1976 to 1986 · Nuclear safety
The Karen Silkwood case
Danny Sheehan filed the lawsuit on behalf of Karen Silkwood’s estate against Kerr-McGee and served as its chief counsel. The case reached the Supreme Court, which in 1984 held that federal law does not bar punitive damages for nuclear injuries.
Who was Karen Silkwood?
Karen Silkwood was a laboratory technician and union activist at Kerr-McGee’s Cimarron plutonium fuel plant near Crescent, Oklahoma, where she had raised concerns about worker safety. In November 1974 she was found to be contaminated with plutonium. On November 13, 1974 she died in a car crash while driving to meet a New York Times reporter, reportedly carrying documents about the plant.
The lawsuit
In 1976 Danny filed suit on behalf of her estate and her father, Bill Silkwood, and served as chief counsel, guiding the investigation and legal strategy, with Wyoming trial lawyer Gerry Spence as lead trial attorney. The case brought together the team that founded the Christic Institute in 1980.
In 1979 a federal jury in Oklahoma City found Kerr-McGee liable for her contamination and awarded $505,000 in actual damages and $10 million in punitive damages.
At the Supreme Court
The Tenth Circuit threw out the punitive award, holding that federal regulation of nuclear safety barred it. In Silkwood v. Kerr-McGee Corp., 464 U.S. 238 (1984), the Supreme Court reversed that ruling 5 to 4, holding that federal law does not preempt state punitive damages for nuclear injuries, and returned the case to the lower courts. In 1986 the case settled for $1.38 million.
The case became one of the best-known corporate accountability fights of its era and was the subject of the 1983 film Silkwood, starring Meryl Streep.
Watch Danny’s lectures on this case
- Sara Nelson introduces the Silkwood case (May 1, 2012)
- The Karen Silkwood investigation (May 3, 2012)
- The Karen Silkwood trial (May 8, 2012)
- The Silkwood appeals and Three Mile Island (May 10, 2012)
From his UCSC lecture series. All lectures.