by Tom Flocco / TomFlocco.com –

http://www.tomflocco.com

NORTH CAROLINA (November 9, 2003) – After Army Sergeant Michael Lee Tosto died mysteriously in Iraq on June 17, 2003, his family learned that the US tank driver’s death certificate consistent with depleted uranium (DU) poisoning. Medical indications raise questions whether Pentagon misled Congress and families of dead soldiers by employing ‘pneumonia’ and ‘cigarette-smoking’ claims to cover up prior-knowledge of DU safety issues and negligence

“Why couldn’t they just decontaminate his wedding ring and send it back to the family,” Janet Tosto told us in a phone interview. Her son, Army sergeant Michael Tosto, 24, of Apex, NC, a tank operator with the 35th Regiment, First Armored Division in Baghdad, died mysteriously in Iraq on June 17 — just 48 hours after presenting what the surgeon general’s office deemed as “flu-like symptoms exhibiting pneumonia.”

Just prior to death, Tosto’s mother told us he was said to be working guard duty and check-points around Baghdad, adding that “Michael’s military death certificate says he died from pulmonary edema [swelling of the lungs from fluid] and pericardial effusion [failure of cardiac pumping output].”

A study of these and other symptom presentations related to Tosto’s death via statements from a number of university research medical professionals reveals that his cause of death is also consistent with depleted uranium poisoning.

Tort Reform Could Shield Bush Backers from Troop Lawsuits
Given parallel symptoms, serious questions arise as to whether the Pentagon is acting as a damage control team — protecting the Defense Department against congressional probes or civil procedure for negligence and prior-knowledge–after years of multiple Gulf War-linked depleted uranium warnings.

Military officials will not discuss DU ties to ill and dead soldiers. But parents and spouses with legitimate thoughts of legal action linked to negligent troop deaths recently heard President Bush reiterate his quest for tort reform against “junk lawsuits.”

Bush was asking aggrieved Americans to “learn to differentiate between politics and reality” in filing their frivolous civil actions. (10-28-2003, Press Conference, White House Rose Garden) However, growing evidence and cause-of-death symptom interpretations point to a White House strategy to head off inevitable military tort claims against the government.

This, as George W. attempts to convince Congress to provide a shield of “tort reform” protection around defense industry corporate contractors — key providers of presidential and congressional fiduciary encouragement. Curiously, around 500 died in Gulf War I; but nearly 10,000 are now dead — in the prime of life — just 12 years later.