25 YEARS OF NIGHTMARES

• Document Type: CREST
• Collection: General CIA Records
• Document Number (FOIA) /ESDN (CREST): CIA-RDP91-00587R000200880088-0
• Release Decision: RIPPUB
• Original Classification: K
• Document Page Count: 1
• Document Creation Date: December 22, 2016
• Document Release Date: July 14, 2010
• Sequence Number: 88
• Publication Date: July 28, 1985
• Content Type: OPEN SOURCE

STAT
Sanitized Copy Approved for Release 2010/07/14: CIA-RDP9
ARTICLa WASHINGTON POST
01 PACE-F-
28 July 1985
28
25 Years
Of Nightmares
Victims of CIA-Funded Mind Experiments
Seek Damages From the Agency
By David Remnick
wrYe1toe Puss SuN write.
Harvey Weinstein, a quiet, bearded man who practices psychiatry
at Stanford University, says there are days when he is "ashamed" of
his profession, nights when he cannot stop thinking about the Cana-
dian psychiatrist who "ruined my father's life ... Left him with noth-
ing. It's a nightmare that never ends."
With funding from the CIA, the late Dr. D. Ewen Cameron did a
series of mind-control experiments on 53 people, including Harvey
Weinstein's father, Louis, a prosperous Montreal businessman. All
had come to the Allan Memorial Institute of McGill University in
Montreal between 1957 and 1961 for treatment of various psycho-
logical ailments.
The experiments, Weinstein says, left his father "a human guinea
pig, a poor pathetic man with no memory, no life. He lost his busi-
ness, he lost everything." Weinstein is one of nine plaintiffs in a law-
suit, seeking damages from the CIA.
To erase or "de-pattern" personality traits, Cameron gave his sub-
jects megadoses of LSD, subjected them to drug-induced "sleep ther-
apy" for up to 65 consecutive days and applied electroshock therapy
at 75 to-es the usual intensity. To shape new behavior, Cameron
forced t- 'm to listen to repeated recorded messages' for 16-hour
intervals, a technique known as "psychic driving." Cameron and the
CIA were interested in brainwashing and the ability to redirect
thought and action. The patients did not consent to the treatment
and were never told they were being used for research.
"When you're 13 years old and you we your father-an indepen-
dent, kind, smart person-become a different man before your eyes,
it's impossible to accommodate that," Weinstein says.* 1 remember
one of his first visits home from the hospital. He didn't talk much,
and when he did talk it made no sense. When he wasn't sleeping he
was drowsy. He asked us things about his parents, even though
they'd been dead for years. His memory was gone. At night once,
when I was in bed, I saw him come into my room and urinate on the
floor. He didn't know where he was.
"My father has ended up feeling guilty that he had done something
to deserve this punishment. He is convinced the CIA listens to his
telephone. He's ashamed, embarrassed. My mother died without
seeing the end of this. It will be a tragedy if my father dies without
restoring some sense of dignity to his life."
Today Louis Weinstein lives alone in Mon-
treal, cared for by his two grown daughters.
No one knows the whereabouts of all the
subjects, some of whom may be dead. But
Louis Weinstein and eight others, including
Velma Orlikow, the wife of a New Demo-
cratic Party member of the Canadian par-
hament, claim they have been injured irrep-
arably by the experiments. 9'd say Velma
operates at about 20 percent of capacity.*
David Orlikow says. "It's horrific.*
The CIA's involvement in mind control
experiments has been coming to light for
years. The suit flied by the group against
the U.S. government has been pending here
in U.S. District Court since December 1980
before judge John Garrett Penn. The plain-
tiffs originally asked for $1 million each in
damages but have cut that to $175,000.
The government - has offered to pay
$25,000. The group's attorney, Joseph
Raub Jr., calls the settlement offer "de-
meaning" and contends that the CIA has
managed to delay the proceedings by
"stonewalling."
The CIA's counsel, Lee Strickland, de-
clined to comment on the case. Agency
spokeswoman Kathy Pherson said, "We
don't comment on cases under litigation.
It's inappropriate to try cases in the press."
In Cameron's defense, Brian Robertson,
the present director of the Allan Institute,
and James Farquhar, a psychiatrist there,
wrote in the Montreal Gazette that "we
have not been able to uncover a single
shred of evidence that Dr. Cameron knew
of the CIA connection with his research
funding." They said Cameron's work "must
be placed in its historical context" and that
"in Cameron's day [researchers] were not
expected to inform their patients of the na-
ture of their resarch in the way that they
are today."
The CIA has asked Judge Penn to block
Rauh from taking depositions from two key
agency figures-Stacey Hulse and John
Knave, who have been publicly identified as
former CIA station chiefs in Ottawa. They
are both retired.
Cameron, who died of a heart attack
while mountain climbing in 1967, had been
one of the most prominent psychiatrists in
North America. A former president of both
the Canadian and American psychiatric as-
sociations, he was selected to diagnose Nazi
Sanitized Copy Approved for Release 2010/07/14: CIA-RDP91-00587R000200880088-0