Court OKs Three Mile Island Suits

The Supreme Court on Monday refused to free the Three Mile Island nuclear plant's owners from lawsuits by nearly 2,000 people who say their health problems stem from the nation's worst nuclear accident.

The court, without comment, rejected an appeal in which the plant owners argued that all the lawsuits should be thrown out because a trial judge ruled against 10 people whose claims were designated as a "test" case.

The justices also turned down a separate appeal by those 10 people, who said the judge wrongly barred most of the expert testimony offered to support their claims.

During the 1979 accident at the Three Mile Island plant near Harrisburg, Pa., a combination of mechanical and human failures allowed the reactor core to lose cooling water and partially melt. Some radioactive gases were released.

Almost 2,000 people sued the plant's owners, saying exposure to radiation caused health problems such as cancer and birth defects. The cases were filed separately, not as a class-action, but for administrative reasons were handled jointly by a federal judge.

Ten cases were chosen to be tried first as a "test case" that might predict the outcome of the other cases and lead to possible settlements.

U.S. District Chief Judge Sylvia H. Rambo held a pretrial hearing and determined that most of the scientific expert testimony offered by those who sued was not reliable enough to be admitted as trial evidence.

As a result, Rambo ruled in 1996 that there was insufficient evidence to link the residents' health problems the radiation that leaked from the plant. She dismissed all of the nearly 2,000 cases.

Last November, the 3rd U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals upheld her ruling on the expert testimony and the dismissal of the 10 cases. But the appeals court revived the rest of the lawsuits, citing those peoples' constitutional right to have their cases heard by a jury.

The plant owners' Supreme Court appeal said the decision to throw out all of the cases was proper under trial judges' traditional authority to dismiss meritless claims.

But the plaintiffs' lawyers said the plant owners had agreed that the outcome of the first 10 cases would not be binding on the other claims.

In the other appeal acted on Monday, the 10 plaintiffs' lawyers said the hearing on expert testimony was too extensive and intruded on their right to have the facts decided by a jury.

The plant's owners said the judge properly performed her "gatekeeping role" to ensure expert testimony would be reliable.

The cases are General Public Utilities vs. Abrams, 99-1603, and Dolan vs. General Public Utilities, 99-1604.