Sen. Chuck Grassley of Iowa was interviewed by Sam Donaldson for the Prime Time Livestory. Events at the VA Hospital in Columbia have been part of Grassley's overall investigation of the FBI crime lab. Grassley requested extensive documents related to the case from FBI Director Louis Freeh during a June 4 hearing of the Senate Judiciary Committee. Despite a pledge to respond quickly, Freeh has continued to withhold the information. Grassley has stated that there is no basis for stonewalling by the FBI, as the statute of limitations on the case expired in August.
The case is based upon events in 1992, when up to 44 deaths occurred in the Columbia VA hospital in a certain ward during the shift of one nurse. The FBI was immediately called in to investigate. Since then, the nurse in question left the hospital to take a job at a home for the elderly in Columbia. There, up to 36 people died under similar questionable circumstances. Grassley has expressed frustration that the FBI has sat on this case and failed to resolve it during the five-year federal statute of limitations.
Grassley during the last year has conducted aggressive oversight of the FBI crime lab from his position as Chairman of the Judiciary Subcommittee on Administrative Oversight and the Courts.
Prime Time Live is scheduled to broadcast on the ABC network tonight at 9:00 (CST).