Ruling Narrows Definition Of 9/11 Deaths

(CBS/AP)  Police Officer James Godbee began directing traffic just outside the World Trade Center site two days after Sept. 11, 2001, working hundreds of hours before developing a cough.

He died in 2004 of sarcoidosis, a disease that studies have linked to inhalation of toxic dust that hung over the towers' ruins for months. But because he was not at the trade center when the towers collapsed, the city medical examiner has declined to add him to the official Sept. 11 victims' list.

With government officials, scientists and courts in a continuing debate over which deaths can be linked to the trade center dust, Chief Medical Examiner Charles Hirsch has so far drawn the most narrow definition as he considers requests to reclassify several respiratory deaths as homicides.

"All persons killed at the World Trade Center on Sept. 11, 2001, and others who died later from complications of injury or exposure directly caused by the collapse of the twin towers on that day are homicide victims," Hirsch wrote in a letter made public last week that denied a request to call the 44-year-old Godbee a homicide victim. "Mr. Godbee's manner of death will remain 'natural."'

For Hirsch to consider ruling as a homicide the death of a person exposed to trade center dust, "they had to be there at the time of attack, up to and including when the towers came down and the dust form settled," said spokeswoman Ellen Borakove.

"This has been the standard that was decided in our office. There had to be a cutoff," she said.

The decision means Godbee will not be listed on the official Sept. 11 memorial. No money is at stake.

Some other medical examiners and experts called the distinction arbitrary. Families and attorneys of ailing or dead workers said it was wrong.

"What happened 9/11 and in the aftermath of 9/11 can by no stretch of the imagination be called natural," attorney Norman Siegel said Sunday at a news conference protesting Hirsch's decision.

Michael Baden, chief forensic pathologist for the New York State Police, said Hirsch's distinction was artificial.

"It's very arbitrary and unprecedented that someone who inhaled the dust a minute before midnight is a homicide and someone who inhaled the dust a minute after midnight is natural," he said. "If somebody dies as a result of an illegal act, then it's murder."

While Hirsch declined to add Godbee to the Sept. 11 victims' list, the officer had already received line-of-duty benefits from a police pension board.

Scientific studies that have found links to respiratory disease and work at ground zero are based on patients who were at the trade center on and after Sept. 11. A federal judge hearing a lawsuit filed by thousands who said they were made sick by ground zero dust has not put those caught in the dust cloud into a separate category.

Kenneth Feinberg, who oversaw the Sept. 11 victim compensation fund that distributed more than $1 billion to people who said they became sick at or near ground zero, limited the fund to workers who were at the trade center site within four days of Sept. 11, or residents who were there within 24 hours.

He cited a congressional statute that said the fund was to help people killed or injured on Sept. 11 or in its immediate aftermath.

"I had to decide, what is immediate aftermath?" said Feinberg. "I think the line drawing has to be done with care."

Hirsch's decision on James Godbee is not the first time he has issued controversial rulings regarding responders who became sick after Sept. 11, 2001. In October, he ruled that another NYPD cop, James Zadroga, died from misusing drugs - not from toiling for 420 hours in the ruins of the World Trade Center.

[brianbwb-2009]

Here is a question, if the dust contained high amounts of asbestos, which already has been classified as a carcinogenic substance, but the building owners and the agency charged with removing asbestos from the environment failed to do their jobs, either through corruption, or lack of funds, then are they not also as responsible for the death as the ones who pulverized the building in the first place?

[fiteit1]

Okay, let''s assume for a minute that Hirsch is right and Godbee died of natural causes, I think Hirsch''s theory should be tested. Someone should test this theory out on Hirsch and expose him for long periods without him knowing. When he begins experiencing the same symptoms as Godbee and eventually dies a painful death the coroner can say it was natural. But the reality is as he got sicker and possibly find out with tests what was going on the fed''s would want to find out who was doing it and call it terrorism and it would be considered attempted murder.

So does anyone think Hirsch would volunteer to test his own theory? He%u2019s a moron and is just looking out for the mighty $$ and not what is just, but if things were just the U.S. government insiders would have never approved of taking down the towers in the first place.

[alphaa10-2009]

Godbee''s death-- from standing near Ground Zero to direct traffic, while breathing the unsettling haze and smoke-- is anything but a natural death.

Nowhere else in the world could a police officer be called to breathe thick concrete dust and smoke from countless subterranean fires.

Some medical expets put the concrete dust hovering for weeks over Ground Zero at between 10 and 11 PH-- highly alkaline and easily enough to cause injury to esphagal tissue.

In effect, the 911 disaster kept on killing, but long after heavier particles of the buildings had come to earth.

Hirsch made an "administrative" determination-- which is to say, perfectly sensible only to those concerned with limiting legal exposures and with a close reading of congressional funding legislation.

[wogerwabbit]

What we should be looking at is why these people were allowed to risk and ultimately lose their lives in the cleanup effort without the proper safety equipment.

I remember looking at the news clips and thinking that those people were crazy for not wearing face masks (not all of them, but a good many)... but within days of the concern being raised we were assured by government officials that the air quality was safe.

It just galls me that everything about 9/11 just reeks of coverup and lies like this.

Having been an air traffic controller in NY, I know for a fact that standard operating proceedures were not followed that day by a long shot... and I can''t get my head around why that was allowed to happened without having to consider far fetched conspiracy theories. Those planes should never have gotten that far without at least one fighter on their tail. I''m not saying that they could have prevented 9/11, but the whole ATC system is set up for hijack scenerios and has been for many, many years.

My God, they were off course for 40 or 50 minutes before impact. What the hell happened? Why were the controller interview tapes destroyed? Why is it nothing makes sense unless I drink the big brother kool aid and go about my life as if nothing ever happened and the the answers don''t matter.

[rowdytexan2]

...seems a little power tripish to me.

The man was exposed while wearing his uniform in the aftermath, and died from it. That should be enough.

[goldesprit]

Yes--rent SICKO as soon as possible.

If you want to be informed and not out in the cold.

[goldesprit]

To rule that someone has not been injured in this instance, driven by greed and monetary consideration--means any individual that behaves in that manner-- should lose their money and health.

Why? Because it sends the signal that we should not help one another in an emergency--we should carefully weigh the fact that governmental representatives with guaranteed health coverage will *** us fo careing--and try to fix the bugetary "problem".
The word scum comes to mind--and where is our fabulous President/Leader?
NO LEADERSHIP HERE, FOLKS.

[likeitis5050]

This CME is suffering from the effects of 9/11 and should be relieved of his duties..however..he should not be permitted to cash in on the event. What an idiotic approach to ruling a death. One has to draw the line somewhere...and he needs to go.

[spadeisspade]

VOTE GULIANI.......yeah. woo.

[fitedafuture]

anyone seen SICKO yet? ...