U.S.

Los Alamos Scientists Disciplined

September 30, 2000 / 11:17 AM EDT / CBS/AP

Some Los Alamos National Laboratory workers have been disciplined by the University of California, but no one was fired.

The school says the actions stem from the disappearance and mysterious reappearance of two hard drives filled with top-secret information about nuclear weapons.

Citing privacy rules, a university spokesman would not say who had been disciplined, how many or what types of penalties they faced.

He did say the investigation continues and there could be more disciplinary action.

The university's review is separate from a seven-month FBI investigation, which also is continuing. So far, FBI investigators have been unable to find the culprit.

In September, three review panels recommended punishing several lab employees over the hard drive issue. The boards were made up of officials at the lab, the University of California and outside nuclear experts.

The Los Alamos National Laboratory

LOCATION: Los Alamos, N.M., approximately 35 miles northwest of Santa Fe

SIZE: 43 square miles, 18 labs

FOUNDED: 1943 as part of "The Manhattan Project," U.S. atomic bomb research effort

MANAGER: University of California

ROLE: One of 28 Dept. of Energy labs. Develops defense and civilian technology. Civilian projects have included the development of fuel cells to power automobiles. Labs include the Spallation Neutron Source, Nuclear Materials Technology Division and the Nonproliferation and International Security section.

STAFF: 6,800 University of California employees, 2,800 contractor personnel. One-third are physicists, one-fourth engineers, one-sixth are chemists and materials scientists, and the remainder work in mathematics and compu8tational science.

BUDGET: Roughly $1.2 billion a year

(Source: LANL)size>

Lab workers in May noticed that two hard drives containing information on terrorist and nuclear emergencies had disappeared. Supervisors were not told about it for weeks, and the drives mysteriously reappeared behind a photocopier in June.

The announcement was the latest in a string of troubles involving security breaches at the lab.

Last year, Los Alamos fired scientist Wen Ho Lee, who was later indicted on 59 federal felonies for improperly transferring nuclear secrets to portable computer tapes.

Lee pleaded gilty to one count earlier this month and was set free; the judge in the case apologized to Lee and blamed "top decision-makers in the executive branch" for his detention.

The case against Lee stemmed from an investigation of possible Chinese espionage at Los Alamos, but the Taiwan-born Lee denied spying and was never charged with espionage.

A recent report commissioned by the Energy Department found that security crackdowns at the lab in the wake of the Lee case and the missing hard drives was actually hurting security by alienating and demoralizing top scientists.

In September, an inventory of all classified data at the lab, taken in response to criticism over the disappearance of the top-secret hard drives, found two more possible security breaches: two 10-year-old floppy disks, containing classified information, were reported missing.

However, they were found a day later, attached to a paper report in a nearby, secured area. Apparently no classified information was compromised.

The President's Foreign Intelligence Advisory Board a year ago cited inadequate tracking of secret nuclear materials in a stinging rebuke of security at the Energy Department and its weapons labs.