Psy. 502, January 1956). The funding route: 'In 1955, the CIA set up a secret front organization, known as the Society for the Investigation of Human Ecology (SIHE)'; CIA employee Dr John Gittinger read Cameron's paper and invited the application. To allow the suit at all the court reached the doctrine that time does not run 'in the case of defendant's fraud or deliberate concealment of material facts', and the rule applying where 'his injury was inherently unknowable at the time he was injured'.
Follow the trail
Walk this on the live map →