1
BEFORE THE
U.S. DEPARTMENT OF LABOR
NORTHEAST REGION
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In the Matter of: :
:
OSCAR B. SHIRANI, :
:
Complainant, : Case No.: 2002-ERA-28
v. :
:
COMED/EXELON CORPORATION, :
:
Respondent. :
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U.S. District Court
Courtroom 1944-C
Dirksen U.S. Courthouse
230 S. Dearborn Street
Chicago, Illinois 60604
Tuesday,
December 17, 2002
The above-entitled matter came on for hearing,
pursuant to notice, at 9:15 a.m.
BEFORE: ROBERT J. LESNICK,
Administrative Law Judge
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APPEARANCES:
On behalf of the Complainant:
MICHAEL C. McDERMOTT, ESQ.
134 N. LaSalle Street
Suite 1410
Chicago, Illinois 60602
312-372-4550
On behalf of the Respondent:
SCOTT E. GROSS, ESQ.
DARREN R. REISBERG, ESQ.
Sidley, Austin, Brown, and Wood
10 South Dearborn Street
Chicago, Illinois 60603
312-853-7011
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Reporter: Stuart Karoubas Date: December 17, 2002
OALJ Case Name & Number: Oscar B. Shirani, 2002-ERA-28
WITNESS (FULL NAME) DIRECT CROSS REDIRECT RECROSS
Ross B. Landsman 13 30 37
Oscar B. Shirani 44
Walter Hahn 138
Ann Harris 145
David Helwig 174 213
Oscar B. Shirani 241
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EXHIBITS
EXHIBITS IDENTIFICATION RECEIVED WITHDRAWN REJECTED
ALJ 1 33
CX 1 49 51
CX 2 51 52
CX 4 120 135
CX 5 123 135
CX 6 126 135
CX 7 129 135
CX 8 245 266
CX 9 247 266
CX 14 20 38
CX 29 58 136
CX 32 264 266
RX 10 178 179
RX 11 180 192
RX 17 31 33
RX 26 175 176
RX 27 194 199
RX 28 199 204
RX 29 204 207
RX 30 208 209
RX 39 207 207
RX 46 39 42
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1 P R O C E E D I N G S
2 (9:15 a.m.)
3 JUDGE LESNICK: This is a proceeding arising out of
4 the Energy Reorganization Act, ERA hereafter, 42 U.S.C. Section
5 5851, and the regulations promulgated at 29 C.F.R. Part 24.
6 It is Oscar Shirani versus Exelon Nuclear, Case
7 Number 2002-ERA-28, pursuant to a Notice of Hearing, issued
8 October 8th, 2002.
9 My name is Robert J. Lesnick. I am the United States
10 Administrative Law Judge assigned to hear this case and make a
11 decision in this matter.
12 This case relates to a complaint filed by Mr. Shirani
13 on January 28th, 2002 with the Occupational Safety and Health
14 Administration of the US Department of Labor.
15 I will ask counsel for the employer to state his
16 name, address, including the area code and zip code. Proceed.
17 MR. GROSS: Scott Gross. Sidley, Austin, Brown and
18 Wood, 10 South Dearborn, Chicago, 60603.
19 JUDGE LESNICK: Thank you.
20 MR. GROSS: Phone number 312-853-7011.
21 JUDGE LESNICK: Thank you, Mr. Gross. And
22 Mr. Shirani, you are present today?
23 MR. SHIRANI: Yes, sir.
24 JUDGE LESNICK: And your counsel. Enter his
25 appearance, please.
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1 MR. McDERMOTT: Yes, Judge. Michael C. McDermott,
2 134 North LaSalle, Suite 1410, Chicago, 60602. Area Code 312-
3 372-4550.
4 JUDGE LESNICK: All right. We've had a number of
5 preliminary actions in this case. And I have accumulated a
6 file that is rather thick, about three or four inches.
7 However, let me say to both of you, assume that none
8 of this is in the record. Anything you wish to be in this
9 record for this matter you'll present to me today and the
10 following three days.
11 And it is a case that, in all of these whistleblower
12 cases that sometimes can involve some strong feelings between
13 individuals. I caution both sides to direct their comments to
14 the bench, not to each other, and to be civil in this matter.
15 If you aren't then I will see that you are, but I
16 caution you at the beginning, I know that tempers run high,
17 and, but I expect everyone to conduct themselves civilly. All
18 right. Any preliminary motions?
19 MR. GROSS: Not a motion, Your Honor, just a request.
20 JUDGE LESNICK: Yes.
21 MR. GROSS: Mr. McDermott and I have already
22 discussed this. We have a witness flying in today who we hope
23 to put on the stand this afternoon. And Mr. McDermott has
24 already indicated that he wouldn't have a problem with us
25 putting him on wherever we are in the proceedings just to get
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1 him finished.
2 JUDGE LESNICK: All right.
3 MR. McDERMOTT: And I think Mr. Gross is correct, we,
4 we've each talked about people coming in from distant places,
5 and I have someone flying in from California tomorrow morning
6 early.
7 And, and I'd hope Mr. Gross would extend the same
8 courtesy. And I have someone who's in today from Tennessee who
9 I'd like to make sure I get her testimony some time today.
10 We also have someone coming in from Canada, and I'd
11 like to get his testimony, as brief as it may be, sometime this
12 afternoon.
13 MR. GROSS: That's fine.
14 JUDGE LESNICK: All right. Okay. Thank you,
15 gentlemen. All right, Mr. McDermott, do you wish to give an
16 opening?
17 MR. McDERMOTT: I do. And I'm glad you gave the
18 precautionary statement about personal investment in issues of
19 this kind.
20 It's interesting to note that if you look out the
21 window to the south, less than five miles from here, you'll see
22 Stag Field. That occurred during my lifetime, I don't know how
23 old you are, Judge.
24 But the events that occurred at Stag Field, through
25 the work of Enrico Fermi, bring us to this place today. It is
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1 truly a Janus gift. It is a two-faced event in human history.
2 It's interesting to note that Webster's New World
3 Collegiate Dictionary has only this to say about Enrico Fermi.
4 It's Fermi, Enrico, 1901 - 1954, U.S. Nuclear
5 Physicist born in Italy.
6 It's no wonder our college students have an imperfect
7 understanding of what heats a kettle and what events surround
8 the heating of that kettle.
9 Professor Fermi and his colleagues and subsequent
10 scientists and subsequent engineers and subsequent good and
11 great minds produced for us a gift with enormous potential but
12 with enormous responsibility.
13 And anybody stumbling through the 1940s and anybody
14 who wants to read the newspapers today, the '40s are not dead.
15 But anybody stumbling through the 1940s comes to grips with how
16 you balance the public good and how you balance regulation of
17 an industry that has potential to harm and to help.
18 This is the story of Oscar Shirani, who has
19 approximately 20 years of experience, 21 years of experience in
20 this industry, and a person who, working for the Respondents,
21 had accelerated his capacity, had developed a reputation, had
22 had no remarkable downside until he hits a wall in 1997, with a
23 change in a corporate attitude in Respondent's corporation.
24 It's a story of what occurs between November of 1997 and
25 October of the year 2001.
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1 And I think we will be able to produce evidence
2 sufficient to support his claim as a, not whistleblower,
3 something I'd rather call an energy safety advocate. Thank
4 you, Judge.
5 JUDGE LESNICK: Thank you, Mr. McDermott. Mr. Gross,
6 do you wish to give an opening?
7 MR. GROSS: Your Honor, we will rely for the most
8 part on what we provide in our testimony and exhibits, as well
9 as the post-hearing memorandum.
10 I would like to point out a couple of things, though.
11 And I appreciate Mr. McDermott's brief opening, I'll keep it
12 brief as well.
13 I think, Your Honor, as we proceed through this
14 trial, you're going to get a good glimpse of what has been
15 going on with Mr. Shirani's career at Commonwealth Edison
16 Company.
17 And then, after October 2000, Exelon Nuclear, and
18 then Exelon Business Services Company, or BSC. Hopefully,
19 we'll be able to keep all those straight and get those sorted
20 out in terms of the corporate identities.
21 But what you will see, Your Honor, is, essentially
22 the bottom line, Mr. Shirani impugning the integrity of a lot
23 of people who did nothing but try to help him. And we will
24 have those individuals here explain what they did, how they did
25 it, and why they did it, for the sole purpose of helping
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1 Mr. Shirani achieve promotional aspirations.
2 This has nothing to do with any safety complaints in
3 nuclear, this has nothing to do with any concerns that
4 Mr. Shirani might have had and the type of audit work he did.
5 This has solely to do with his efforts to obtain
6 promotional opportunities, and when that did not pan out as he
7 liked, how he is now using this forum to impugn the integrity
8 of a lot of very good people. That will be what we will
9 present, and I think that will become evident throughout.
10 JUDGE LESNICK: Thank you, Mr. Gross. All right.
11 Mr. McDermott, you may proceed with your case.
12 MR. McDERMOTT: Thank you, Judge, I'd like to call
13 our first witness, a Mr. Ross Landsman, please. And I take it
14 we'd be joined in a motion to exclude witnesses.
15 JUDGE LESNICK: I don't see any need to, but if
16 that's something you're going to suggest, we'll need to review
17 it first.
18 MR. McDERMOTT: I don't know if I've never had a
19 hearing which allowed for witnesses to be present for a
20 opponent party or opponent witness testimony. I'd so move,
21 Judge.
22 JUDGE LESNICK: If you so move, then I, I do grant
23 the motion.
24 MR. GROSS: The only, the only request, Your Honor,
25 is that we have the opportunity, in addition to counsel, to
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1 have one company representative here for the party.
2 JUDGE LESNICK: Sure, sure.
3 MR. McDERMOTT: Is that --
4 MR. GROSS: Russ Bastyr.
5 MR. McDERMOTT: Well, is that person also a witness?
6 MR. GROSS: Yes, as is Mr. Shirani.
7 JUDGE LESNICK: Wait, how many folks is that? One
8 person?
9 MR. GROSS: Yes. One company representative, Russ
10 Bastyr.
11 JUDGE LESNICK: Yes, is that who's sitting next you?
12 MR. GROSS: No, this is counsel.
13 JUDGE LESNICK: Oh, all right.
14 MR. GROSS: And Felicia is counsel as well.
15 JUDGE LESNICK: Oh, all right. Yes, that's
16 appropriate. That one person, um-hum.
17 MR. McDERMOTT: The person is also a witness, Judge.
18 JUDGE LESNICK: I understand.
19 MR. McDERMOTT: The person was also Mr. Shirani's
20 supervisor during the period, for years.
21 JUDGE LESNICK: The motion --
22 MR. McDERMOTT: And a company, a company with 20 some
23 thousand individuals could, could find somebody other than
24 Mr. Bastyr.
25 JUDGE LESNICK: Well, I understand, but the motion
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1 for sequestration is actually not open to opposition. But also
2 well established that it allows each party to, to keep one
3 person in the room.
4 And that can be any designated company
5 representative, witness or otherwise. And often it is perhaps
6 the primary witness in the case. But I can't designate that
7 person as their representative.
8 MR. McDERMOTT: May I ask that he sit at the table?
9 JUDGE LESNICK: Well, actually that is appropriate.
10 MR. GROSS: That's fine.
11 JUDGE LESNICK: Now, what I don't know is what
12 facilities we have for individuals. Does our court reporter
13 know? Why don't we go off the record?
14 (Off the record.)
15 (On the record.)
16 JUDGE LESNICK: All right. There are no witnesses
17 present in the courtroom, save the representative for the
18 company and Mr. Shirani himself. And the witness is now
19 seated. And sir, could you raise your right hand?
20 (Whereupon,
21 ROSS B. LANDSMAN
22 was called as a witness by and on behalf of the Complainant,
23 and after having been first duly sworn, was examined and
24 testified as follows:)
25 DIRECT EXAMINATION
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1 MR. McDERMOTT:
2 Q Would you please state your name for the record?
3 A. Dr. Ross B. Landsman.
4 Q And Dr. Landsman, what is your trade or occupation?
5 A I work for the Nuclear Regulatory Commission in the
6 Chicago office. I'm an engineer.
7 Q And I take it you're a doctor as a Ph.D., is that
8 correct?
9 A That's correct.
10 Q And what is your Ph.D. in, sir?
11 A Civil Engineer.
12 Q From what university?
13 A IIT, Illinois Institute of Technology.
14 Q And when did you earn that degree?
15 A 1973.
16 Q And I take it you have a Master's degree?
17 A Yes.
18 Q From what institution, sir?
19 A The same school.
20 Q And a Bachelor's degree?
21 A Same school.
22 Q How did you get off campus? Do you know your library
23 has moved, I hope you know that.
24 A I haven't been on campus for a while.
25 Q But that's a sad event. In any event, how long have
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1 you been with the NRC?
2 A 23 years.
3 Q Were you employed anyplace before the NRC?
4 A I worked at Sargent and Lundy Engineers prior to that
5 for six years.
6 Q And were you employed anywhere prior to Sargent and
7 Lundy Engineering?
8 A Yes, just a very, smaller firms.
9 Q So it's, it's the case that you went to Sargent and
10 Lundy upon graduation, or upon completion of at least your
11 Master's degree, is that correct?
12 A No, I went there for, the job market was sort of bad
13 then, so I went to Sargent and Lundy.
14 Q What exactly is your position with NRC?
15 A I'm a Project Engineer in the Decommissioning Branch
16 of the Division of Materials.
17 Q And what is you do as a Project Engineer?
18 A I'm the Region Three Coordinator for Dry Cask
19 Storage, Dry Field Storage.
20 Q And when you say Region Three, what does Region Three
21 encompass, sir?
22 A The Midwest, more than, that's the easy way to look.
23 Q How many Regions are there in the NRC?
24 A Four.
25 Q And can you explain what dry cask storage is as it
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1 relates to your profession, or your job?
2 A All the nuclear plants have been generating spent
3 nuclear fuel all these years, and they ran out of storage room
4 in the pool.
5 And the Department of Energy hasn't opened up the
6 mountain they have out in the west. So they ran out of room.
7 So the NRC is allowing it to store it in dry cask at that plant
8 site until the mountain opens up.
9 Q And how long has the utility, the industry, the
10 creators been using dry casks for storage?
11 A I want to say since '95, I think, somewhere around
12 there.
13 Q Relatively recent?
14 A Yes.
15 Q Can you describe a dry cask, physically?
16 A It's a big garbage can, not a cask. It's a big steel
17 garbage can, that they weld the lid on.
18 Q Do you have any idea what the tonnage is?
19 A Oh, how much it weighs?
20 Q Yes.
21 A Loaded or unloaded?
22 Q Unloaded.
23 A I want to say 50,000 pounds.
24 Q And loaded, I take it it's loaded with liquid?
25 A Spent nuclear fuel.
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1 Q Spent nuclear fuel, and water, am I correct, or no?
2 A No, you drain the water out. So with the fuel it
3 weighs about a 100 thousand pounds.
4 Q Is there a principal manufacturer of dry casks?
5 A No, I think there's three left.
6 Q And who are the three?
7 A One is Holtec out in New Jersey, Transnuclear out
8 west, I can't remember what the other one is, we don't use the
9 other one in Region Three, so I'm not sure.
10 Q Is that your only responsibility with NRC at this
11 point, dry cask?
12 A Right now, yes.
13 Q That's a 100 percent of your time?
14 A Yes.
15 Q And in devoting your time, what is it you do, vis-a-
16 vis, dry cast storage?
17 A I make sure the utilities follow our regulations.
18 Q And again, those are the NRC regulations?
19 A Correct, in regards to the dry cask.
20 Q Are you familiar with Oscar Shirani?
21 A Yes.
22 Q When, if you recall, did you meet him?
23 A I think I met him years ago, but the latest time I
24 met him was at a Holtec user's group meeting.
25 Q Do you recall when that occurred?
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1 A It was November of --
2 Q November of 2000.
3 A Correct.
4 Q Okay. And you said it was a Holtec user's group
5 meeting?
6 A Right.
7 Q How many individuals would have been participating?
8 A I'd say a hundred.
9 Q All right. And a Holtec user would be a
10 representative from the utility?
11 A No, a Holtec user's going to be anyone who's using
12 their cask was at this meeting to learn the latest and greatest
13 about the cast.
14 Q And this --
15 A It's put on by the manufacturer, it's more of a
16 marketing tool, I guess.
17 Q Okay.
18 A But I was invited to attend.
19 Q And Mr. Shirani attended, I take it.
20 A That's correct.
21 Q Did Mr. Shirani do anything in a formal way at this
22 Holtec user's group meeting?
23 A Yes, one of things was he performed an audit previous
24 to that, and one of the questions, I don't what part of the
25 seminar it was at, he asked, he did an audit at Holtec.
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1 And there was a whole bunch of open items, or a whole
2 bunch of things that he found. And I think he was asking at
3 the meeting, again, it was two years ago. Why they weren't
4 closed yet, or what Holtec was doing about the issues.
5 Q So he wasn't on a dais as a formal presenter, I take
6 it.
7 A No, I don't think he was, no.
8 Q And did he entertain questions from people as well,
9 if you were to recall?
10 A I don't recall.
11 Q All right. Did you have occasion to speak with him
12 personally, that day?
13 A Afterwards, yes.
14 Q And what, if anything, did he say to you, and what,
15 if anything, did you say to him?
16 A I just asked him if I could get a copy of the report
17 and he said you've got to go through, I don't know if he said
18 it, I thought you had to go through official, at that time it
19 was Commonwealth Edison channels.
20 I think they were Common at that time, or they might
21 have been Exelon, I'm not sure. The times are vague, but, I
22 had to go through their licensing department or whoever
23 actually had to give me the report. The audits, I'm sorry.
24 Q And as again, the Holtec audit was the subject of his
25 discussion?
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1 A Correct. And I thought they sounded like there was a
2 lot of big items in there that I should know, that the NRC
3 should know about, that would make the casks suspect.
4 Q Was the --
5 A The casks that we were getting at Dresden. Dresden's
6 a power plant, and.
7 Q Let me bring that, bring you around to that. When
8 you attended this meeting in November of 2000, you knew, am I
9 correct, that Commonwealth Edison and/or Exelon was a user of
10 Holtec product, dry cast?
11 MR. GROSS: Your Honor, I'm going to object as to the
12 leading nature of the question. I'm not sure how far you're
13 willing to go on those types of questions, but this is.
14 JUDGE LESNICK: Well, I'll allow leading on your
15 basic foundation, and not controversial cases, or issues, or
16 facts. But I'm not sure again where we are or not. So as we
17 get deeper into the substance I would sustain the objection.
18 MR. McDERMOTT: You are sustaining it?
19 JUDGE LESNICK: Yes.
20 MR. McDERMOTT: All right.
21 BY MR. McDERMOTT:
22 Q In November of 2000, did Commonwealth Edison use
23 Holtec products?
24 A Yes.
25 Q And did they use Holtec products at specific sites?
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1 A They were using them at the Dresden power station.
2 Q At any other site that you knew of as a regulator?
3 A Commonwealth Ed?
4 Q Yes.
5 A No, they were only using them at Dresden.
6 Q Do you know how many dry casks were being in, were in
7 use, in November of the year 2000 at Dresden?
8 A In November of 2000 I don't think they used any yet.
9 They were just still receiving them. I think they were in the
10 fabrication process.
11 Q And you knew that from your work?
12 A And --
13 Q And your assignments?
14 A Yes. That's why I was anticipating.
15 Q You were doing your job?
16 A I thought I was.
17 Q Thank you. I'll ask you to look at what has been
18 previously marked and provided to us by the Respondents. It is
19 Complainant's Exhibit Number 14.
20 (Whereupon, the document referred to
21 as Complainant's Exhibit No. 14 was
22 marked for identification.)
23 BY MR. McDERMOTT:
24 Q I'm going to hand it to you in loose form, making it
25 a little easier for you to go through. Mr. Landsman, take
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1 just a minute.
2 A Yes.
3 Q Can you tell the Judge what that document is?
4 A That, this appears to be the audit that Oscar was
5 talking about at the meeting.
6 Q And do you know who authored that audit?
7 A Oscar was on the team, it appears, that did the
8 audit. How's that?
9 Q All right.
10 A I don't know, there was a few people on the audit, I
11 don't know their names.
12 Q Right.
13 A But Oscar, I think, was part of the team.
14 Q There's a cover letter, just as it came to us from
15 the utility, that is directed to you, is that correct?
16 A Not this letter.
17 Q All right, what, can you, have you ever seen that top
18 letter?
19 A This letter that you gave me that's on top is from
20 Oscar to U.S. Tool and Die.
21 Q No, I mean it's dated when?
22 A August 4th.
23 Q All right. And it is a cover letter then for the
24 actual audit report?
25 A That's what it appears to be.
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1 Q And did you receive a copy of that, as well?
2 A Yeah, yes.
3 Q All right. And there was a separate cover letter I
4 take it that transmitted that particular document into your
5 hands, am I correct?
6 A From Commonwealth Edison Company, correct.
7 Q Is it, you know, did you have a chance to read the
8 audit at some time?
9 A Yes, I did, after I received it.
10 Q Based upon your skill, and training, and experience,
11 did you find any issues that were significant and troublesome
12 in the audit?
13 A Yes, I thought the, most of the issues were very
14 troublesome, and I tried to get the Regional people, which I am
15 in the NRC, we don't do, what's called vendor audits. Holtec
16 would be a vendor, they're supplying --
17 Q I understand.
18 A All right. So I had to call my associates in, out of
19 the Washington D.C. office. They're the ones who do the vendor
20 audits and I tried to get them to go out here to see what was
21 going on.
22 Because they never were out there while Holtec was
23 fabricating any casks. They were just out there to do a paper
24 audit earlier and make sure they had a Quality Assurance
25 program.
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1 So not if they were under, they were building some.
2 And it appeared from this audit that they were out of control,
3 I wanted the NRC to go there and do an inspection.
4 Q And when you say they were out of control, who do you
5 mean?
6 A Just be careful with the word.
7 Q That's fine.
8 A Holtec hired U.S., Holtec, I got to get it, Holtec is
9 an engineering company, they don't do any fabrication. They
10 subcontracted to U.S. Tool and Die to build a cask. That
11 should be on the record, so somebody.
12 It was U.S. and, U.S. Tool and Die has the jargon in
13 the industry as a Ma and Pa Kettle organization and they don't
14 have a Quality Assurance program. So Holtec had an approved QA
15 program from the NRC.
16 They were, they were supposed to watch U.S. Tool and
17 Die to make sure they made the cask according to the specs that
18 the NRC approved.
19 And according to this audit, they were not. They
20 were not following the drawings like they were supposed to.
21 Q And in your opinion, those were serious issues?
22 A I thought so, in my opinion.
23 Q Would you, when you read this audit did it appear
24 that the audit was still open?
25 A Yes it was open. Not the audit, the audit findings
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1 were still open.
2 Q Findings were still open, the audit was completed?
3 A Correct, but the issues were still out there and I
4 thought that's what Oscar was asking at this meeting about, was
5 the resolution to the issue.
6 Q Did you have occasion to, to call Mr. Shirani
7 subsequently?
8 A I don't know if he called me, or I called him, I'm
9 not sure.
10 Q Did you, did you have an opportunity to talk to him
11 on the telephone after meeting with him and after receiving
12 the, the audit report?
13 A Yes, I did.
14 Q What, if anything, did you say to him, and what, if
15 anything did he say to you?
16 A I'm not sure which phone call. I talked to him a few
17 times after I got this. That's when I found out there was
18 another audit done at, Holtec hired another fabricator called
19 Omni, and they were also building part of the cask, so, for
20 Dresden.
21 Q All right.
22 A So I found out there was another audit, so I had to
23 get back to the licensing people. And he said there was a lot
24 of problems at Omni. So I wanted to read that audit since
25 that's, the equipment they were fabricating was also getting
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1 shipped to Dresden.
2 So I had to get back to the licensing, whoever, at
3 Edison, to get a copy of that audit. Which I got a copy of
4 also, which.
5 Q Did you have a chance to read that audit?
6 A Yeah, those findings I thought were worse than the
7 U.S. Tool and Die audit. They were so bad that Holtec no
8 longer uses Omni as a fabricator. Now I don't if it was
9 because of this audit, or their own audit.
10 But they don't use them anymore to build anything.
11 They finished building what they were building for them, and
12 then they don't use them anymore.
13 Q Did, did Oscar participate in that audit as well?
14 A Yes.
15 Q Go ahead.
16 A Well, you asked me if I asked him anything, I don't
17 know if it was for that audit or the U.S. Tool and Die audit, I
18 think it was, I don't know which audit came first.
19 But it was the second audit I think, that, I don't
20 know if it was Omni, or that one. I remember asking him on the
21 phone, Oscar why don't you stop the job?
22 They were, I don't know if it was Omni or that one,
23 they were so bad, the audit findings, I thought, I asked Oscar
24 on the phone why didn't you stop the job?
25 Q And what did he say to you?
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1 A He said I was afraid of my job, that's why he didn't
2 stop the work. I remember that one, okay. And I think, I
3 don't know if it was after that phone call or one of the other
4 phone calls that I went to my, we have an Allegations
5 Coordinator at work.
6 And I said, gee, I just talked to a gentlemen who
7 said there were some bad findings, and he didn't stop the work.
8 Is that considered, I think I might have got my, my
9 attorney involved just to make sure that we weren't, you know,
10 in the middle of an allegation, and somebody was saying, no, as
11 long as he didn't actually come to you and say, you know, that
12 there was an allegation.
13 It's really not an allegation. So, but I remember
14 bringing it up at work that, you know, this guy found all, or
15 this audit, Oscar wasn't the only one on that audit, either.
16 On all this stuff, and he was afraid to stop them, because he
17 was afraid he'd lose his job.
18 Q Now, you know that Oscar did subsequently lose his
19 job?
20 A Correct.
21 Q Do you have an opinion as to why he lost his job?
22 MR. GROSS: I'll object, calls for a legal
23 conclusion, and fact conclusions, and there's no foundation
24 whatsoever that this gentleman has any knowledge as to how
25 Mr. Shirani lost his job.
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1 JUDGE LESNICK: Do you want to respond,
2 Mr. McDermott?
3 MR. McDERMOTT: I do.
4 BY MR. McDERMOTT:
5 Q You deal with people who are similarly situated to
6 Oscar in various utilities, am I correct?
7 A That's correct.
8 MR. GROSS: I'll object as -- Your Honor.
9 JUDGE LESNICK: Well, I'll sustain the earlier
10 objection but let him proceed on this track.
11 MR. McDERMOTT: Thank you, Judge.
12 BY MR. McDERMOTT:
13 Q And you're a Ph.D. engineer, correct?
14 A Correct.
15 Q And you know what engineers do when they do auditing
16 work within utilities, correct?
17 A Correct.
18 Q And you know the ponds within which they have to
19 swim, correct?
20 A Correct.
21 Q And you know fear when you hear it, correct?
22 A Correct.
23 Q Is it common for an engineer to feel pressure from
24 management when they're doing Quality Assurance audits?
25 MR. GROSS: I'll object, lack of foundation, vague,
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1 and irrelevant.
2 JUDGE LESNICK: I think it is, Mr. McDermott. You
3 can try another approach, but not that one.
4 MR. McDERMOTT: All right.
5 BY MR. McDERMOTT:
6 Q Did you ask anybody else at Commonwealth Edison or at
7 Dresden specifically to follow up on what you saw as
8 troublesome in, troublesome in this Holtec, in this Omni, I'm
9 sorry, U.S. Tool and Die and Omni, Holtec audits?
10 A Yes, I did.
11 Q And what, if anything, did you learn?
12 A It was the people at Dresden who were in charge of
13 the dry cast work on the, after I read this Omni audit, I
14 remember going to them and asking them, why don't you do
15 something about it?
16 This is, you know, it's your company. The
17 equipment's coming in here, and it's defective. And there was
18 a, I hate to throw another term on the stand, but they were
19 writing numerous condition reports on-site of the equipment
20 showing up, that it was defective.
21 It's just the way they document it when it comes
22 on-site. It's like writing tickets. On everything that was
23 coming in from Omni was not right. And they had to send stuff
24 back, and it was being rebuilt.
25 And even the stuff from Holtec, they had to ship a
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1 lot of things back. It was being rebuilt, they had to machine
2 it on site. I said, why are you putting up this? This is
3 crazy.
4 And they said because the Purchasing Department is
5 controlling this, and the stuff's coming. We can't stop it,
6 and we'll go to the bottom of the list, and we won't get our
7 equipment when we need it.
8 So they were just putting up with it. This is when I
9 also called my people in Washington and tried to get them to do
10 something, but they didn't do anything, either.
11 Q Did the site people, the Exelon and/or ComEd site
12 people tell you that they, they were the ones who went to Oscar
13 Shirani and asked him to conduct the audits?
14 A No.
15 Q In your own professional opinion should the public
16 know about this kind of conduct as it applies to nuclear
17 safety? I mean, you've just, you've just given testimony with
18 respect to the people at Dresden telling you that they can't do
19 anything about these defective products that are coming in.
20 You've told us what dry cast storage is. I take it
21 that's an issue of public safety, am I correct?
22 A That's correct.
23 Q Does the public have a right to know about these
24 things?
25 A I try to make them aware.
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1 Q Is that part of your job?
2 A Yes.
3 Q And I take it from your testimony because you do not
4 do vendor audits the people in the NRC who do vendor audits
5 were not interested in the issues you brought to them, is that
6 correct?
7 A That's correct.
8 Q I have no other questions.
9 JUDGE LESNICK: Mr. Gross, you may cross examine.
10 MR. GROSS: Thank you, Your Honor.
11 CROSS-EXAMINATION
12 BY MR. GROSS:
13 Q Mr. Landsman, my name is Scott Gross. I'm the
14 attorney for the Respondents. I'd like to ask you a few
15 questions about that November 2000 Holtec meeting where you had
16 a conversation with Mr. Shirani.
17 When you talked to him at that meeting, that was one
18 conversation at the meeting?
19 A The meeting went on for days, I can't say if it was
20 one, or.
21 Q When you had the conversation within which you
22 requested a copy of the audit, did you approach Mr. Shirani to
23 make that request, or did he approach you, do you recall?
24 A No, I do not recall.
25 Q You did, in fact, receive a copy of that audit,
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1 correct?
2 A Correct.
3 (Whereupon, the document referred
4 to as Respondent's Exhibit No. 17
5 was marked for identification.)
6 BY MR. GROSS:
7 Q And let me show you what is marked as Respondent's
8 Exhibit 17.
9 MR. GROSS: And, Your Honor, I have prepared a binder
10 of all the exhibits that I thought may be easiest to use.
11 JUDGE LESNICK: All right, thank you. I appreciate
12 it.
13 BY MR. GROSS:
14 Q Does that letter in Exhibit 17 represent the
15 transmittal letter of the audit that you requested from
16 Mr. Shirani at that meeting?
17 A Yes, it appears to be, yes.
18 Q And you received the audit within about two weeks
19 from your request, correct?
20 A Okay, yes.
21 Q You're not sure?
22 A Well, I'm looking at the date, yeah, okay, I'll
23 agree.
24 Q Have you made any other requests of audits from
25 Commonwealth Edison Company that is vendor or supplier audits?
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1 A Yes, as I just stated, the Omni audit.
2 Q And did you receive a copy of that one, as well?
3 A Yes.
4 Q Any other that you recall?
5 A No, those are the only two I knew that were conducted
6 of the fabricators that I was interested in at Dresden.
7 Q You indicated that after you had had a phone
8 conversation with Mr. Shirani you discussed with someone,
9 possibly an attorney with the NRC, as to whether this might be
10 an allegation, is that correct?
11 A The Allegation Coordinator, so, yes.
12 Q Anyone else who you talked to?
13 A And the Region, yeah, there's a, there's a person
14 that's in charge of that.
15 Q And your understanding was the decision was made not
16 to take any action?
17 A Correct, at that time.
18 Q At that time. You also indicated you had raised
19 issues in Washington about the Dresden dry casts.
20 A That's correct.
21 Q Sometime later in 2000?
22 A Or at the same time, roughly around --
23 Q Or in 2000?
24 A November 2000, November, December 2000.
25 Q And the people in Washington were your superiors or a
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1 different part of the NRC, or?
2 A No, it's a different, it's the Spent Fuel Project
3 Office at the, at headquarters, and they do the vendor audits.
4 Q And they decided to take no action on your concerns?
5 A I couldn't get them excited. They went later on
6 though, a year later, or a year and-a-half later.
7 MR. GROSS: Your Honor, we move to admit Exhibit 17.
8 JUDGE LESNICK: Any objections?
9 MR. McDERMOTT: No objection, Judge.
10 (Whereupon, the document referred
11 to as Respondent's Exhibit No. 17
12 was received into evidence.)
13 JUDGE LESNICK: Let me note for the record
14 Plaintiff's exhibits will be marked as CX, and Employer's as
15 EX.
16 I've marked the Complainant's pre-trial as ALJX 1.
17 (Whereupon, the document referred
18 to as Administrative Law Judge
19 Exhibit No. 1 was marked for
20 identification.)
21 JUDGE LESNICK: Do we have a pre-trial copy from the
22 Employer?
23 MR. GROSS: I can get one, Your Honor.
24 JUDGE LESNICK: All right, and I'll mark that as ALJ
25 2. And this binder is, did you say 17?
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1 MR. GROSS: Exhibit 17 is one you just admitted into
2 evidence.
3 JUDGE LESNICK: Okay, and that's been marked in this
4 binder. Let's go off the record.
5 (Off the record.)
6 (On the record.)
7 JUDGE LESNICK: On the record.
8 BY MR. GROSS:
9 Q Mr. Landsman, in your position as, position with the
10 NRC, do you have an understanding as to what employees in the
11 nuclear till of these obligations are to report safety
12 concerns?
13 A I think I do.
14 Q And what do you understand an obligation to be?
15 A They're supposed to report.
16 Q To who?
17 A To their supervisors, or to, or if they're not paying
18 attention, or if they're not listening or doing anything, they
19 have, they can go to the NRC then.
20 Q And do you believe the individuals who are employees
21 in the nuclear industry who have a safety concern should go to
22 the NRC?
23 A If they're not getting satisfaction from their
24 management.
25 Q Are you familiar with the requirements of the
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1 regulations that relate to employees' obligations to report
2 safety concerns?
3 A Can I quote them? No.
4 Q I'm not asking if you can quote them. I'm just
5 asking if you're familiar with them, generally?
6 A Yes.
7 Q And is it your understanding that an employee in the
8 nuclear industry's obligations arise in part from those
9 regulations?
10 A Okay.
11 Q I asked you, sir, yes or no?
12 A Yes.
13 Q Thank you. And if an employee feels that they raised
14 a safety concern to a supervisor, and they're not getting
15 satisfaction, do you believe an employee has an obligation to
16 go to a higher level to report that concern?
17 A An obligation?
18 Q Yes.
19 A Or a, I wouldn't call it an obligation.
20 Q What would you call it?
21 A Depends how much trouble he wants to raise in his
22 organization. Or if he comes to the, we have resident
23 inspectors at the site, or he can go talk to the NRC.
24 Q Or if an employer has an Employee Concerns Program,
25 an employee would have an obligation to raise a concern there,
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1 as well?
2 A In my experience, those are usually useless.
3 Q Usually useless?
4 A Yes.
5 Q Let me ask you how you are here today. Were you
6 subpoenaed to attend today?
7 A I think so.
8 Q Did you get a copy of this subpoena yourself?
9 A I don't think so, I, they were working through my
10 attorney.
11 Q And are you aware of whether anyone directed you to
12 be here today?
13 A I'm pretty sure there was a subpoena of, to my
14 headquarters office.
15 Q You never saw it yourself?
16 A No.
17 Q And did anyone in your office, supervisor or
18 otherwise, tell you that you needed to be here pursuant to
19 subpoena?
20 A Bruce, I'm asking for help.
21 Q If you recall?
22 A No, I don't recall.
23 Q I have no further questions.
24 JUDGE LESNICK: Mr. McDermott?
25 MR. McDERMOTT: Yes, Judge.
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1 REDIRECT EXAMINATION
2 BY MR. McDERMOTT:
3 Q Would the audit that you identified as our Exhibit
4 Number 14, and Judge, now that I know you're marking this as
5 C1, is that correct?
6 JUDGE LESNICK: Yes.
7 MR. McDERMOTT: C1. And you're going to mark it, so
8 I don't have to?
9 JUDGE LESNICK: I'd prefer if you do.
10 MR. McDERMOTT: Sure. The difficulty is it has
11 their, their inventory code number, then my number, now it says
12 C1.
13 JUDGE LESNICK: Okay.
14 MR. McDERMOTT: So it, it's going to be all over it.
15 I'll put it, put it --
16 JUDGE LESNICK: Let's see what is on there, let me
17 just look so I can.
18 MR. GROSS: Can we go off the record for a second?
19 JUDGE LESNICK: Sure.
20 (Off the record.)
21 (On the record.)
22 JUDGE LESNICK: Can't do two things at once. All
23 right, back on the record. Off the record we discussed how to
24 mark the exhibits. In the pre-hearing report by the
25 Complainant, exhibits were tentatively marked.
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1 We'll, we will stay with those numbers. So they may
2 come in out of order, and that's fine. This first exhibit has
3 been previously marked as 14, it will remain so. It had been
4 identified, but just offered now. Any objection?
5 MR. GROSS: No, Your Honor.
6 JUDGE LESNICK: All right. Then Complainant's
7 Exhibit 14, marked as CX 14 will be admitted. Proceed.
8 (Whereupon, the document referred
9 to as Complainant's Exhibit No.
10 14 was received into evidence.)
11 BY MR. McDERMOTT:
12 Q And now we get to how the best laid plans of mice and
13 men. I'm going to ask you, Mr. Landsman, to look at what is
14 tendered and is now finally numbered today, as I see for the
15 first time, as Respondent's Exhibit Number 46.
16 And it would be, I would, you know, I guess it's C,
17 it's C, I don't know what it is now.
18 MR. GROSS: RX.
19 JUDGE LESNICK: Was it identified in the pre-hearing?
20 As what?
21 MR. GROSS: Respondent's Exhibit 46.
22 MR. McDERMOTT: It was Respondent's.
23 MR. GROSS: And we can stick with that.
24 JUDGE LESNICK: We can stick with that.
25 MR. GROSS: Yes.
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1 MR. McDERMOTT: And if we can, I couldn't find it in
2 the pre-hearing, that's all.
3 MR. GROSS: It is.
4 JUDGE LESNICK: Fine.
5 (Whereupon, the document referred
6 to as Respondent's Exhibit No. 46
7 was marked for identification.)
8 THE WITNESS: Do you want me to read it?
9 BY MR. McDERMOTT:
10 Q Yes, please.
11 A The whole thing?
12 Q Well, let me direct you, page, have you ever seen
13 this document before, or a document like this before?
14 A No.
15 Q From Commonwealth Edison or from Exelon?
16 A Not that I can recall.
17 Q All right. I'll direct your attention to page two.
18 I'm sorry, let me bring you back to page one. This has to do
19 with the Holtec DSQG audit of U.S. Tool and Die, am I correct?
20 As best as we can see?
21 A That's what it appears to be.
22 Q Directing your attention to page two, the second full
23 paragraph, would you, it's entitled 'Corrective Actions to be
24 Taken.' Could you take a moment and read that paragraph?
25 A Okay.
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1 Q Specifically, and for the record, one sentence in
2 that paragraph is, 'the subject findings were thoroughly
3 evaluated and all issues were resolved satisfactorily during
4 the audit by the team not to have any impact on the Dresden
5 Station Unit 1 Dry Storage Cask loading.' Can that be true?
6 A That depends on the date of this.
7 Q The date of this is 8/14/00.
8 MR. GROSS: I'll object as to the date he's
9 indicating, that's not accurate at all.
10 JUDGE LESNICK: Well, why don't if we get agreement
11 on it. The status due date is 8/21. Where does 8/14 come
12 from, Mr. McDermott?
13 MR. McDERMOTT: I'm looking at 8/14 as being the date
14 that, on page three, I'm sorry, it's 8/4.
15 JUDGE LESNICK: I see a discovery date 8/4.
16 MR. McDERMOTT: Yes.
17 JUDGE LESNICK: Exempt date 8/4. Is there any
18 problem with that, Mr. Gross?
19 MR. GROSS: Well, not as to what you're describing.
20 But there are a lot of dates in 2001, as well. And there's no
21 indication as to the date that particular entry was put in
22 there. And Mr. Landsman said he's never seen it before.
23 JUDGE LESNICK: Well, why don't you question him
24 further, Mr. McDermott.
25 MR. McDERMOTT: Yes, Judge.
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1 BY MR. McDERMOTT:
2 Q I'll ask you to look at page number four, the very
3 last paragraph, the bottom paragraph, above the, the insignia
4 supervisor, Russell Bastyr, date 8/4/2000. And it's proposed,
5 it's kind of a proposed solution.
6 A Okay.
7 Q All right. The final sentence there is strikingly
8 identical to the prior sentence, and that is the subject
9 findings were thoroughly evaluated and all the issues resolved
10 satisfactorily during the audit by the team not to have any
11 impact on the Dresden Station Unit 1 Dry Storage Cask loading.
12 And it is followed by, again, the supervisor,
13 Mr. Bastyr, 8/4/2000, and it's EX 8 dash 343 dash 5648,
14 Department SES. Can that statement possibly be true on
15 8/4/2000, in light of your reading the audit report of
16 Mr. Shirani's?
17 A No, it cannot be true.
18 Q Thank you. I have no other questions.
19 JUDGE LESNICK: Is that document now offered?
20 MR. McDERMOTT: Yes, Judge. We're offering it.
21 JUDGE LESNICK: And I presume no objection from --
22 MR. GROSS: No objection.
23 JUDGE LESNICK: I will admit that document. You can
24 keep that, because I'm marking the Employer's copy, and I
25 presume by doing that Employer's Exhibit Number is appropriate,
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1 provided there is no difference whatever between those
2 documents.
3 So the official document will be Employer's Exhibit
4 46.
5 (Whereupon, the document referred
6 to as Respondent's Exhibit No. 46
7 was received into evidence.)
8 MR. GROSS: I have no follow-up questions, Your
9 Honor.
10 MR. McDERMOTT: Thank you, Mr. Landsman.
11 JUDGE LESNICK: Mr. Landsman, you're excused.
12 THE WITNESS: Thank you, sir.
13 JUDGE LESNICK: You may step down.
14 MR. McDERMOTT: May I step out to see if my --
15 JUDGE LESNICK: Yes, let's take a five minute recess.
16 (Whereupon, a short recess was taken.)
17 JUDGE LESNICK: Back on the record.
18 MR. McDERMOTT: We're back on the record, and I'd
19 like to call Mr. Shirani.
20 JUDGE LESNICK: All right.
21 MR. McDERMOTT: Mr. Shirani, please have a seat.
22 MR. GROSS: Your Honor, may I make a quick procedural
23 point?
24 JUDGE LESNICK: Sure.
25 MR. GROSS: I just wanted to request, we have
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1 received copies of the subpoenas of Ms. Harrison and Mr. Hahn.
2 To the extent there are any other subpoenas, we have never
3 received them and we would ask that we receive a copy of them.
4 JUDGE LESNICK: Okay.
5 MR. McDERMOTT: And they, those are in fact the
6 subpoenas that are live, and I have the originals and I will
7 ask you sometime during the proceedings to sign them.
8 My instructions from the NRC Chief Counsel's office
9 in Washington was that they were not going to honor a subpoena,
10 they gave me the words to put in the subpoena and I had to
11 submit a separate affidavit.
12 Now, if he wants to see all of my correspondence with
13 the Chief Counsel's office at the NRC, I'll certainly make it
14 available to him. That's what brought Mr. Landsman here.
15 There is a subpoena copy out there. But it's in the Deputy
16 Chief Counsel, Charles Mullins' file.
17 JUDGE LESNICK: All right. Well that's an issue for
18 you all, I mean, to raise and put in. My only concern with the
19 subpoena is whether or not there is some witness who doesn't
20 choose to appear.
21 MR. McDERMOTT: Right, and --
22 MR. GROSS: I understand. Okay.
23 JUDGE LESNICK: You know, and then I get involved.
24 MR. McDERMOTT: Right.
25 JUDGE LESNICK: Otherwise, the whole process, in
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1 fact, has been set up, as you know, to be accessible through
2 the internet and for you all to proceed. And again, we only
3 get involved in controversy.
4 But all right. But I'll be here to make, if you wish
5 to make a record on that point later. And at this point,
6 Mr. Shirani, would you please raise your right hand?
7 (Whereupon,
8 OSCAR B. SHIRANI
9 was called as a witness by and on behalf of the Complainant,
10 and after having been first duly sworn, was examined and
11 testified as follows:)
12 JUDGE LESNICK: You may proceed to question the
13 witness.
14 MR. McDERMOTT: Thank you, Judge.
15 DIRECT EXAMINATION
16 BY MR. McDERMOTT:
17 Q Would you state your name and spell your name, first,
18 middle, and last name completely for the court.
19 A Oscar B. Shirani, O-s-c-a-r, B, S-h-i-r-a-n-i.
20 Q And your residence address, Mr. Shirani?
21 A 21 West 704 Buckingham Road, Glen Ellyn, Illinois,
22 60137.
23 Q And how long have you resided there?
24 A 12 years.
25 Q All right. Are you currently employed?
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1 A No, no sir.
2 Q Are you currently selling your services in any manner
3 or form?
4 A I'm trying to do some consulting.
5 Q And have you been able to get some consulting work?
6 A For the last six weeks I've been helping another
7 company writing their Quality Assurance program. And helping
8 them to get out of some audit findings that they were cited by
9 another company.
10 Q All right. You, you were employed by Commonwealth
11 Edison, is that correct?
12 A Yes.
13 Q What was your start date with Commonwealth Edison?
14 A May 21st, 1990.
15 Q And how old were you on that date?
16 A I'm 46 now, so minus 12.
17 Q 34, right?
18 A 34, yes.
19 Q And what is your trade or occupation?
20 A I have a Civil Engineering Bachelor of Science and
21 Master's Degree, in Civil Engineering. And I have been
22 involved with the civil structural design analysis, and
23 mechanical structural seismic analysis, weak link analysis,
24 stress analysis, and, for 14 years.
25 And in addition, I have seven years of Quality
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1 Assurance audit experience --
2 Q Now, in May of 1990 when you joined Commonwealth
3 Edison, were you recruited to a position?
4 A No, I did apply for the position.
5 Q Who had the final say in your hire?
6 A Mr. Tom Maiman.
7 Q Can you spell that last name?
8 A M-a-i-m-a-n.
9 Q And what was Mr. Maiman's title in 1990?
10 A I believe he was Executive Vice President of the
11 Nuclear Operation Department at that time was called NOD.
12 Which later became NGG, Nuclear Generation Group.
13 Q And, when, did that title remain the same during your
14 tenure at Commonwealth Edison, then Exelon, his title, that
15 person's title?
16 A I'm not sure, he could have gone up the ladder, or,
17 I'm not sure. But I think that's the highest level before you
18 become President.
19 Q That's the person in charge of generation?
20 A The nuclear, right.
21 Q Nuclear generation?
22 A Yes.
23 Q That's the person who hired you?
24 A Yes.
25 Q All right. Did you have experience in energy
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1 production prior to 1990?
2 A Yes, I was --
3 Q What was it?
4 A I was working ten years for architect engineering
5 company, one of the largest in the world, called Stone and
6 Webster Engineering Corporation, headquartered in Boston,
7 Massachusetts. I worked for them almost ten years.
8 Q And what did you do for Stone and Webster?
9 A I was performing structural design analysis for the
10 structures, components, and supports.
11 And I was also writing generic solutions, procedures,
12 code interpretation, I was also reviewing their final license
13 submittals to the NRC as I, I was qualified as the independent
14 reviewer of the design analysis.
15 And I served in five different nuclear power plants.
16 Q Where were they, if you remember?
17 A Yes. The first one I went to, Surry, S-u-r-r-y,
18 Nuclear Power Plant in Virginia, owned by VEPCO, Virginia
19 Electric Power Company.
20 And after that, I went to another power plant in, for
21 VEPCO again, which was North Anna Power Plant. They are just
22 like about a hundred miles away from each other.
23 Shortly after I came back to Boston, ad they sent me
24 to Millstone Nuclear Power Plant, Millstone Number Three, which
25 was under the construction. And I was there for about two
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1 years.
2 Q And where was that located?
3 A That was Millstone, Waterford, Connecticut.
4 Q All right.
5 A Next to the submarine stations. And then two years
6 later, the headquarter called me to go to Beaver Valley Nuclear
7 Power Plant, working for Duquesne Light and Power. I believe
8 now, they sold it to First Energy.
9 Q And where was that located?
10 A That's in Beaver, Pennsylvania. After I left the
11 Beaver Valley Nuclear Station, I was called again by Boston
12 headquarter to go to Comanche Peak Nuclear Power Plant, in Glen
13 Rose, Texas. Working for Texas Utilities.
14 Q And what years were you at Comanche Cheek?
15 A Comanche Peak.
16 Q I'm sorry, Peak.
17 A From 1986 time frame, until end of 1989. Almost,
18 almost three years. Then shortly after, I left Stone and
19 Webster, and I joined Westinghouse in Richland, Washington. I
20 was --
21 Q The state of Washington?
22 A State of Washington. I was the Structural Analyst,
23 and I was training their engineers and their construction
24 people, and helping them with the structural analysis.
25 Q Now, these are all related to the nuclear industry,
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1 correct?
2 A Yes, sir.
3 Q For ten years?
4 A Ten years, right.
5 Q I'm going to ask you to, you're the Complainant in
6 this matter, am I correct?
7 A Yes.
8 Q And just to, to get certain perfunctory things out of
9 the way, we've marked this as our Exhibit Number 1.
10 (Whereupon, the document referred
11 to as Complainant's Exhibit No. 1
12 was marked for identification.)
13 BY MR. McDERMOTT:
14 Q That is a copy, am I correct, of your complaint? Am
15 I correct?
16 A Yes.
17 Q All right. And, that's the document that, that
18 brings us here today, am I correct?
19 A Yes.
20 MR. McDERMOTT: I'd like to offer into evidence,
21 Judge, so we can make sure --
22 JUDGE LESNICK: Any objections?
23 MR. GROSS: Your Honor, we're going to offer a
24 different version that's actually signed and executed. I don't
25 know if we want to use that instead, but I have no objection to
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1 this document.
2 MR. McDERMOTT: Just hold on to it. We're bringing
3 it into -- anyway.
4 JUDGE LESNICK: Okay.
5 MR. GROSS: And I object to the extent it's used in
6 any way to bring into evidence as facts anything that's stated
7 in the complaint.
8 MR. McDERMOTT: I have not intention, intention to
9 that. At whatever conferences I asked you, and inquired if you
10 had seen the complaint. And you said I'm sure it's going to
11 come in as an Exhibit, and I said, fine.
12 MR. GROSS: Right.
13 MR. McDERMOTT: And that's --
14 MR. GROSS: And does that have that --
15 JUDGE LESNICK: All right. And to, and to that
16 consideration it, again, the facts stated in here have to be
17 shown.
18 MR. McDERMOTT: Correct, by this case.
19 JUDGE LESNICK: But you represent that this a, this
20 is a copy no one's signed?
21 MR. McDERMOTT: Correct.
22 JUDGE LESNICK: This is the actual complaint?
23 MR. McDERMOTT: Right.
24 JUDGE LESNICK: All right.
25 MR. McDERMOTT: Thank you, Judge.
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1 (Whereupon, the document referred
2 to as Complainant's Exhibit No. 1
3 was received into evidence.)
4 (Whereupon, the document referred
5 to as Complainant's Exhibit No. 2
6 was marked for identification.)
7 BY MR. McDERMOTT:
8 Q I'm asking you to look at it, at our Exhibit Number
9 2. And would you tell the Administrative Law Judge what that
10 is entitled?
11 A It's a complaint glossary.
12 Q It's a complaint glossary. And it, it lists, at
13 least for the purposes of the complaint, but we hope for the
14 purposes of the hearing, the acronyms and/or the letter
15 shorthand for various items mentioned in the complaint.
16 But also items that are commonly used in the, with
17 your business, correct?
18 A Yes.
19 Q For example, the M & S, as it applies to?
20 A Mechanical and Structural Engineering Division within
21 Commonwealth Edison.
22 Q Right. So M & S, if you were to mention that in your
23 testimony, would be aided in, if there's a record that has to
24 be produced, this glossary will assist.
25 MR. McDERMOTT: Do you have any objection, counsel?
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1 MR. GROSS: Your Honor, a couple of these are legal
2 conclusions and argument, explaining what they mean. But I
3 have no objection for the use of it as to understand what the
4 acronym stands for, the words.
5 JUDGE LESNICK: All right.
6 MR. McDERMOTT: That's my only purpose, Judge.
7 JUDGE LESNICK: All right. Received.
8 (Whereupon, the document referred
9 to as Complainant's Exhibit No. 2
10 was received into evidence.)
11 MR. McDERMOTT: Thank you.
12 JUDGE LESNICK: Plaintiff's 2.
13 BY MR. McDERMOTT:
14 Q So when you worked for Stone and Webster, you were at
15 least in four, possibly five separate states over a period of
16 ten years?
17 A Yes.
18 Q All right. And, over a period of seven years, and
19 then you were in a new state when you went to work for
20 Westinghouse, is that correct?
21 A Yes.
22 Q When you worked -- strike that. Westinghouse is a
23 principal vendor, am I correct, for Commonwealth Edison and
24 Exelon?
25 A One of the major.
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1 Q One of the majors. What does Westinghouse vend to
2 ComEd, Exelon?
3 A Commonwealth Edison has two systems called PWR, and
4 BWR. PWR stands for Pressure Water Reactor, which is designed
5 by Westinghouse.
6 And BWR stands for Boiling Water Reactor, designed by
7 General Electric. And these two are N triple S suppliers,
8 which is, stands for Nuclear Safety Supply Systems.
9 They designed the reactors, they designed all the
10 components, which is related to the operation, design, and
11 construction, and then maintenance and operations of the
12 reactors.
13 Q While you were employed at Commonwealth Edison in the
14 capacity of Quality Assurance, were you asked to do any Quality
15 Assurance investigation or assessment of Westinghouse?
16 A I don't recall. I don't think so.
17 Q Was that something you would have volunteered to do,
18 having worked for them?
19 A I would have done it, but I think, because I wanted
20 to make sure that I keep my independence. Because I may have
21 produced some of those documents at Westinghouse. I provided
22 that reason that I'd rather not to be assigned to Westinghouse.
23 I want to make sure as a Quality Assurance, I am
24 independent, as required per 10 C.F.R. 50, Appendix B,
25 Criterion One.
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1 Q And Westinghouse designed the Pressure Water
2 Reactors, correct?
3 A Yes.
4 Q And, how many, during the time you worked for
5 Commonwealth Edison, how many reactors exist or existed in
6 Commonwealth Edison prior to the merger?
7 A Prior to Exelon, Commonwealth Edison and the parent
8 company, Unicom, they had 12 nuclear units operating. And I
9 had, they had one unit which was decommissioned. So it was
10 total of 13, but operating was 12.
11 Six PWR's designed by Westinghouse, which are Zion,
12 Byron, and Braidwood. And the BWR's designed by GE are LaSalle
13 County Nuclear Station, and Dresden Nuclear Station, and Quad
14 Cities Nuclear Stations.
15 So we have like half and half. Six units from
16 Westinghouse. Six units from the General Electric.
17 Q And in listing these 12 you give six sites, and that
18 tells us there are two reactors at each site, that's out there?
19 A Yes.
20 Q Thank you. What was your first assignment at
21 Commonwealth Edison, what was your first job?
22 A My first job, I was hired as the Structural Engineer,
23 in the Mechanical Structural which we abbreviated as M & S
24 Group.
25 And I was performing structural analysis
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1 calculations, troubleshooting of the nuclear stations, because
2 we were located at the headquarter.
3 And the stations were contacting the headquarter for
4 any problems they had, or any design assistance they needed.
5 Traditionally, Commonwealth Edison was doing like, Engineering
6 was doing management. They were not doing in-house
7 engineering.
8 And my commitment to Mr. Maiman was because I do have
9 extensive architect engineering background, I would like to
10 change the culture and bring in-house capabilities in
11 Commonwealth Edison. And start developing criteria of teaching
12 the engineers.
13 Q How many managers were in the Mechanical and
14 Structural Group?
15 A I would say, between 50 to 70.
16 Q And, it's your opinion that they were behaving more
17 as managers than engineers?
18 A Yes.
19 Q They would be assigned to projects that were designed
20 by engineers other than ComEd engineers, correct?
21 A Yes.
22 Q And they were interfacing with vendors, primarily?
23 A Interfacing with vendors primarily. yes.
24 Q And they would have to, they were centrally located,
25 but there were also engineers, am I correct, at the sites?
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1 A Yes.
2 Q So the 70 or so are the total who were in the
3 Engineering Group in the suburbs?
4 A 50 to 70 was at the headquarter, which was at 1400
5 Opus Place, Downers Grove, Illinois, 60515.
6 Q All right.
7 A And, mostly they were headquartered there. And the
8 nuclear stations they had site engineering group. But kind of,
9 you could say, the brain of the engineering was located at the
10 headquarter. So that's where you go and help the sites.
11 Q What, if anything, did you do to further this change
12 in culture?
13 A I walked to the sites and I started talking to
14 people. Finding out where they spend most money. And came up
15 with several months, I didn't even tell my supervisor what I'm
16 going to do.
17 But I got it, enough information finding that
18 Commonwealth Edison was spending between five to seven millions
19 in some years, between six to eight millions, millions of
20 dollars doing the structural reading.
21 And the sites were calling headquarter, and the
22 headquarter was giving the jobs to architectural engineer
23 firms, like Sargent and Lundy, mostly. And Bechtel
24 Engineering, and so forth.
25 So what I did, I gathered all the data. And then I
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1 gathered all the managers, and I told them that I could provide
2 engineering solutions, because I did this kind of work at the,
3 at Stone and Webster.
4 And with less than 120 thousand dollars I can provide
5 that document for you, which I was successful, they gave me.
6 And I also presented that --
7 Q Excuse me, what year did you call all of these
8 managers together, after you walked through the sites?
9 A It was around 1992, the time frame.
10 Q All right. And what if anything physically was
11 produced by you and others to accomplish this goal?
12 A I produced minimum six technical information
13 documents, called TID's. And I believe each one, like about
14 close to 400 pages. And then also they are four of them are
15 technical information document for all the different nuclear
16 stations.
17 Boiling water reactors and pressure water reactors,
18 structural, structural support criteria. Which I put all the
19 codes, all the formulas, that the engineers in-house, they can
20 just follow without any dependency to the outside firms.
21 Q But prior to your coming to Commonwealth Edison, were
22 any TID's, did you create the term TID?
23 A No.
24 Q Were there TID's in existence?
25 A There were a few TID's, but they were administrative
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1 in nature.
2 Q I'm sorry?
3 A They were administrative in nature, just how to go
4 about doing things. But by the time it gets to the technical
5 of the, of the program, they had to call Sergeant & Lundy to do
6 their work, or architect engineer firms as a contractors.
7 So, not only I put a brain behind it, there were
8 other that they may have existed, and I did not want to go and
9 reinvent the wheel. So I used those, and I put assembly of all
10 the documents together.
11 And then I also present those to, some of those, to
12 the American Society of Mechanical Engineering, Pressure Vessel
13 Piping, is known AMSME PVP conferences. And it's, they are
14 published in their volumes.
15 (Whereupon, the document referred
16 to as Complainant's Exhibit No.
17 29 was marked for
18 identification.)
19 BY MR. McDERMOTT:
20 Q All right, so, I'll ask you to look at what we've
21 marked as our Exhibit Number 29. You produced these for us,
22 they've been identified as the TID's that you, you made
23 available to us, but for one that we did not collect, am I
24 correct?
25 MR. GROSS: I'll have to quickly look through those.
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1 MR. McDERMOTT: Sure.
2 THE WITNESS: Mr. McDermott, these are --
3 BY MR. McDERMOTT:
4 Q Did you have a question? Mr. Shirani, I'm going to
5 ask you to look at what is bundled by string and rubber band
6 and hardware. Would you just a minute and just make sure those
7 are the documents that were produced by us, or excuse me,
8 produced by Exelon at our request.
9 A Yes, Mr. McDermott.
10 Q And what are those documents?
11 A They are Zion Station Pipe Support Analysis. They
12 are LaSalle County Station Pipe Support Analysis. Byron,
13 Braidwood Station Pipe Support Analysis. PWR Stations
14 Temporary Breaking Load Criteria. BWR Stations Temporary
15 Breaking Load Criteria.
16 Q Is that a representative sample of the TID's that you
17 wrote?
18 A Yes.
19 Q Is, is this all of them?
20 A No.
21 Q Would there be an equal number, a number equal to
22 these that were not for use, or?
23 A I believe one of the pipe support analysis that we
24 requested for Dresden, Quad Cities repeatedly and it was not
25 produced.
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1 Q Okay. But it's a fair example of the work that you
2 did, correct?
3 A Yes.
4 Q And let me ask you, you didn't do this all alone?
5 A No.
6 Q Who helped you in creating these TID's?
7 A I contracted portions of it to the outside.
8 Q All right. So you had to spend some money?
9 A Yeah.
10 Q Is that the 125,000 dollars you mentioned?
11 A Yeah.
12 Q Did you exceed that budget?
13 A No.
14 Q So, did you have to use Sargent and Lundy for some of
15 this work?
16 A Yes.
17 Q All right. Anybody else?
18 A That's all.
19 Q All right. Did they see the handwriting on the wall,
20 did they see they were going to lose business if you did this?
21 MR. GROSS: I'll object, Your Honor, as to the lack
22 of foundation as to what someone else thought, or saw on the
23 wall.
24 JUDGE LESNICK: Sustained. Go ahead.
25 BY MR. McDERMOTT:
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1 Q You turned over to your management?
2 A Yes.
3 Q Did copies of the TID's go to the sites?
4 A Yes, it was a standard.
5 Q They were widely distributed throughout the six
6 geographical areas, and the twelve operating plants, correct?
7 A Yes, sir.
8 Q Did those people know who you were?
9 A Yes.
10 Q Did they know you were the author of this, or I'm
11 sorry, not author, editor of this, these documents?
12 A I prepared those documents, I advertised it, and I
13 went to all the sites. And I provided 12 training for over 300
14 engineers at all nuclear sites.
15 Q So it would be hard for them not to know who Oscar
16 Shirani was, right?
17 A Yes.
18 MR. GROSS: I'll object, Your Honor.
19 JUDGE LESNICK: I'll allow it.
20 MR. McDERMOTT: Thank you, Judge.
21 BY MR. McDERMOTT:
22 Q So this is 1993 probably?
23 A 1993, '94 time frame.
24 Q And you mentioned ASME?
25 A A-S-M-E, ASME, yes.
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1 Q And that's the American?
2 A That's American Society of Mechanical Engineers,
3 around the world.
4 Q But you aren't a mechanical engineer, were you?
5 A Yeah, that was a challenge actually.
6 Q What do you mean?
7 A One of my supervisors, I guess, his name was Paul
8 Donovan, he was a mechanical engineer. And he was teasing me
9 that the structural engineers do not understand thermal
10 analysis. And you guys just building bridges, and just put a
11 gap, you don't know what, what you doing.
12 So, one day, I was sitting in another area that,
13 because mechanical structural engineering didn't have enough
14 space, so they put me behind the programs group.
15 And then a gentleman come in and knocking on my
16 shoulder, Mr. Nick Constantino, he was one of the managers of
17 the Programs Group. They are dealing with the valve issues,
18 NOV's.
19 He comes around 9 o'clock, and tap on my shoulder
20 thinking that I was one of the consultants of Sergeant & Lundy,
21 because I was not assigned at any name or cube. And he says,
22 our stations has called, LaSalle Nuclear Station has called.
23 And they are experiencing a thirty percent margin
24 increase in the thrust analysis. Can you look at it? And I
25 was a structural engineer, I said valve, I only have seen it in
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1 my, at my home. I don't know, I'm not a mechanical.
2 But I looked at it, and it was like a stress
3 analysis. So a structural engineer, I will say, envelopes
4 mechanical, we're dealing with a round shape, we're dealing
5 with all kinds of shape.
6 So I understood it, and I didn't have any tools with
7 it. Because they had to make a red phone call to the NRC
8 around 1 o'clock. I have only four hours, and I didn't want to
9 tell him that I'm not a mechanical engineer.
10 I said let me try, see if I can help him. So I went
11 to Susan Corn, who was of the consultants with Bechtel, or
12 maybe it was another name that time. And I said can you show
13 me some valves, I want to know what's the yoke is, you know,
14 the thrust is that you talk about.
15 They showed me the valve. So, I, and I was teaching
16 in the College of DuPage for five years as a structure and a
17 mathematics, too. So I knew the second degree, third degree
18 equations and I figured out, and I figured that the load they
19 talking about, we have 600 percent margin left.
20 And they running only about 30 percent. So I saved
21 them from a red phone call to the NRC.
22 Q All right.
23 A He was very happy about it.
24 Q But that wasn't an answer to my question. You're a
25 structural, not a mechanical engineer.
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1 A So, then I became --
2 Q But you're publishing in, in mechanical engineering
3 journals, right?
4 A Yes.
5 Q Did you make the front page of this mechanical
6 engineering journal?
7 A Yes.
8 Q Do you remember what year that was?
9 A 1995 I presented a paper as a author. I created a
10 code that did not exist. 70 or 80 of the valves at Dresden,
11 Quad Cities, they were exceeding the design allowable by about
12 300 to 500 percent margin.
13 ASME did not have a code. So as the NRC. So in
14 order to really to rectify the situation they have to bring the
15 units down. But I wrote the elastic plastic theory. And I
16 defended the operability of the valves which later was used by
17 the industry.
18 And it became a code. And it is, in 1995, pressure
19 vessel piping. I presented it to the MUG meeting, which Motor
20 Operated user's group. And then, in front of all of the
21 Regions of the NRC, the industry, about 500 people they were
22 listening to that speech.
23 And then NRC had only one question. Wanted to know
24 if I have analyzed the, the deflection within stem on stem
25 stresses.
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1 And then I went and revised it and I presented in the
2 American Society of Mechanical's Pressure and Supply meeting in
3 Honolulu, Hawaii, 1995.
4 And that's how I became more interested to be one of
5 the ASM more mechanical engineer, because it was just like more
6 challenging than the civil engineering. And now I proved to my
7 boss that I could do it.
8 Q Let me ask, you took some pride in this work, did you
9 not?
10 A Yes, of course.
11 Q And you didn't, you weren't bashful if people
12 applauded your, your presentations, were you?
13 A No.
14 Q You like it?
15 A Of course.
16 Q Anything wrong with looking towards a promotion?
17 A That's --
18 Q Anything wrong with looking towards publicity?
19 MR. GROSS: I'll object, Your Honor, as to the
20 morality questions.
21 JUDGE LESNICK: I'll allow it.
22 MR. McDERMOTT: Thank you.
23 BY MR. McDERMOTT:
24 Q So these TID's saved your company according to your
25 testimony four to six million dollars a year?
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1 A True of the last one, the PWR, and the BWR -- those
2 two alone saved every single year for the next 40 years.
3 Q The next what?
4 A The next 40 to 60 years.
5 Q 40 to 60 years.
6 A 40 to 60 years. And it was not even my opinion. It
7 was, I was interviewed by the, a gentleman from the Finance
8 Department. And they put the figures together, and got the
9 figures from the stations.
10 And they assembled that it is three to five million
11 some years, six to eight millions of dollars that we were
12 sending, spending to the outside contractors.
13 Q All right. Did your work and recognition result in a
14 promotion within Engineering?
15 A I did not understand your question, sir.
16 Q Did you become a Lead Engineer and a, and a manager
17 of a unit called MOV?
18 A Yes.
19 Q Was that a promotion?
20 A Yes.
21 Q All right. When did that occur?
22 A 1993. I was hired 1990 as a Principal Engineer,
23 Level Seven. 1993 I was promoted to the Lead Senior Engineer,
24 Level Eight.
25 Q And that meant more money?
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1 A Yeah, of course.
2 Q And again, let me just stop you there. Level Seven,
3 Level Eight, those are economic bands, am I correct?
4 A Yes, salary grade band.
5 Q Those were the salary grade bands in use in
6 Commonwealth Edison at the time?
7 A Yes.
8 Q Who's the number one man in Commonwealth Edison at
9 this time, '93?
10 A 19, 1993?
11 Q 1993.
12 A I believe it was Mr. Tom Maiman, and Mr. Lou
13 Delegeorge.
14 Q When you were hired in, were you at grade Level
15 Seven?
16 A Yes, I was a Principal Engineer.
17 Q Okay, and you were promoted in '93 to a grade Level
18 Eight?
19 A Eight, Senior Engineer.
20 Q All right. How long did you remain in Engineering?
21 A Up to November 28th, 1994.
22 Q Now did you do any training sessions other than those
23 training sessions related to the TID's when you were in
24 Engineering?
25 A Well that, the first four TID's, the pipe support
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1 design criterion, it's in-house capability, increasing in --,
2 yeah, and then I also helped with the MOV seismic analysis and
3 a weak link analysis training.
4 As well as seismic, which is, seismic means
5 earthquake, scaffolding. Because, you know, I'd reviewed some
6 of those, too. Also I reviewed some of the other mechanical
7 TID's.
8 Later on these TID's changed their name, I guess
9 these recent years they have changed it to Commonwealth Edison
10 or Exelon Standards. So maybe some of the TID's for these
11 particular ones, may not have the, exist, these numbers.
12 They may have just changed number name, or revisions
13 or so. But these are, at that time, it was the latest current.
14 Q And they may be called the Exelon Standards now?
15 A Right.
16 Q The Exelon something standards, or?
17 A MS, mostly they are using, Mechanical Standards.
18 Mechanical Structural Standards.
19 Q Did you change your, your position within
20 Commonwealth Edison in 1994?
21 A Yes. I went to Quality Assurance Department. That
22 the name of the group was SES, Supplier Evaluation Services
23 Group.
24 I had helped them before in, from 1990 to 1994 as a
25 subject matter expert in their audits of their outside or
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1 inside audits.
2 Q All right, let me ask you, the SES existed when you
3 came to work for Commonwealth Edison in 1990, correct?
4 A I don't know if it was 1990, but I knew it existed
5 November 28th, 1994, when I joined it.
6 Q But you said you helped them prior to joining them?
7 A I didn't know their name, but I knew that I'm helping
8 Quality Assurance Group, as a subject matter expert.
9 Q And what is a subject matter expert?
10 A Subject matter expert is since the audits, internal
11 audits or external audits, they have to comply with the 10
12 C.F.R. 50, Appendix B, and it has 18 criteria. Criteria number
13 three, which I will say, heart of the audit, is a design
14 control process.
15 So usually, Quality Assurance people don't have
16 experience in that area. So they have to go and get expertise
17 in engineering to assist them to, to assure that they do
18 understand the intent of the 10 C.F.R. and the ANSI and ASME
19 standards.
20 Because traditionally Quality Assurance people are
21 not trained to the technical standards. So I didn't have --
22 Q Let me stop you right there.
23 A Yes.
24 Q I'm going to ask you to look at what has been
25 identified as an abbreviated version and provided to counsel.
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1 Look at what we're calling our Exhibit Number 3. Do you know
2 what that is, Oscar?
3 A Yes, sir.
4 Q What is it?
5 A This is the Code of Federal Regulation, Section 10,
6 Part 50, which is known as 10 C.F.R. 50, Appendix B. And for
7 simplicity for this Court, I will call it Code, to make it
8 simple.
9 Q All right. Let me ask you, you're testifying that
10 prior to joining this organization called SES you're acting as
11 a subject matter expert with respect to Criteria three, in that
12 code, is that correct?
13 A Yes, sir.
14 Q And your subject matter expertise were in what areas?
15 A Mechanical and structural areas.
16 Q The kinds of things you did daily with respect to the
17 sites, and with respect to the organization, the, the
18 superstructure in, on Opus Place, is that what you said?
19 A Yes.
20 Q All right.
21 A And 14 years prior experience.
22 Q Did you have occasion between '90 and 1994 to work
23 with the Code?
24 A I knew a little bit about it, but I was not trained
25 to be auditor.
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1 Q You mentioned that Criteria Three, in your opinion,
2 is the heart of the Code, is that correct?
3 A Yes.
4 Q What are the other important criterias that you know
5 of in that Code?
6 A I will say, Criterion One.
7 Q What is Criterion One?
8 A Organization.
9 Q All right.
10 A Is very important. And I will call 16 as a brain,
11 which is called Corrective Action Program. It's like body, you
12 build a structure, it's like a human body.
13 If the heart gets sick, or the brain. If the heart
14 controls everything, and the brain controls everything, if you
15 get cut in your hand, the heart feels it.
16 JUDGE LESNICK: Let's stop there.
17 (Off the record.)
18 (On the record.)
19 MR. McDERMOTT: Thank you, Judge.
20 BY MR. McDERMOTT:
21 Q You were mentioning the Code, what, you were
22 mentioning the Code, what is the purpose of Criteria number
23 one?
24 MR. GROSS: Your Honor, I'm going to object to the
25 testimony regarding his interpreting any legal departments, or
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1 giving a legal opinion.
2 JUDGE LESNICK: Is that interpreting the Code?
3 MR. McDERMOTT: I'm just asking him to --
4 JUDGE LESNICK: I'm not sure I remember what the
5 question is.
6 MR. McDERMOTT: The question is, can he give us a
7 synopsis of Criteria one of the Code. What it's purpose is,
8 what it states generally.
9 JUDGE LESNICK: Well, I won't, I won't accept it as a
10 legal standard or interpretation, but if, if you can ask him
11 what his, what he understands it to mean.
12 MR. McDERMOTT: Fine. Thank you.
13 BY MR. McDERMOTT:
14 Q What do you understand Criteria one to mean, Oscar?
15 A You're referring to the Criterion one of 10 C.F.R.
16 50, Appendix B?
17 Q Yes, the Code.
18 A Which title is Quality Assurance Criteria for Nuclear
19 Power Plants and Fuel Processing Plants.
20 Q All right.
21 A I would put in a very layman's term, because we have
22 some of them are not engineers or Quality Assurance, and make
23 it very simple. Organization, any licensee, like Exelon or
24 Commonwealth Edison, from NRC gets the license to invoke all
25 the requirements of these 18 criteria.
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1 Criterion one, Organization Structure, says, the left
2 side of the equation should be different than the right side of
3 the equation.
4 What I mean by left of the equation, left side of the
5 equation is all production. Engineering, supply management,
6 maintenance, construction, operations, and all that stuff,
7 which is almost comprised more than 99 percent of the work
8 force and the budget.
9 The right side of the equation, however, is the
10 Quality Assurance end, which inside the Quality Assurance is
11 also Quality Control.
12 Overall, the right side of the equation provides the
13 nuclear oversight function. Criterion one, these two entities
14 have to be separable and they have to be independent.
15 The Quality Assurance function, the right side of the
16 equation, has to be independent from production, retaliation,
17 harassment, cost, budge, schedule, to do the quality.
18 To focus quality. You cannot mix the right side of
19 the equation, put it on the left side of the equation. You
20 could do it if in non-nuclear plants, fossil plants, which is
21 not nuclear safety, or public safety.
22 But if you are getting licensed from the NRC, to
23 invoke this requirement, your Quality Assurance program and
24 associated procedures which implements the Quality Assurance,
25 and should be in accordance with the Code, they have to be a
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1 separate entities.
2 Q And again, who's on the right side?
3 A The right side is Quality Assurance, which I was
4 representing from 1994, and beyond, up to January 14 of 2001.
5 Q All right. And on the left side are all the others
6 you mentioned?
7 A All the others.
8 Q Numerically, that's where the money's made, correct?
9 A Yeah.
10 Q Numerically, that's where all the bodies are working,
11 correct?
12 A Resources, budget, 99 percent of the budget
13 resources, everything is on the left side of the equation. One
14 side of, only less than one percent is providing oversight,
15 which is considered overhead, you may call it, because we don't
16 produce anything. And we have to make sure that they comply
17 Codes.
18 Q And you've already told us what you thought the head
19 and the heart was.
20 A Yeah, and in my opinion the right side of the
21 equation usually they are not liked. If I couldn't say they
22 hated, but they have, they always at your best you are
23 everybody's enemy on the left side.
24 Because they are not NRC. They are scared of NRC.
25 People are scared of the QA because we are raising issues, and
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1 force them to implement it, and in that work in that kind of
2 thing, you're going to effect budget. You're effect delay.
3 You're going to delay things. You're going to not
4 going to make a lot of people happy on the left side of the
5 equation.
6 Q You were, did you apply for a job at SES, in the
7 Quality Assurance, on the, in the right side?
8 A Yes.
9 Q And was the job posted, did you read it in some kind
10 of publication, or was it?
11 A No, actually they didn't even have any opening. But
12 since I was helping them as a subject matter expert for a few
13 years, one of the auditors -- recommended me to talk to Ed
14 Netzel.
15 Q And who was, spell Netzel for the record if you will.
16 A N-e-t-z-e-l.
17 Q And what was Mr. Netzel's position at the time?
18 A He was the SES Director.
19 Q All right.
20 A SES at that time was part of the Quality Assurance
21 function.
22 Q All right. And, he approached you, or you approached
23 him? You approached him?
24 A I approached him, and then he says, I, oh, I can
25 always use technical people, which I don't have. And I don't
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1 have any openings, but I'll find a position for you.
2 Q And did he?
3 A Yes.
4 Q All right. Did your grade band, or your compensation
5 band change at that time?
6 A No, but he made a commitment that if you stay for a
7 year, I'll give you a promotion because the first year you have
8 to learn about QA.
9 We're going to take advantage of your technical,
10 you're going to take advantage of our training, to make you
11 auditor, and lead auditor. And I figured, that's a good thing.
12 Q Was there a company policy with respect to employees
13 moving from one department or area, to another department or
14 area, i.e. did the employee have to seek his current
15 supervisor's permission to leave and take a position in another
16 area?
17 A Yes, traditionally is also in the forms. That you
18 are required minimum two years on the job to satisfy. And your
19 supervisor, who, is it justified that you met the minimum
20 requirement, he could release you.
21 But sometimes there are, you know, circumstances that
22 the supervisor may do --
23 Q For example, if the person may be critical?
24 A Yeah.
25 Q All right. Were you released to take the job in
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1 Quality Assurance?
2 A Yes.
3 Q And what exactly was your title when your title when
4 you went there, and what exactly was the month in 1994?
5 A Once I went to 1994, I still, since I was not
6 auditor, or the lead auditor at that time, when I taking
7 training. I believe that they just put me auditor in training,
8 or the lead.
9 I mean, until I finished my training, I think I took
10 a three days class, and I observed, I was observer in two
11 audits. So they qualified me to the American Nuclear Standard
12 Institute, which I call it ANSI.
13 ANSI standard and N45 point 2 point 23, to be
14 auditor.
15 Q And how long did that take?
16 A To be auditor, and lead auditor I will say between 12
17 to 18 months to be really to understand what it really means.
18 Q When you left your department, was there anybody else
19 qualified and certified the way you were qualified and
20 certified?
21 A I don't understand the question.
22 Q Well, you went through this, this training and the
23 rest, am I correct?
24 A Yeah.
25 Q And the component parts took 18 months approximately?
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1 A No, it takes 12 to 18 months until really you
2 understand. You digest the codes and the standard, being
3 different audits, to be exposed to different audits before the
4 company can really trust you that to make you a lead auditor,
5 and especially for major audits, to make you lead auditor.
6 Q For example, when, when was it after '94 that you
7 became a lead auditor?
8 A I think I was within nine months.
9 Q All right. Was Mr. Bastyr working in the, the SES at
10 the time?
11 A I believe that he was one of our many co-workers.
12 Q Was he a lead auditor at that time?
13 A I'm not sure, I was not supervisor to know what was
14 his, qualification was.
15 Q When did you lead your first audit?
16 A I would say around fall of 1995.
17 Q All right. Had you been there a year before you led
18 your first audit?
19 A No.
20 Q Do you recall who your first audit, or what your
21 first audit was?
22 A I think was not the first one, but it was one of two,
23 the first two, three, I was, I went to Ebasco Engineering in
24 twin towers. The same building which was subject to 9/11.
25 Q You're going to have to give me that name again, it's
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1 a name that I've never heard. Who engineering?
2 A Babcock, I'm sorry, that was not Babcock's, I believe
3 it was, did I say Babcock's?
4 Q I didn't hear it, that's why I'm asking you to repeat
5 it.
6 A Yeah, cross, cross that off. I think it was Ebasco
7 Engineering. Ebasco and it was later on merged with --
8 JUDGE LESNICK: How do you spell it?
9 THE WITNESS: Ebasco is E-b-a-s-c-o. And later was
10 merged with Raytheon Engineers.
11 BY MR. McDERMOTT:
12 Q All right.
13 A I believe maybe the title of the audit was the
14 Raytheon Engineers, it was in the twin towers.
15 Q And when you say twin towers, they were vendors for
16 Commonwealth Edison?
17 A Yeah.
18 Q They were engineering vendors, correct?
19 A Yes.
20 Q And you went to the twin towers to conduct an audit?
21 A Yes.
22 Q Did you conduct it alone, or did you have team
23 members?
24 A No, that was a NUPIC audit. NUPIC stands for Nuclear
25 Users Procurement Issues Committee. N-U-P-I-C, Nuclear Users
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1 Procurement Issues Committee, which is almost 54 utilities
2 world wide, 46 in the United States.
3 And they share audits together. That will save the
4 cost for the utility, and it will be a lot less work for their
5 suppliers. That was in --
6 Q And this was a time, let me ask you, NUPIC has 46
7 domestic participants. Exelon, or, and we're talking about
8 1994, it's Commonwealth Edison, is a member and a participant
9 in NUPIC, correct?
10 A Yes.
11 Q You say they share, they have audits, how would they
12 determine who's to be audited?
13 A They have two or three times NUPIC meetings around
14 different sites of the country.
15 Q Two or three times a year?
16 A Two, three times a year. And they have NUPIC
17 charters, that they have rules and regulations that they
18 follow. And each utility has one or two NUPIC representative
19 to go and form all the rules, regulations.
20 Decide which supplier is going to be audited next,
21 who's going to be the lead, who are the other participants.
22 And that's how it's done.
23 Q And I take it they do this because there's a finite
24 number of suppliers for the, for the energy industry, correct?
25 The nuclear energy industry right?
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1 A Yes.
2 Q And NUPIC, then, is an association of the energy
3 producers who have to use these vendors?
4 A Yes.
5 Q Okay. It being your first, or very earliest or one
6 your earliest audits, you don't remember who else was on the
7 team with you?
8 A The lead utility was Wisconsin Electric, and I don't
9 know his, I know his first name was Tony. I don't remember his
10 last name.
11 Q All right. That's, it's not important. How
12 regularly did you leave, again now, are you in the Opus campus
13 when you moved to SES?
14 A Yes.
15 Q Do you move to a different floor on the Opus campus?
16 A No, were on the Suite 300. Third Floor.
17 Q Was that also where Engineering was?
18 A Engineering was on the fourth floor.
19 Q All right, so you did move.
20 A I went from fourth, to third.
21 Q So you moved?
22 A From Engineering to QA.
23 Q All right, so you moved, physically you moved, in
24 '94?
25 A Yes.
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1 Q How frequently during a calendar year from 1994 until
2 you left SES, did you leave the campus to conduct an audit?
3 A I will say average between 12 to 15. Some years I
4 did 17, 18 audits, some years I did less than 12. But I think
5 on average between 12 to 15 is a fair guess.
6 Q During your tenure with them, how many audits did you
7 do?
8 A I would say if I add them all up together, it would
9 probably be between 80 to a 100, or more.
10 Q Now --
11 A But how many, I do not --
12 Q You didn't read each and every one of those audits?
13 A No.
14 Q All right. How many do you, if you think about it,
15 how many do you believe you led?
16 A From 1995 time frame to 2001, I will say more than
17 40.
18 Q More than 40?
19 A Yes.
20 Q What would be the average size of an audit team?
21 A Depends on the, the contractor or the supplier that
22 you audit. The size of the audit team, the scope of the audit
23 team, the complexity of, the importance of the safety related
24 function that we did.
25 I will say architect engineering firms, like Sergeant
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1 & Lundy, Bechtel, Stone and Webster, and major ones, that we do
2 majority of the work at ComEd and Exelon, they roughly have
3 like five, to eight, to nine. And majority of them is mostly
4 technical specialists. Because it has to, because the
5 activities affecting quality should be focused on the core of
6 the scope of the activity.
7 So architect engineering, but NSSS suppliers, like
8 General Electric, if you're doing a full-blown audit of 18
9 criteria, the last one I was there 1998, the NUPIC audit of the
10 GE, 27 auditors there, were there.
11 And out of those 27, surprisingly only three of them
12 were technical specialists.
13 Q Now let me, let me just use that as an example. Were
14 you the lead on that 1998 GENE?
15 A No. I was, I was told to participate.
16 Q All right. And were you given an assignment?
17 A Yes.
18 Q All right. In 1997, you were a lead, am I correct?
19 A I was the lead of the ComEd special audit.
20 Q Okay.
21 A That was another NUPIC audit, the ComEd special
22 audit.
23 Q Just so I have it here, the GE, and GENE stands for
24 what?
25 A General Electric Nuclear Energy.
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1 Q And you keep slipping into these quick, you said the
2 triple what?
3 A N triple S. NSSS, which is Nuclear Safety Supply
4 Systems.
5 Q All right. And how do they, you've mentioned
6 Westinghouse as being one, you've mentioned General Electric as
7 being one, how many others are there?
8 A Not at ComEd system, of the, there may be after the
9 Exelon they merged with other ones that they could combustion
10 engineers, too. But, there are very, very, few combustion
11 engineer, called it CE. They have, I guess they are producing
12 PWR systems.
13 Q When you act as a, acted as a lead engineer, I'm
14 sorry, lead auditor in these 40 plus audits, am I correct?
15 A Yes.
16 Q Over that period of time. You have to, you didn't
17 tell people what to do, you have to lead them, am I correct?
18 A I have to lead them, stay with them, every single
19 moment, every single hour, every single day. You have a daily
20 debrief to summarize what was the result.
21 And then also you have some technical specialists
22 that they may not be aware with the Code. It's your
23 responsibility before you audit, you prep them.
24 Q All right. So you're doing a little bit of teaching.
25 A Before the audit.
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1 Q You're doing a lot of leading.
2 A Yes.
3 Q You're acting as a colleague to similarly situated
4 professionals, correct?
5 A Yes.
6 Q Would you characterize that as demonstrating certain
7 management skills?
8 A Yes.
9 Q All right. Did Commonwealth Edison consider that
10 management skills?
11 A Yes.
12 Q All right.
13 A You are responsible for the overall integrity of the
14 audit.
15 JUDGE LESNICK: Is that, you're objecting to the
16 question?
17 MR. GROSS: I'll object to his characterizing what
18 ComEd thought.
19 JUDGE LESNICK: What was the question?
20 MR. McDERMOTT: Well, I'm an --
21 MR. GROSS: It was already answered.
22 JUDGE LESNICK: Well, we can still entertain an
23 objection, though.
24 MR. McDERMOTT: The question was, did ComEd believe
25 those skills to be management skills. That teaching, leading,
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1 colloquialism, or communication with colleagues.
2 MR. GROSS: Asking a question about an entity called
3 ComEd, and what the entity thought.
4 JUDGE LESNICK: I think it's an appropriate
5 objection, so I'll disregard the answer.
6 MR. McDERMOTT: All right.
7 BY MR. McDERMOTT:
8 Q Did your management, your management in SES where you
9 did all these 40 plus lead audits commend you and tell you that
10 they thought that was an expression of good management skills?
11 A Prior to GE audit, yes.
12 Q After the GE audit?
13 A After GE audit I was just not getting anywhere.
14 Q All right, so prior to 1997 you're management
15 complimented you on your skills?
16 A Yes. I got the highest achievement award from
17 Engineering, I got outstanding achievement from Lou Delegeorge.
18 Mr. Wagner, is our Vice President of Engineering. And the
19 records were submitted to Sidley, Austin.
20 Q To the Respondents, correct?
21 A Yes.
22 Q But conducting audits wasn't your only task, am I
23 correct, when you went to SES?
24 A No, we --
25 Q What else did you have to do?
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1 A I remember I got some calls from Engineering that
2 they don't have enough structural engineers to do walk down and
3 help the stations. And then there was an equality --
4 Q No, I'm talking about 1994.
5 A Oh, 1994?
6 Q I'm talking about what was your, you were brought on,
7 you were taught auditing over a nine month period, you get into
8 your first audit, what else are you doing on a day to day
9 basis, aside from these audits?
10 A Not only you participate and lead audits, but also
11 you do third party review for the audits that you were not
12 participant.
13 You receive the product, and then you're also
14 responsible for maintenance of the approved supplier list.
15 Like, I was assigned to more than 70 vendors. And these, most
16 70 vendors, they are -- architect engineering major, or
17 architect engineering services were the most technical. So I
18 have to make sure --
19 Q So, let me stop you. You said the maintenance of the
20 approved supplier list?
21 A AASL, I mean, they call it ASL, approved supplier
22 list.
23 Q That is a document?
24 A Yes.
25 Q And approved supplier list?
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1 A It's a control document. To make sure if any vendor
2 added, deleted, if you have a warning against a vendor it
3 should show on that, and it is as a control. If you don't
4 follow that, you're messing the procurement process --
5 Q All right. Who, who gets copies of this ASL?
6 A It's living document, within the system within the
7 computer system.
8 Q So it goes to Purchasing?
9 A It goes to Purchasing.
10 Q It goes to Engineering?
11 A Right.
12 Q Goes to what else?
13 A Engineering, Maintenance, Operations, buyers. So if
14 anybody needs to apply or send any work to any suppliers, they
15 have to check that ASL to make sure it is not conditionally
16 approved, does not have restriction, is clear, and is approved
17 with no warnings. In order to --
18 Q With, with no what?
19 A No warning.
20 Q Okay. And when you began in 1994 at SES, how many
21 co-workers or fellow workers did you have?
22 A I will say between 12 to 14 people we were at the SES
23 Group.
24 Q Were there women employed in, in that office?
25 A Yes, I believe Pat Weiger was the only one I recall.
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1 Yeah. W-e-i-g-e-r.
2 Q All right. You do the audits, and you do this
3 maintenance of the ASL list. How do you maintain it?
4 A You have to look at the NUREG-0040.
5 Q What's that?
6 A Which is the document produced by NRC NRR office,
7 Washington, D.C. as Mr. Landsman said. Because they go and
8 perform audits. And they, if they have experienced any
9 problems they document in that NUREG-0040.
10 Q All right. So these, these people exist out there,
11 and they flag something that has to picked up by you or your
12 co-worker who's monitoring that particular vendor who's been
13 assigned to you?
14 A That's on aid, because the whole NRC expects your QA
15 program to comply with the 10 C.F.R. 50.
16 Q Right.
17 A Part of your audit preparation to make sure that once
18 you prep to go and look at the right things, one of those items
19 that you look to see if there is an industry issues with that
20 supplier.
21 To see if there was the past audit findings. Because
22 if you go in and do audit of the 18 criteria, the main function
23 of the conclusion you make in the audit, that their Quality
24 Assurance program has been effectively implemented.
25 And the last audits that had been given to them, the
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1 cause and action, and action to prevent recurrence, and a
2 follow up was done in order to make that conclusion as a good
3 objective evidence that there is no other issues, and there are
4 not repeated issues.
5 Q Okay, but where do you go to get this information,
6 you're losing me?
7 A It's part of the preparation. You start preparing.
8 Q You go find it?
9 A Yeah, it's all documents. It's in the books, you go
10 pull out.
11 Q All right. Okay.
12 A You will contact Engineering, you send them that I'm
13 going to General Electric. What other things you want me to
14 look, and these are the stuff that I'm preparing.
15 You ask them to bring you, give you technical
16 specialists, if there is a procurement that you have, and then
17 you look at the procurement process. The audit really starts
18 from your house first, before you go to the supplier.
19 Because your procurement people are responsible to
20 obtain all this technical --
21 Q I understand that, but what I'm, what I'm asking a
22 question about is, if Wisconsin Power sends a special audit
23 team to Holtec.
24 A Right.
25 Q U.S. Tool and Die.
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1 A Yeah.
2 Q And they come up with an audit, do they share it with
3 your, do their Q and A share it with your Q and A people? How
4 is that done?
5 A The NUPIC charter is expecting that. They don't say,
6 this is your proprietary, because they share together.
7 Q Right. So that would come, that would come through
8 the NUPIC charter, or through the NUPIC organization. And
9 become a flag for Commonwealth Edison, even though you may not
10 know that they were doing it, or, or may never know it.
11 You have to know it, it comes in to you, and then you
12 can use it to manage the ASL.
13 A Yes.
14 Q Is that correct?
15 MR. GROSS: Your Honor, I'm going to object to the
16 leading questions again. I'm not objecting more frequently
17 because I don't consider any of this to be relevant to our
18 proceeding, but I am objecting now because they are getting far
19 along.
20 JUDGE LESNICK: Well, that's appropriate. Again, for
21 the ease of getting in a lot of background information it's
22 fine. But as we get into more relevant, and again, as we are,
23 try not to ask leading questions. And I'll entertain
24 objections as we.
25 MR. McDERMOTT: Thank you, Judge.
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1 JUDGE LESNICK: Proceed. A leading objection
2 Mr. Shirani is any, or a leading question is any question that
3 suggests an answer. And it is not appropriate.
4 BY MR. McDERMOTT:
5 Q What other areas present the flags for the SES
6 employee who's maintaining an ASL file?
7 A Sometimes a utility is approached by a supplier. And
8 then in order to go and do a, perform a full blown audit, you
9 could go to the NUPIC database and find out how many other
10 utilities are using this supplier.
11 In order to reduce costs not to do and do the audit.
12 So you go and get all that information, call them up, and they
13 send you the report. The vendor is their own reporters.
14 Charter is NUPIC, if you request it, you'll review that to see
15 if it meets your QA program.
16 If it meets it the Wisconsin Electric QA program,
17 doesn't necessarily meet your QA program. That's why you do
18 the third party review. Because you are committed with your QA
19 program, your procedures, and overall, to the 10 C.F.R. 50,
20 Appendix B.
21 Q How are you anointed or appointed as a third party
22 reviewer?
23 A For all my 70 vendors, I got to constantly do third
24 party review. Because they are constantly are audited by NUPIC
25 every two years. And you just, you either participate, see, if
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1 there are 70, 80 vendors in my name, every year, or every other
2 year, your name pops up.
3 You either participate, or lead, or you sit in the
4 office to not participate. But you receive the report to do
5 third party review.
6 Q Now, you had 70 vendors. They are 14 to 12 coworkers
7 with you at this time period, right?
8 A 1994, 1995 time frame.
9 Q All right. And how many vendors in total were there?
10 A That time, I think it was around eight to nine
11 hundred vendors.
12 Q All right. During 1995 and 1996 who was your
13 supervisor?
14 A 1995 to 1996 was Mr. Edward Netzel.
15 Q During 1996 and 1997 who was supervisor?
16 A Mr. Edward Netzel.
17 Q And during that time period, did you receive any
18 other promotions?
19 A January of 1996 I was promoted to Level Nine, and my
20 title was Quality Assurance Administrator. And I remember one
21 of my super --
22 Q Again, when was that?
23 A That was January 1996. That title was held by
24 Mr. Don Felz, who was a supervisor, and he had the same title.
25 Quality Assurance Administrator.
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1 Q Your previous title was what?
2 A Previous title was, before to Quality Assurance
3 Administrator, I think I was a term like SES Specialist, they
4 were called then. Because term used for the auditors and the
5 lead auditors.
6 Q In January of '96 did that result in an increase in
7 salary?
8 A Yes.
9 Q What, what, did it increase in grade?
10 A Increase in grade and salary.
11 Q What was your grade then?
12 A 1996, January 1996, from Level Eight, I became Level
13 Nine.
14 Q And there was a corresponding increase in salary?
15 A Yes.
16 Q All right. Did you keep that Quality Assurance
17 Administrator title for a long while?
18 A I believe about a couple months after they lift the
19 stop work.
20 Q Do you have, did you, do recall that changing? Let
21 me just -- changed.
22 A Yeah.
23 Q Do you recall when?
24 A It was December or January time frame of 1998.
25 Q January of 1998?
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1 A Yes.
2 Q What did it change to?
3 A Senior Lead Auditor.
4 Q Senior Lead Auditor, are you sure?
5 A Lead Senior Auditor, or Senior Lead Auditor? It
6 still was the same level. But no longer the term Quality
7 Assurance Administrator was used because we were moving away
8 from QA to the supply.
9 Q How many audits did you do in 1997?
10 A I will say that between 12 to 15 was in the average.
11 Some years could be less than 12, sometimes more than 15. I
12 will say roughly between 12 to 15 was a average.
13 Q You did an audit of General Electric Nuclear Energy,
14 correct?
15 A I led the audit of the --
16 Q Is that correct?
17 A Yes.
18 Q But when did you do it?
19 A That was in August 18 to 22nd, 1997.
20 Q And how many, excuse me, who assigned you to do that
21 audit?
22 A Mr. Edward Netzel.
23 Q And why was the audit to be done?
24 A Commonwealth Edison got a confirmatory letter in
25 November 12, 1996 from the NRC. Because they had already three
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1 plants on the watch list. Zion station, Dresden, and Quad
2 Cities. Two of them boiling water reactor, one is the pressure
3 water reactor.
4 They were on a watch list. And during the ISI
5 activity, which is In Service Inspection activities, NRC was
6 doing review of In Service Inspection activities at Dresden,
7 Quad Cities.
8 And while reviewing the Commonwealth Edison
9 calculations, and Sargent and Lundy calculations, they
10 encounter a situation in which they found a wrong pump curve
11 was used.
12 Once they do the analysis for the pump, there are a
13 lot of design variables. So there is something that you curve
14 it as a curve, and you do the design analysis. One of the
15 factors was used wrongfully and that was, caught the NRC's
16 attention.
17 Q Right. And the NRC discovered this issue?
18 A Yes.
19 Q And the NRC then, what kind of letter did you?
20 A A confirmatory letter.
21 Q And a confirmatory letter means what? Not this one,
22 what does it mean?
23 A Overall means that you shape up, or otherwise I'll
24 come stronger, basically.
25 Q And the letter comes from the NRC to who?
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1 A To the licensee who was found noncompliant.
2 Q All right. And that means Commonwealth Edison?
3 A That means Commonwealth Edison.
4 Q How would you go about that audit in 1997?
5 A Because of that effort, Engineering made some
6 commitment and the Quality Assurance SES was part of that
7 commitment in addition to the NUPIC audit which NRC, was not
8 really too much fond of, because they were thinking they were
9 more compliance based audit.
10 So they asked Commonwealth Edison to reassure me that
11 you know how to control your suppliers. Because they knew
12 Sargent and Lundy has designed and constructed all the 12
13 units, or most of the 12 units of nuclear plant.
14 So they figured that they wanted to make sure that
15 ComEd come up to the conclusion that this is an isolated case.
16 They wanted to know what's the overall implication of these
17 findings. So --
18 Q So what did you do? All right --
19 A So they ran a compliment, and this was one of the
20 audit with Sergeant & Lundy audit, Bechtel audit, and GE audit,
21 one of them. And --
22 Q All the same year?
23 A Within all the same, either 1996, toward the end of
24 '96, or toward the 1997. Or, even after the GE.
25 Q Did you have, did you have anything with the Bechtel?
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1 A Yes.
2 Q So that was an audit you worked at?
3 A Yeah.
4 Q Same issue?
5 A Sergeant & Lundy, I found issues, but it was not too
6 serious.
7 Q All right. But it was the same issue, it was the
8 same NRC concern, correct?
9 A Yes.
10 Q And Sargent and Lundy, am I correct?
11 A Depend on the scope, if Bechtel didn't have too much
12 activity, you wouldn't do too much with Bechtel. But the
13 Sergeant & Lundy and the Ge they were the main contractors.
14 That there was a lot of activity that was going on
15 with them, so, Criterion Seven, of the 10 C.F.R. 50, says that
16 audits should be performed and the frequency of the audit shall
17 be depend on the important and the complexity of the safety
18 rated or quality assurance functions that you do.
19 So that's how we were, you know, provided assurance
20 through the NRC that they, we'd know how to control the
21 suppliers.
22 Q The NRC sends a confirmatory letter, correct?
23 A Yes.
24 Q There are other audits?
25 A There are other audits.
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1 Q Did you participate in the other, in the first two
2 audits?
3 A I participated, and I lead Sergeant & Lundy audits.
4 Q All right.
5 A I believe Bechtel.
6 Q Did you lead that audit as well?
7 A Bechtel, I believe I lead it, or another one I
8 participate in.
9 Q Either, or?
10 A Yeah, either, or.
11 Q You did lead the GENE audit?
12 A Yes.
13 Q When did you, did you notify GE?
14 A Yes, we --
15 Q When did you notify them that there was to be an
16 audit?
17 A Usually --
18 Q When did you notify them?
19 A Within 90 days.
20 Q Pardon me?
21 A 90 days in advance we notified them.
22 Q All right. And how do you notify them?
23 A By letter.
24 Q Okay. Do you recall what the letter says?
25 A The letter says that we are coming and this is the
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1 scope. And that scope was saying that we are not doing a full
2 blown audit, this is a design, special designed audit of the
3 Ge.
4 Q All right. Then what's, what happens, do they
5 communicate with you?
6 A Yeah, they, they said fine and it, you know usually
7 as part of the preparation of the audit I asked them --
8 Q Yeah, what did they do, I'm talking about this audit.
9 A This audit, they said fine, we're going to do --
10 Q All right. What happened next?
11 A I asked them to send the jobs that they had done from
12 that date, backward for three years, the last three years. And
13 they sent me the sample of all the analysis that they did. And
14 part of the preparation, I picked 15 as a sample.
15 15 designed record file, which called DRF, and I
16 thought it was 15 calculations we look at. We found out it was
17 almost 54 calculations in that sample that we chose. And once
18 they saw the sample, they said it's going to be extensive
19 effort for us to go look for them.
20 I said, well, this is not 20 years ago, this is the
21 last three years. They said we come in, we usually give you
22 the report to evaluate, design report. I said I don't want
23 design report, it's just a summary, I want to go to the bottom
24 of the calculations.
25 So they said it's going to be massive effort. I
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1 talked to Engineering, and Engineering sent them 5,000 dollars
2 three months in advance to make the calculations from their
3 storage, and make it available.
4 I wanted to choose our sample, not the samples that
5 they choose. Usually from the NUREG.
6 Q All right. What occurred then?
7 A And then I gave them a 30 days' notice that we are
8 coming and they should be prepared.
9 Q And what's contained in this thirty days' notice?
10 A You summarize the scope, what -- all the ANSI
11 standards applied, their quality assurance manual, what we have
12 accepted.
13 All their applicable procedures that we have
14 reviewed, and are accepted. We say we do all the audit of all
15 these to make sure you are in compliance with the codes.
16 Q Do you remember the audit number?
17 A Yes.
18 Q What is, what was it?
19 A G97 dash 120.
20 Q All right. Who was on, I take that you had an audit
21 team?
22 A Yes.
23 Q Who was on your audit team?
24 A I had recruited five technical specialists, and I
25 would say it, that the best five that I could find in Chicago
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1 area. One of them was from Virginia, because we couldn't find
2 expertise in a thermal analysis.
3 Q All right.
4 A So I recruited somebody from Virginia.
5 Q And they all had specialties?
6 A They all had specialties. Some of them the also
7 served as a technical specialist in NRC audits.
8 Q How long did, strike that. Did you tell
9 Commonwealth, I'm sorry, did you tell General Electric who your
10 audit team members were?
11 A Yes.
12 Q Who they were going to be?
13 A Yes.
14 Q How did you do that?
15 A Through the correspondences. Or you could even, you
16 talked to them, too, as well.
17 Q Did GENE identify a contact person for you to deal
18 with?
19 A I believe the contact person for the audit usually,
20 usually is the Quality Assurance manager?
21 Q And who was the GE Quality Assurance Manager?
22 A Robert Nicholls, N-i-c-h-o-l, l-s or l-l-s, I'm not
23 sure.
24 Q And did you have communications with him?
25 A Yes.
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1 Q Did he greet you when you arrived?
2 A Yeah.
3 Q All right. Again, what day did you arrive?
4 A We arrived the night before August 17th. So once we
5 entered was August 18th, that we had the entrance meeting, in
6 the morning.
7 Q And again, this is San Jose, California?
8 A San Jose, California, GE headquarter.
9 Q What, if anything, occurred at the entrance meeting?
10 A At the entrance meeting as soon as I introduced the
11 audit team, Bob Nicholls was very surprised, and he says this
12 is like a technical assessment, not an audit.
13 Q All right, let me stop you there. How, you and all
14 your members of the team are there, correct?
15 A Yeah.
16 Q Mr. Nicholls is there, correct?
17 A Mr. Nicholls --
18 Q Who else is there?
19 A Dr. Shiam Dua was there, George Strandbach was there,
20 a few other lead engineers. Some of my ASME colleagues which
21 -- supply people. They were part of their experts sitting
22 there.
23 Q Who is they? Part of their experts?
24 A No, part of the, their experts, and our experts, they
25 were all there at the entrance meeting.
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1 Q Were you equal in number, or did they outnumber you?
2 A Oh, they outnumbered us.
3 Q And what was the ratio?
4 A I would say there more than ten or 15 people. And we
5 were total of six. I was the only lead auditor, and the other
6 one was subject matter experts. They were not auditors, or
7 lead auditors.
8 Q Right. What, what occurred then?
9 A They said three of your people are contractors. And
10 we are not going to let them to look at our calculations. I
11 told them that they are working on the ComEd -- And we have
12 hired them.
13 They said still, you're going to look at the
14 proprietary design information, and they could be from our
15 competitors.
16 I said they are working under our QA program, and our
17 procurement document, which is mandated by Criterion Four of
18 the 10 C.F.R., which not only translates the technical and
19 quality requirement of the suppliers, they also say that we
20 have the right of access without any notice, to come and look
21 at everything we want. But we still give them the luxury, the
22 benefit, to go 90 days and one month, we have any right to go
23 any time even by surprise, by the Code, by the procurement
24 requirements. But they had objections.
25 Q How long --
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1 A It took us --
2 Q Let me, let me ask the question. How long was this
3 conversation between you and Mr. Nicholls' people?
4 A It lasted six hours.
5 Q Was it finally resolved?
6 A Yeah. I told them that per Code requirements, and
7 our procurement requirement, you are denying the right of my
8 access.
9 And if you do not let me look at the proprietary
10 design document, just show me the exit meeting, and I will
11 exit. And I will consider this one as a denial of our access
12 to all proprietary design information which is ComEd.
13 Q What, if anything, did they do?
14 A Within that six hours I was in constant negotiation
15 and getting advise from my bosses' boss, Mr. Edward Netzel's
16 boss was Mr. Lon Waldinger. L-o-n, first name, last name is
17 Waldinger, W-a-l-d-i-n-g-er.
18 And Mr. Waldinger was advising me you do not need to
19 sign proprietary information. We are entitled to those calcs,
20 that the contractors you have with you, they are working under
21 our program.
22 I said Mr. Lon Waldinger, I'm even willing to sign
23 the proprietary agreement, but they're still denying. And then
24 he says, no, don't sign it. So back and forth, back and forth.
25 So once finally I said show me the exit, GE was also
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1 talking to their lawyers behind the scene for six hours. Then
2 finally they figured that the case could be serious, so they
3 said, okay, let's proceed.
4 Q Did you lose the first day of the audit?
5 A Almost.
6 Q But you went to work?
7 A I went to work and we stretched the hours to the
8 late. We worked ten hours straight every day.
9 Q And can you explain how an audit day went, how the
10 audit days went at GENE?
11 A Every, every calculations, because we knew that the
12 scope was really vast. We faced 54 design analysis and these
13 are very complex. Very complex analysis.
14 Q In layman's term, this was a design for?
15 A Design for the reactor analysis, thermal analysis,
16 seismic analysis, the structural mechanical component analysis,
17 reactor head analysis. We had some core shroud crack in our
18 Quad Cities reactor vessel. We had to investigate all that
19 stuff.
20 So it was not a normal audit. It was, required an
21 extensive engineering background and especially with going to
22 the GE. They have a lot of Ph. D's and a lot of highly
23 qualified people. So you have to deal with those.
24 And to their surprise, all the 54 calculations, we
25 cited every one of them, for multiple reasons. And we have in
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1 our QA program that we have defined the levels of our findings.
2 The Level One requirements of the Commonwealth Edison
3 QA program at that time, which does not exist anymore, it says,
4 Level One does impact the safety and reliability of the
5 structures, systems, and components, or is a significant
6 Quality Assurance program breakdown. Which we cited one of our
7 findings.
8 Then we had seven Level Two findings, which was,
9 definition of the Level Two is it may have impact on the safety
10 and reliability of the systems, structures, and component, or
11 is in major nonconformance to the Quality Assurance program
12 breakdown. And Level Three is in lower scales.
13 Q Did these issues become apparent immediately on the
14 first day?
15 A No, gradually.
16 Q All right.
17 A Because we gave daily debrief.
18 Q And when you say daily debrief, what is that?
19 A Daily debrief is what you looked at over all day, and
20 then you, you sit down and present it to the higher management.
21 But during the day --
22 Q When you say the higher management, you mean GENE?
23 A The Quality Assurance, GENE, Quality Assurance,
24 engineers and everything.
25 But before you form your opinion for the daily
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1 debrief, see this is a performance based audit, it's not a
2 compliance that you just sit in a room, and you write your
3 opinion, and think this is my opinion.
4 You give the chance, you look at the audit, and then
5 Criterion, Section three of the Code, with the ANSI standard ad
6 the ASME standard, one of the verification of design method is
7 detailed written design review has been verified. You have to
8 verify that.
9 So once we looked at, and we interviewed, with a lot
10 of prepare, and the reviewer of the calculations. They agreed
11 that the calculations has a lot of problems.
12 Q Let me, let me ask you, do you, did you go from
13 office to off, did your team members, your 16 members go from
14 office to office?
15 A Usually we get a big room.
16 Q All right.
17 A And they brief people.
18 Q I'm talking about this one, what happened during this
19 audit?
20 A During this audit mostly they brought their engineers
21 there, or you could go to the site.
22 Q But most of the time, they came to you?
23 A Most of the time they came to there.
24 Q What time did your audit day start?
25 A We started around 8:00 to 8:30.
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1 Q And what time did it end?
2 A Usually, we ended like 6:00, 7 o'clock.
3 Q And that was true for the Tuesday, Wednesday,
4 Thursday, and Friday?
5 A Friday, we worked until I guess 2 o'clock in the
6 afternoon.
7 Q And then what happened?
8 A Usually Friday in the morning, you should not do the
9 audit. You should prepare for, get all that stuff, but it was
10 extensive, so --
11 Q The exit meeting, let me ask you, was this the
12 longest audit you've ever done?
13 A I will say this one was one of the toughest audits
14 that I'd done.
15 Q Okay. And then what happens on Friday?
16 A On Friday, as is expected, and I communicated every
17 day and at the entrance, that I would not to have, like to have
18 any surprises to the exit meeting.
19 The exit meeting should last less than 20 minutes or
20 half-an-hour. And they were telling me that tomorrow, I mean,
21 on Thursday they were saying our big manager's going to be
22 there.
23 Q Right. Now who's, who tells you this?
24 A This is their engineers.
25 Q Not Nicholls?
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1 A No, not Nicholls.
2 Q Right. Where is the exit meeting held?
3 A Exit meeting at the same room at San Jose, California
4 GE headquarter.
5 Q Right, the same room you were using for the audit.
6 A Yes, sir.
7 Q A room approximately this size?
8 A I would say the lengthwise was this, but it was a
9 little bit narrower, a little bit, maybe a couple --
10 Q But approximately the size of this room.
11 A Approximately, yes.
12 Q All right. Who attended the exit meeting?
13 A I will say roughly between 24 to 30 people.
14 Q Had your numbers grown, or were you still at six.
15 A Six.
16 Q Nobody came in from Illinois to San Jose?
17 A No.
18 Q Nobody came from any other part of the country?
19 A No.
20 Q All right. What, if anything, happened at the exit
21 meeting?
22 A At the exit meeting I introduced myself again, and
23 the audit team members.
24 And I told them to briefly, within a minute or two,
25 describe themselves again and their expertise and their
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1 knowledge. Everybody did. And, and I said I would appreciate
2 if you keep your questions to the last.
3 And I formed 21 audit findings. And I presented it,
4 as soon as I start presenting the first one, the gentleman that
5 I just found that time, it was Mr. Helwig, David Helwig. The
6 gentleman was --
7 Q Just, just what transpired?
8 A He raised his hand and said I object, this is not a
9 finding. I said, Mr. Helwig, is that your name? He said yes.
10 And said, I said would you please keep your questions to the
11 last? And I requested that, and I will appreciate it. Just
12 let me finish.
13 Q What did he say to you?
14 A He said, you want to waste your time and my time.
15 I said it's about 2 o'clock, 2:30, and I will call our airline,
16 and I change my airline to tomorrow, and I stay until 12
17 o'clock tonight, as you wish, and answer all your questions
18 before I leave.
19 Because I want to make sure you understand them, and
20 you fix them. Not just this is my opinion, and I wrote --
21 Q And what did he say to you?
22 A He said, go ahead. And he was less interested to
23 even listen to the rest of it.
24 Q How do you know?
25 A Presented all the 21 findings, and I elaborated on
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1 the significance of the findings, and I said there are a lot of
2 information in your calculations which is in total
3 noncompliance with the code that your QA program has committed
4 to. And they were mainly committed to the American Nuclear
5 Standard Institute, ANSI, N 45 point two, and all their
6 standards. And especially for design was ANSI, N 45 point two,
7 point 11, which is a design code.
8 Q All right.
9 A And they violated every of them so I --
10 Q So, you've got 21 findings.
11 A Yes.
12 Q And what happens next, after you explain them.
13 A I explain to them, and he said, well, I told you --
14 Q Who's he?
15 A Mr. Helwig. He said I told you you're waste your
16 time. Because let's go back to the first. And I said, I
17 understand, you know, your opinion, but I'm not working to
18 your QA program, I'm working to my QA program. And my QA
19 program says that if I find a lot of design error, a lot of
20 design nonverified assumption, a lot of design that I don't
21 even know where you got these numbers from. A lot of these
22 stresses which I don't even know is reliable. I don't
23 understand a lot these distresses and the state distress is
24 indeterminate. I have cited more than 12, ten, at least seven,
25 of your safety related softwares as is unreliable, and then.
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1 Q And what did he say to you?
2 A He, he just pound the table and got up. And he's
3 pretended that he's walking away.
4 Q And?
5 A And then I said, Mr. Helwig you're more than welcome
6 to leave, but I presented, and I'm entertaining any questions.
7 Q All right.
8 A And then he said, you are ridiculing our QA program?
9 We've been audited by NRC a few months ago. We've been audited
10 by so many nuclear commanders, so many utilities been here,
11 nobody ever ridiculed my QA program like you do.
12 And I said, Mr. Helwig, I cannot speak for others. I
13 looked at my own objective evidence. My own objective evidence
14 is almost more than 30 pages of nonconformance. If I want to
15 type it, it's going to be --
16 We have found multiple problems, and I, if I really
17 want to exercise my right, I can even call NRC and put a stop
18 to it right now. Because I don't want to have no confidence as
19 a technical person, as a QA person, I don't trust your QA
20 program.
21 Q And what did he say to you?
22 A Then, he says, I don't understand why you're so
23 inflexible and so tough, Mr. Shirani. And I said, Mr. Helwig,
24 let's sit down and communicate. I am not using my codes, these
25 are the codes, and I have highlighted. And I presented, and I
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1 turn it to people to look at it in the audience.
2 A lot of managers who were sitting there. As soon as
3 it got to him to review, he took it like this, and pass into
4 the next guy. There was just like no interest. And I told
5 him, I said, I'm not auditing GE's ego, or your ego, I'm
6 auditing your program.
7 And your program found that is in total incompliance
8 with the Code. You have a significant quality assurance
9 program breakdown in the design.
10 Q What did he say to you?
11 A He says to me, you should cite me as a areas that I
12 need to improve, and then he says, well, you know what? If you
13 ask me, am I proud of this calculation. Now all of a sudden,
14 he soften it, if you think I'm proud of these calculations,
15 probably, I'm not.
16 Yeah, I understand some of your points. But you
17 know, we have gone through six -- and a lot of those general
18 vague ideas that we have gone through, we have improved over
19 the last six months. You're not telling me something
20 different. And we've making those progress. And I said, well
21 I didn't see.
22 He said, well, did you look at the last six months?
23 I said all these are representative of the last three years,
24 which the last six months is included.
25 And then he said would you give me an opportunity, to
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1 give me something that I, there's a project that I'm very proud
2 of, that I presented to you. Or are you going to be tough, and
3 not going to accept.
4 I said, I'd be willing, I told you I still take -- So
5 he directed one of his managers, and they brought a big binder
6 here. And I remember --
7 Q Well, was the binder titled?
8 A Yeah, that was one of the calculations that they did.
9 And apparently that was not of the samples that we chose.
10 Q Right, so it's other than the sample.
11 A Right.
12 Q Other than the 15 that you thought you were sampling,
13 which really turned out to be 53 or 50?
14 A Yeah. And then he brought another one.
15 Q Right.
16 A And I said well, you know, if I look at something and
17 it's acceptable, at least I would say one out of the 54.
18 Q Okay.
19 A Or one out off 55, was excellent. I'm not going to
20 take a side or the other one.
21 Q Right.
22 A And then all, during our discussion that he was
23 challenging that these should not be finding, it should be
24 areas of improvement. I said Mr. Helwig, can you explain to
25 me, what is the definition of the finding in your mind, that I
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1 can, at least we can talk the same language.
2 He said in my opinion, if the design finding is, if I
3 have made error, which make your station, with unverified
4 design input. I mean, that I, that you can not rely on that
5 number offered in your plant.
6 I said no, Mr. Helwig, if I had that combination,
7 knowing that one of the factors is above design limit, I would
8 not sit here and waste my time with you. I would go on the red
9 phone call to the NRC and I will say that plant has to come
10 down, or has to be evaluated. But this is not the one --
11 Q Did you look at the --
12 A We looked at the ones that he showed us. Few of the
13 calculations ones we looked at, the highest stress load and
14 condition was not addressed in the calculation.
15 There were seismic allowable with the LOCA, L-O-C-A,
16 which is loss of cooling accident. And a seismic, which was
17 safe shut down earthquake, SSE loading combination, which in
18 our opinion, was the worst -- combination.
19 And there were more than so many safety related
20 software, that we didn't, they did not even verify it validate
21 it.
22 The Code says every revision you make to the
23 software, is like a design change. They verified, not even
24 when it read zero, that they did not validate the six or five
25 subsequent revisions, and I said this is a breakdown. This is
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1 not acceptable.
2 Q These are the ones he brought you fresh?
3 A Right. And we were trying, and I said, case is
4 closed. We are finding the same issues in the calc that you
5 are proud of, and I think the exit is adjourned --
6 Q Is that what happened?
7 A Yes, and we shook hands with everybody, and he walked
8 away.
9 Q Did he shake hands with you?
10 A No.
11 Q Did you raise your voice?
12 A I talked very professionally. And I asked my team
13 members if I, if I maybe not remember anything, did I act
14 unprofessional. And the team members said, you stayed with the
15 Codes, and you did not let him intimidate you.
16 Q Did he raise his voice?
17 A Yes, he raised his voice, he pounded that table.
18 Q Did Mr. Nicholls say anything after Mr. Helwig --
19 A Oh, Mr. Nichol was in a total denial the whole week.
20 Especially --
21 Q That day. I'm talking about the exit.
22 A Yeah, he was, he was very upset.
23 Q Mr. Nicholls, did he speak during this exit meeting?
24 A No, no.
25 Q Did anybody but Mr. Helwig speak for GENE?
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1 A No.
2 Q He was the only spokesperson?
3 A Yes.
4 Q Well, what happened next, what did you do with that
5 GENE audit?
6 A I, once I came back, I called my, I went to my, Ed
7 Netzel, my director of SES. And I told him about the major
8 issues, and I said --
9 Q Right, and what happened?
10 A He said, let's go talk to Lon Waldinger.
11 Q Who?
12 A Lon Waldinger, his boss.
13 Q His boss? Okay.
14 A And Lon Waldinger was behind the scene on the first
15 day, he knew all the trouble. So we went there, and I, I took
16 my technical specialist, give him the opportunity to ask us any
17 question. We spent about an hour. Mr. Lon Waldinger --
18 Q Right, this is everybody from your team?
19 A Yeah, most them, they read that. Except one or two
20 didn't come. But I, I knew all the issues.
21 Q Was this like the next Monday?
22 A The next Monday.
23 Q All right.
24 A So Mr. Lon Waldinger tell Mr. Netzel I agree with
25 Oscar, these are serious issues, and I agree with his stop work
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1 order.
2 Because I, I found that if there is a stop work
3 order, this is the worst example that I could ever see. And I
4 have findings against Sargent and Bechtel before, six, seven,
5 eight, three weeks. But they have some kind of control in the
6 process.
7 These are the reviewers and the preparers they were
8 switching. The calculations they were done by one preparer and
9 the same previewer, they were the same.
10 There were independency of the calculation was
11 totally gone. There were so many revision, so many numbers
12 from the software outwards, figures crossed, and changed.
13 And if you make any changes, you have to make a
14 revision, and make another person, because the calculation for
15 safety related component reactor design cannot be the opinion
16 of one engineer, cannot.
17 It has to prepared, and reviewed independent. And we
18 found multiple problems. They were even using the codes from
19 Spain reactors, or from Korean reactors. They are not under
20 domain of NRC.
21 Q Were they at least translated into English?
22 A No, they were saying that the crack --
23 Q What do you mean, they were using code, they were
24 using documents in Spanish?
25 A They were comparing. They were comparing, like for
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1 example, there was a crack on the reactor on the shroud, on the
2 reactor head at Quad Cities.
3 Q Right.
4 A They had three line statement that this crack,
5 compared to the crack that we did at Monticello, in Spain, is
6 insignificant as --
7 You could only make that statement if you do a lot of
8 compatibility analysis to see if the crack is the same
9 geometry, same depth, and then you exclude other micro cracks.
10 Then you could come out with a lot of those
11 comparison analysis, and then you say, I can make that. But if
12 you don't do finite element analysis, you cannot even do that.
13 Those plants are not under domain of NRC, and ANSI or ASME.
14 And then once we were told the Spain criteria, they
15 compared their stress analysis to the Korean plants. I mean,
16 what kind of design control process is this?
17 (Whereupon, the document referred
18 to as Complainant's Exhibit No. 4
19 was marked for identification.)
20 BY MR. McDERMOTT:
21 Q I'll ask you to look at what has been previously
22 marked as Complainant's Exhibit Number 4. It consists of 595
23 pages and it was produced with, by the Respondent. Can you
24 take a minute and look at that?
25 A Yes, sir. Can I take that?
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1 Q Sure.
2 JUDGE LESNICK: Let's go off the record.
3 (Off the record.)
4 (On the record.)
5 MR. McDERMOTT: Yes, Judge.
6 JUDGE LESNICK: Proceed.
7 BY MR. McDERMOTT:
8 Q Mr. Shirani, is that a true and accurate copy of the
9 design audited General Electric Nuclear Energy from August of
10 '97?
11 A Yes.
12 Q All right.
13 JUDGE LESNICK: What's the number of that?
14 MR. McDERMOTT: It's our Exhibit Number 4, Judge.
15 JUDGE LESNICK: All right.
16 BY MR. McDERMOTT:
17 Q Could you please put that rubber band around it
18 again? Mr. Shirani, how long did it take to write the portion
19 of that audit that resulted in the stop work order? 500 pages
20 weren't written before a stop work order was issued, were they?
21 A No, we had to summarize a summary of these to, we had
22 several sections with Engineering, several were summarized --
23 Q Well, how much, in paper, how much was written?
24 Out of that --
25 A I will say at least 30, 40 pages --
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1 Q All right. And were you the principal author of
2 those?
3 A Yes.
4 Q All right. Who else authored and/or edited that 30
5 or 40 pages?
6 A Mr. Edward Netzel.
7 Q Anybody else?
8 A Not that I know of.
9 Q All right. How many days did it take to do that?
10 A Four days.
11 Q And it began on what, what day in 1997?
12 A The audit was from 18 to 22nd, so Friday, 23rd, 24th,
13 25th, which is the next Monday.
14 Q So it took from the 25th to the 29th?
15 A 29th.
16 Q All right.
17 A They were changed from 21 to 12 CARs, Corrective
18 Action Records.
19 Q All right. What's a, a what?
20 A All the 21 findings that I brought back.
21 Q Yes.
22 A Once they, once Ed Netzel worked on it, they --
23 Q You said they, was it just Ed or was it --
24 A Ed Netzel, ComEd.
25 Q Okay.
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1 A Yeah, Ed Netzel was representative of --
2 Q Did he take it to anybody else?
3 A I --
4 Q That you know of?
5 A I don't know.
6 Q Okay.
7 A And all the impact statements were removed.
8 Q All right.
9 A Summarized, and it was, became, you know, they
10 supported the stop work. But it was not really totally
11 reflective of the nature and significance of the findings.
12 Q What do you mean, it wasn't totally reflective?
13 A Because, by the Code, is once you find issues of
14 deficiencies, you have to write what's the impact on that, on
15 the design, for the analysis.
16 Q And none of those impacts were there?
17 A Once was -- no.
18 Q Okay.
19 A And I was not supposed to look at it.
20 Q It's no question, there's no question.
21 A Okay.
22 (Whereupon, the document referred
23 to as Complainant's Exhibit No. 5
24 was marked for identification).
25 Q I'll ask you what that, what's been marked as Exhibit
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1 Number 5. Can you tell the Court, can you tell the Court what
2 that is?
3 A Yes, this is August 29, 1997 SES letter number 97
4 dash 26, a letter to Mr. Bob Nicholls at GE, QA Manager, from
5 Mr. Edward Netzel, and I was not included in this letter.
6 Q What do you mean you were not included?
7 A I was not on the cc. They said if you want --
8 Q But is that the stop work order --
9 A Yeah, this is a stop work order.
10 Q Is there a reason your name doesn't appear there?
11 A I asked him, and put a note there, why I was a lead
12 auditor, why that they said questions to be asked from Ed
13 Netzel or Paul Zurowski. None of they, where this during that
14 audit. And to best of my knowledge they were not ultimately
15 familiar with the ANSI, and 45 211, like I was.
16 Q But they were identified as the contact persons for
17 the purposes of GENE questions related to the audit results,
18 right, or the audit itself?
19 A Yes, sir.
20 Q What's the practical purpose of a stop work order?
21 A Practical purpose is since you find a significant
22 Quality Assurance program breakdown in all aspects of the
23 samples that you chose. You stop the production to make sure
24 it does not go further.
25 Q Now, does the stop work order just apply to the area
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1 you audited, or does it apply company-wide in GENE?
2 A Apply to all the safety related design analysis
3 performed by GE and their GE Quality Assurance program. So,
4 which is the core portion of their scope. That's all they do,
5 they do design analysis.
6 Q They don't build trains, do they?
7 A No. They build reactors, but they do engineering to
8 support the reactors.
9 Q I don't understand. So the impact of this stop work
10 order on GE is what?
11 A Means that all the safety related procurement
12 process, procurement activities from ComEd to GE shall be halt,
13 stopped.
14 Q Were they halted?
15 A No.
16 Q Why?
17 A They, we had 17 procurement plans in place, written
18 by Mr. Bill Betourne, who was the Procurement Manager. And
19 they were all thrown in the garbage, basically. None of them
20 followed.
21 Q So it's a stop work order in name only?
22 A Name only, exactly. And even on, ASL, -- supplier
23 list, it's very clearly say, no safety related analysis should
24 be contracted to GE without procurement plan.
25 So they wrote the procurement plan to say, oh, it's
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1 in place. But the procurement plan is not working, so it
2 becomes name only. That's the bottom line. That's my opinion.
3 (Whereupon, the document referred
4 to as Complainant's Exhibit No. 6
5 was marked for identification.)
6 BY MR. McDERMOTT:
7 Q I'm going to ask you to look at Exhibit Number 6,
8 which is, consists of five pages. Can you tell the judge what
9 that document is?
10 A This is the Quality Assurance vendor program print.
11 This is what I'm referring to, approved supplier list, ASL.
12 Q And does it list GE there?
13 A Yes.
14 Q Where?
15 A Is a short name here said GE Nuclear. And it has the
16 vendor number, and a V number.
17 Q And what's it's date?
18 A It's printed 1/1/97 at 12:57, but that was for that
19 page.
20 Q All right, that's a historical document. What's the
21 last page say? The bottom of the last page?
22 A Bottom of the last page. Procurement warning, this
23 is what you --
24 Q What does it say?
25 A Dated 8/29/97, it says, no new procurement activity,
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1 or changes to the existing procurement activity are allowed
2 with GENE, General Electric Nuclear Energy Nuclear Services,
3 for safety related architect engineering services based on the
4 results of ComEd design audit, G 97 dash 120.
5 And associated stop work order, SES -- number 97 dash
6 267, dated 8/29/1997.
7 Q And was that, as you previously testified, part of
8 what you were responsible because GENE was one of your 70
9 vendors?
10 A Yes.
11 Q And knowing what you knew, you had to do this.
12 A Yes.
13 Q I.e. to keep up the contemporary reality of the Q and
14 A, the plot, I'm sorry, approved vendor's list?
15 A Yes.
16 MR. GROSS: I'll object again to the leading
17 questions, Your Honor.
18 JUDGE LESNICK: All right. We'll see if it's --
19 BY MR. McDERMOTT:
20 Q Mr. Shirani, who's the author of this document?
21 A It is, GENE is my vendor.
22 Q Who is it, who authorized that document?
23 A My, I did.
24 Q And, and when did you do it?
25 A Upon the letter that's it was issued as a stop work
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1 order on 8/29/97, and it was notifying all the NUPIC members
2 that this was in place, so.
3 Q Was that your responsibility on August the 29th,
4 1997?
5 A Yes. G, General Electric, was my vendor to the last
6 day I left ComEd Nuclear. So nobody could do any work with
7 this, as long as this vendor is not removed from my
8 responsibility.
9 Q And what was your title on August the 29th, 1997?
10 Your job and title?
11 A Quality Assurance Administrator.
12 Q And one of your responsibilities was to conduct
13 audits, correct?
14 A Right.
15 Q And what were your other responsibilities?
16 A Yeah, as I mentioned before the third party review of
17 things. And also I was assigned to some other non-QA work.
18 Q And an ASL is what?
19 A Approved supplier list.
20 Q And what was your responsibility for the approved
21 supplier to list?
22 A To make sure that this vendor is adequately
23 controlled. Be responsible for removing the procurement
24 warning. Adding new, or whatever, you to maintain it.
25 Q Right.
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1 A To make sure it's controlled.
2 Q You did your job?
3 A Yes.
4 (Whereupon, the document referred
5 to as Complainant's Exhibit No. 7
6 was marked for identification.)
7 BY MR. McDERMOTT:
8 Q Thank you. I'll ask you to look at Exhibit Number 7.
9 What is Exhibit Number 7?
10 A Procurement plan, engineering services, shroud head
11 hold down bolts at General Electric Nuclear Energy.
12 Q And what's the date of that document?
13 A 10/10/97, October 10, 1997.
14 Q Does the document disclose its original, where it
15 comes from?
16 A Yes.
17 Q Where?
18 A On the page three, it says ComEd procurement plan
19 review and acceptance is based on signing three signatures.
20 Cognizant engineer, cognizant engineer supervisor, and then
21 nuclear oversight. Which was the --.
22 So if they do any kind of procurement, these three
23 organizations have to review because the GE Quality Assurance
24 program has been suspended due to the stop work. So we cannot
25 work under the --
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1 Q Is there another document --
2 A There's another one dated October 21st, 1997, it says
3 procurement plan, Engineering Services, i.e., scram accumulator
4 pressure-based by General Electric Nuclear Energy.
5 Q Scram what?
6 A Scram accumulator.
7 Q What is a scram --
8 A Those are the terms for the design analysis that they
9 do for Dresden, Quad Cities. They do provide engineering
10 services, and they doing the technical specifications. And
11 they do minimal required pressure for controlled rod drive.
12 They do hydraulic controlled scram accumulator
13 pressure to make sure that the design pressure is not exceeded
14 to put you in a nondesign or operability situation.
15 So when they say, the sentence states in bold, this
16 work is safety related. So you can --
17 Q Does that back one have an origin?
18 A Yes.
19 Q And what's its origin?
20 A On page three again has the same requirement, ComEd
21 procurement plan review and acceptance. In addition to this,
22 there was a checklist which is per ANSI standards that ComEd
23 endorsed. It goes through list of 19 items to make sure
24 design if it has been correctly --
25 Q Well, that's not before you. But you say that would
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1 have a companion document, is that correct?
2 A Yes.
3 Q A checklist?
4 A Yes.
5 Q And your testimony is those were thrown in the
6 garbage?
7 A Yes.
8 Q How did you get those?
9 A I contacted Bill Betourne and he had it
10 electronically, two of them, he said he's got 17 of them that
11 procurement plan was very expensive to write. Again for, for
12 just love of it.
13 Q How many man hours?
14 A A lot of hours, because you have to put all the
15 technical, all the QA requirements. Because now, you cannot
16 rely on the GE QA program. You have to put all the technical
17 quality requirement, bridge that, to work under ComEd's QA
18 program.
19 Because if, if their program is suspended everything
20 they do safety related in your eyes should be as a commercial
21 grade item. That you have to do dedicated under your program.
22 Q All right.
23 A That's the purpose of procurement though.
24 Q And normally that would be written by Q and A
25 people --
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1 A Bill Betourne was part of the QA.
2 Q Was he part of SES?
3 A At, at one time, he was. At this particular time,
4 they gave him procurement plan, and that was his major, major
5 work.
6 Q You mean that was a title, procurement.
7 A A procurement manager.
8 Q Is there such a title, was there such a title when
9 you left?
10 A I don't believe so because --
11 Q All right.
12 JUDGE LESNICK: Before you ask another question,
13 let's do some housekeeping here. We, you discussed just under
14 a dozen documents. At this point we only have four admitted by
15 the Complainant, and one Employer Exhibit 46.
16 The one's identified, but not offered. If you don't
17 wish to offer them, that's fine. If you --
18 MR. McDERMOTT: I will, I would, I suppose, Judge.
19 JUDGE LESNICK: If you want to put more foundation in
20 before you offer them, that's okay, too. But if you've already
21 covered them.
22 MR. McDERMOTT: I have, and I was just going to offer
23 them at the moment you said we have another break.
24 JUDGE LESNICK: Well, I guess I prefer this when we
25 offer them as you go along.
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1 MR. McDERMOTT: Oh, fine.
2 JUDGE LESNICK: That way, while the documents are in
3 front of anybody, if we have objections we can all discuss it.
4 Rather than if, just presume Mr. Gross objects to all of them,
5 I don't want to go back and pull the documents for all of them,
6 so why don't we do that? You're going to offer them all up
7 this point.
8 MR. McDERMOTT: Yes, Judge.
9 JUDGE LESNICK: Up to -- All right, well, let's take
10 them one at a time. CX 3, that's actually a copy of the regs.
11
12 MR. McDERMOTT: That's correct.
13 JUDGE LESNICK: I prefer not to mark the regs.
14 Unless the reg that he testified about is different than that
15 which currently exists.
16 MR. McDERMOTT: No, there's not.
17 JUDGE LESNICK: All right. If it, if there's no
18 dispute as to what the reg says itself, then I prefer not to
19 mark three.
20 MR. GROSS: There is no dispute.
21 JUDGE LESNICK: All right. So let's, so in your
22 briefing if you want to attach a copy, that's fine. If you
23 want to refer to it, we won't mark it as an exhibit.
24 MR. McDERMOTT: That's fine. I understand.
25 JUDGE LESNICK: Okay. Number 4, the design audit of
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1 GENE, any objection to that?
2 MR. GROSS: No.
3 JUDGE LESNICK: 5, the stop work order?
4 MR. GROSS: That's the August 29th letter?
5 MR. McDERMOTT: Yes.
6 JUDGE LESNICK: Yes.
7 MR. GROSS: No objection.
8 JUDGE LESNICK: All right. Six, the QA vendor
9 program procurement warning, of, dated August 29th, 1997. Any
10 objection?
11 MR. GROSS: No objection.
12 JUDGE LESNICK: And 7, the ComEd GENE procurement
13 plans dated October 10th, 1997, and October 21st, 1997, they
14 are two of them.
15 MR. GROSS: Yes, I object. Because they are
16 documents that have never been signed or executed by anyone.
17 JUDGE LESNICK: What day you say to that?
18 MR. McDERMOTT: Well, he identified them, he said
19 where he received them, and he said who the man was who wrote
20 them, and he said the time and labor, and he said they're two
21 of 17.
22 I mean, that's pretty substantial identification in
23 that various period of time when you have, or allegedly have a
24 stop work order this is the only way that a vendor can work for
25 you.
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1 MR. GROSS: If the limited purpose of them, Your
2 Honor, is to establish that someone wrote these based on his
3 testimony, I have no objection to that. But I do not want any
4 implication being made that these ever executed, put into
5 effect.
6 MR. McDERMOTT: Oh, I think he testified they were
7 not executed and they were not put into effect. That's exactly
8 the, that's exactly the point.
9 MR. GROSS: That's right. Then I have no objection
10 if that's the limited purpose.
11 JUDGE LESNICK: All right, with that in the record,
12 then 1 through, 1 through, 4 through 7 will be accepted in the
13 record. Now there was an earlier packet.
14 (Whereupon, the documents
15 referred to as Complainant's
16 Exhibit No. 4 through 7 were
17 received into evidence.)
18 MR. McDERMOTT: The TID's.
19 JUDGE LESNICK: Yes, the TID's.
20 MR. McDERMOTT: Correct.
21 JUDGE LESNICK: What number was that?
22 MR. McDERMOTT: That came out of in Exhibit Number
23 29 --
24 JUDGE LESNICK: Okay. Any objection to that?
25 MR. GROSS: No objection.
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1 JUDGE LESNICK: All right. Then 29 will be accepted.
2 Okay.
3 (Whereupon, the document referred
4 to as Complainant's Exhibit No.
5 29 was received into evidence.)
6 MR. GROSS: Your Honor, you had indicated that
7 there's only one Respondent's Exhibit in the record admitted.
8 JUDGE LESNICK: That's 46.
9 MR. GROSS: I thought we had asked for and got
10 admitted Exhibit 17 as well.
11 MR. McDERMOTT: But he's talking about my exhibits.
12 MR. GROSS: Which was --
13 JUDGE LESNICK: Is than an Employer Exhibit?
14 MR. GROSS: An Employer Exhibit that we used during
15 the --
16 JUDGE LESNICK: Yes, that's correct. You're correct.
17 I'm sorry.
18 MR. GROSS: That is, I'm sorry, okay.
19 MR. McDERMOTT: Yes, and I think he's missing --
20 MR. GROSS: I'm sorry, but he had said only one, I
21 wanted to make sure that there were two.
22 JUDGE LESNICK: Oh, I marked it as a Complainant's
23 Exhibit. That's an Employer's Exhibit.
24 MR. GROSS: Yes.
25 JUDGE LESNICK: I just mismarked it. I mean in my
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1 notes, I'm going by notes. The reporter has it accurately
2 marked, and the exhibit is properly marked, but thanks for the
3 correction. Okay.
4 That's why I like to keep this straight as we go
5 along. Making the proper record is the most important.
6 Anything further before we break?
7 MR. McDERMOTT: Nothing further, Judge.
8 JUDGE LESNICK: Okay, let's do, let's come back, it's
9 about 12:35. No later than 1:15.
10 MR. GROSS: 1:15, all right.
11 MR. McDERMOTT: 1:15?
12 JUDGE LESNICK: Yes.
13 MR. McDERMOTT: Good.
14 (Whereupon, at 12:35 p.m., a luncheon recess was
15 taken.)
16
17
18
19
20
21
22
23
24
25
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1 A F T E R N O O N S E S S I O N
2 (1:43 p.m.)
3 JUDGE LESNICK: All right. We're back on the record
4 after a lunch break. It's 1:43 and proceed.
5 MR. McDERMOTT: By my calculations, we're starting
6 early then.
7 JUDGE LESNICK: Yes.
8 MR. McDERMOTT: Thank you. With the Court's
9 indulgence, I'd like to call Mr. Walter Hahn, who is a
10 subpoenaed witness. They have the subpoena. He's been
11 identified in the pre-trial report and he's flown down from
12 Canada, so he's one of those out of jurisdiction.
13 JUDGE LESNICK: Okay.
14 (Whereupon,
15 WALTER HAHN
16 was called as a witness by and on behalf of the Complainant,
17 and after having been first duly sworn, was examined and
18 testified as follows:)
19 JUDGE LESNICK: You may question the witness.
20 MR. McDERMOTT: Thank you, Judge.
21 DIRECT EXAMINATION
22 BY MR. McDERMOTT:
23 Q Would you state your name and spell your first and
24 last name for the Court Reporters?
25 A It's Walter Hahn, H-a-h-n, and the first name's
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1 W-a-l-t-e-r.
2 Q And Walter, what is your trade or occupation?
3 A I'm trained as an engineer and I'm currently a supply
4 director at Ontario Power Generation.
5 Q And that is in Ontario, Canada?
6 A Yes.
7 Q And where, do you have an engineering degree?
8 A Yes. I have degrees in mechanical and aeronautical
9 engineering as Bachelor's of Sciences. And then a Master's
10 Degree in Mechanical Engineering from MIT and an Engineer's
11 Degree from MIT, also in Mechanical Engineering.
12 Q Were you ever employed by Commonwealth Edison?
13 A Yes. I was employed there from October '94 through
14 December 2000.
15 Q And did you have one or more than one job during that
16 time period?
17 A It was multiple jobs initially.
18 Q What was your first post or position at Commonwealth
19 Edison?
20 A It was in the supply management position for power
21 generation services, which covered both fossil plants and
22 nuclear plants. And then, ultimately became segmented more
23 exclusively towards nuclear. And then, following that
24 transition, and we eventually sold off our fossil plants, so it
25 was entirely nuclear. And then I received a severance package
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1 sometime in November, I think, '98 from nuclear. Ninety-nine,
2 I believe.
3 Q November of '99?
4 A Yeah.
5 Q All right.
6 A It was following the merger, so was that October
7 20th, '99, was the merger date?
8 Q I believe it's October 20th, 1999.
9 A Okay. Yeah, so the severance package was November of
10 that year.
11 Q Now, your first position was, you say, supply
12 manager?
13 A Yes.
14 Q Who did you report to?
15 A At that time it was Alan Ho, and then ultimately Tom
16 Joyce replaced him in that role.
17 Q And can you spell Ho's last name for us?
18 A H-o. And his first name is A-l-a-n.
19 Q And you then reported to Tom Joyce, is that correct?
20 A Correct.
21 Q And do you recall when Tom Joyce came to ComEd
22 Nuclear?
23 A He was a long-term nuclear employee. He was
24 originally vice president at, Station Vice President at Zion,
25 then over at Dresden, and then came in as a nuclear supply
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1 executive manager.
2 Q And do you recall when that occurred?
3 A It was following Mike Lester. So, what we had was,
4 in '94 it was Mike Lester, then Alan Ho and then Tom Joyce. So
5 I believe Tom Joyce was probably about the '97 time frame.
6 Q All right. He was the person to whom you reported?
7 A Yes.
8 Q All right. Do you recall a meeting in January of
9 1999 with Tom Joyce and other managers who reported to him?
10 A There were multiple meetings there.
11 Q Do you remember a meeting specifically related to
12 salary increases, promotions of your various employees who
13 reported to you?
14 A That's standard process, where Tom, Tom Joyce and his
15 direct reports would get together to review people's
16 performance reviews and assessments and agree as to what grade
17 level they were, and people were rated as A, B, or C. And so
18 they would report their grade level, discuss merit increases
19 and promotions. And that was an annual process.
20 Q Do you recall the meeting specifically in January of
21 1999, the last one you probably would have attended?
22 A Sure.
23 Q Do you recall who was in attendance?
24 A Tom Joyce's direct reports. So, Russ Bastyr, myself,
25 Ron Petri, Paul Roth, Ed Finnegan and a few other folks were
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1 there.
2 Q Do you recall Mr. Bastyr saying anything about
3 Oscar Shirani?
4 A Yeah.
5 Q Do you recall what it was he said in this meeting?
6 A Yeah, Russ made the case for, and you know, first of
7 all, the process was that each manager presented his group of
8 employees.
9 Q All right.
10 A And so, specifically, Russ said that Oscar was his
11 best auditor and he was rated an 'A'. And the process was that
12 in order to keep everyone, you know, like I think a lot of
13 places, you have some great inflation. 'A' is an outstanding
14 performer, which allows you to get a higher than average merit
15 increase. 'B's were good performers, but that's the normal
16 work force, and then 'C' is the lower performer.
17 And normally, the top 20 percent, you limit the 'A's
18 to the top 20 percent. And so, he had mentioned that Oscar was
19 an 'A' and that he was his best auditor. And he brought up the
20 fact that he was a best auditor when he tried to justify
21 promoting him.
22 Q All right, and what was that promotion mentioned, if
23 there was a promotion mentioned at all? Or is that a promotion
24 in money?
25 A No, that was a promotion in level increase.
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1 Q I see. So from whatever level he was, Mr. Bastyr was
2 recommending a higher level?
3 A Yes.
4 Q Do you recall Mr. Joyce responding to that?
5 A Yes. And it created a chuckle across the room. You
6 know, it was something along the lines of, you don't expect me
7 to present that to the executive. And similar to this group
8 process, it then rode up and then was presented to Dave Helwig
9 and each of the senior managers would then present their groups
10 recommendations for salary increases and promotions.
11 Q And again, what was it that Mr. Joyce said that you
12 heard?
13 MR. GROSS: Objection. Asked and answered.
14 JUDGE LESNICK: I'd like to hear it again.
15 THE WITNESS: He said that it would be, and he didn't
16 say it in these words. I can't recall exact words. But he
17 said it that it would be pretty foolhardy to present this one,
18 because it's a lost cause. It wouldn't be accepted. And it
19 created a chuckle, you know, a chuckle in the room. It's kind
20 of like, the implication was it's like walking into, putting
21 your head into the open mouth of a lion. This isn't going to
22 sell.
23 BY MR. McDERMOTT:
24 Q And he said that to Mr. Bastyr?
25 A Yes. And it was a group discussion, so it wasn't
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1 addressed to Russ --
2 Q So other people discussed Oscar's performance as
3 well?
4 A Exactly.
5 Q And did anybody respond to that? Any of your
6 managers?
7 A No, no, and there was very little discussion. It was
8 pretty much just dropped at that point.
9 MR. McDERMOTT: I have no other questions.
10 JUDGE LESNICK: You may cross.
11 MR. GROSS: I have no follow-up questions.
12 MR. McDERMOTT: All right. Thank you. You may step
13 down, sir.
14 JUDGE LESNICK: Is this witness excused?
15 MR. McDERMOTT: He is excused. I have another out of
16 town witness that I'll call.
17 JUDGE LESNICK: I'm sorry?
18 MR. McDERMOTT: I have another out of town witness
19 that I'll call. You said 2:30?
20 JUDGE LESNICK: All right. Thanks, Mr. Hahn, you're
21 released from the subpoena and we'll go off the record.
22 (Off the record.)
23 (On the record.)
24 (Whereupon,
25 ANN HARRIS
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1 was called as a witness by and on behalf of the Complainant,
2 and after having been first duly sworn, was examined and
3 testified as follows:)
4 JUDGE LESNICK: You may question the witness.
5 MR. McDERMOTT: Thank you, Judge.
6 DIRECT EXAMINATION
7 BY MR. McDERMOTT:
8 Q Would you state your name and spell your first and
9 last name for the Court Reporters?
10 A My name is Ann Harris, A-n-n H-a-r-r-i-s.
11 Q And your residence address, Ms. Harris?
12 A 341 Swing Loop, two words, S-w-i-n-g L-o-o-p,
13 Rockwood, one word, Tennessee 37854.
14 Q All right. And are you employed at present?
15 A No, sir.
16 Q Who was your last full-time employment with?
17 A Last full-time employment was the Tennessee Valley
18 Authority.
19 Q And when did you begin working for the Tennessee
20 Valley Authority?
21 A January, right abouts 1982.
22 Q And in what capacity did you join the Tennessee
23 Valley Authority?
24 A I began as a clerk in the engineering and
25 construction at Watts Bar Nuclear Plant.
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1 Q And just slowing down, that's two words, Watts Bar?
2 A Yes, sir. W-a-t-t-s, capital B-a-r. Two words.
3 Q And Watts Bar is located in Watts Bar, Tennessee?
4 A No, sir, it's located in the mailing address of
5 Spring City, two words, S-p-r-i-n-g C-i-t-y, Spring City,
6 Tennessee.
7 Q And when you began working at Watts Bar, in your
8 capacity, was the station on line?
9 A No, sir.
10 Q What was the condition of the station?
11 A It was still under construction. Supposedly it was
12 going to go on line in late '83 or '84 it was going to start
13 up. And it was, everybody was working toward the start up.
14 Q When you say working towards the start up, what do
15 you mean?
16 A The, so that it could go critical or contamination
17 and then to go to make power.
18 Q All right. And were there two reactors at Watts Bar
19 under construction at the time?
20 A Yes, sir.
21 Q All right. And what was your specific function in
22 your job, with your job duties?
23 A I dealt with QA records that were part of the
24 engineering process, to put them on record in the, what we call
25 the vault. Document control.
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1 Q So that's QA records document control?
2 A Yes, sir.
3 Q Who created these documents?
4 A Engineers, engineering aids. Some QA people,
5 inspectors from the quality assurance program. Virtually from
6 everybody in the job site.
7 Q How long did you hold that position?
8 A I was in that position up until I think it was maybe
9 a couple of years. I got three different, there was a
10 progression of clerical, like just straight clerk, which is the
11 bottom feeder, and then up to different levels of clerks.
12 Q And --
13 A In '84 I went to, I think it was maybe February of
14 '84, I don't recall exactly, I became an engineering aid in
15 electrical engineering.
16 Q And what did an engineering aid do?
17 A Supported engineers; a lot of legwork; talked and
18 worked with craft; did a lot of interaction with QA inspectors.
19 Things had to be scheduled in an orderly fashion for things to
20 be worked out, so that systems could be turned over to the, you
21 know, to the people that were going to start up the plant at
22 another date.
23 Q How many employees would have been working at any one
24 time during this first tenure at TVA? How many would have been
25 working at Watts Bar?
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1 A In 1983 and '84 the numbers went all the way up to
2 5,000, maybe 5500. There may have been that same number at a
3 later date, but I don't quite remember.
4 Q All right. What was your next position with TVA?
5 A From there I went to a low-level manager. I was
6 assistant to the unit supervisor in electrical engineering. I
7 had about 10 electrical engineers under my supervision.
8 Q Assistant Unit Supervisor, Electrical, is that what
9 it was?
10 A Yes.
11 Q And how long did you hold that job?
12 A From some time in '86 until some time in '88, I
13 think.
14 Q Do you know Oliver Kingsley, Jr.?
15 A I know who he is, yes.
16 Q Do you recall when he came to TVA, if he came to TVA?
17 A He came to TVA in May, 1988 as the head of, he was, I
18 don't know if at that time his title was president of nuclear
19 power for TVA, but I know that that, somewhere along the line
20 that became known to me, at some time or other.
21 Q And at that time, you held a low-level management
22 position, is that correct?
23 A Yes, sir.
24 Q During that period of time did you have an
25 opportunity to observe the broad range of quality assurance
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1 for, I want to put it the correct way, safety advocate
2 complaints?
3 A I'm sorry?
4 Q During that period of time when you were functioning
5 as assistant unit supervisor, did you also see quality
6 assurance complaints by safety, or public safety, or safety
7 advocates, otherwise known as whistleblowers?
8 A Yes.
9 Q All right.
10 A I was on the team, headed up the team that we had had
11 about 8,000 complaints the year before, in 1985, '86 time frame
12 and the, there was like 8,000 complaints against the safety of
13 the plant. About 2300 of them were against management tactics.
14 And during that time, the NRC said, if you will put these and
15 give us a plan to fix these, we can go on and get on, because
16 we virtually, the TVA nuclear program had been stopped because
17 of these kinds of goings on that had happened. And
18 Mr. Kingsley, we were told, was being brought in to clean up
19 those sort of things.
20 Q All right, now you said 8,000 complaints in a two-
21 year period?
22 A That was from the time that the plant had started --
23 Q Oh, okay.
24 A -- back in, from '72, I think --
25 Q Oh, all right.
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1 A I'm sorry.
2 Q That's okay. Construction began in 1972?
3 A I think the first dirt, shovel of dirt was in 1972.
4 It might have been '69. I just know it was probably 10, 12
5 years before I got there.
6 Q All right. And you became a team leader in what
7 year? 1988?
8 A 19, late 1986.
9 Q Eighty-six. And a team leader of a team called what?
10 A Corrective action for employee concerns.
11 Q Who created this team?
12 A I don't know exactly who created it, but it was at
13 the behest of the NRC. They said we want to see a mechanism
14 and a plan in place to how you're going to deal with all these
15 issues.
16 Q And again, these issues would expand more than a
17 decade?
18 A Yes, sir.
19 Q How big was this team?
20 A I think there was maybe 10, 12 of us. I was just the
21 electrical portion now. There was part from mechanical and
22 part for civil. Part for QA, records, part for every division,
23 design, the whole bit.
24 Q So there would have been a 10-person team for each of
25 those units that you just described?
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1 A Thereabouts.
2 Q Okay. And do you recall the longevity of this team?
3 How long it lasted?
4 A It started up, I was given my assignment in February
5 of '87, late January or early February of '87, and then I was
6 taken off the task some time in the summer of '88. I'm sorry,
7 '87 and then I was sent over to the site licensing organization
8 because they were having problems over there with their
9 employee concerns. And I went over there and worked for the
10 site licensing manager on loan for approximately, through the
11 rest of, up until December of '87. So that, basically, that
12 entire year I was working on employee concerns.
13 Q Did you go back to this team at any time?
14 A Yes, sir.
15 Q When did you go back to it?
16 A I went back to it in early December of '87. I was
17 there for approximately a week and they came in and said that
18 my work was not up to par and that they were removing me, along
19 with, I think there was five supervisors, plus the head of the
20 section.
21 Q Were you, in fact, removed?
22 A Yes, I was.
23 Q And where did you go?
24 A To a hallway.
25 Q I'm sorry?
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1 A To a hallway.
2 Q To a hallway?
3 A Yes, sir, where there was a copy machine, coffee
4 machine and the refrigerator, drinking fountain.
5 Q What did you do about that removal?
6 A Not knowing what I could do, in the spring of '88,
7 after I'd been there for some time, I filed a complaint with
8 the Department of Libel.
9 Q And what was the result of that complaint?
10 A Before the investigator made a decision, TVA and I
11 settled. We came to an agreement. And I was shipped over to
12 the Quality Assurance organization in Document Control.
13 Q And how long did you stay in Quality Assurance
14 Document Control?
15 A I stayed there until April of 1990. And I was sent
16 back to the construction area where employee concerns were
17 being dealt with again.
18 Q You were, again, assigned to employee concerns --
19 A Yes, sir.
20 Q -- at construction. The Quality Assurance Document
21 Control was someplace other than the construction site?
22 A Well, on a nuclear site, there's a lot of different
23 buildings where things go on. So I was across the site from
24 where I had been.
25 Q You're on the campus, but in another building?
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1 A Yes, sir.
2 Q What did you do in Quality Assurance Document
3 Control?
4 A I was given the task of viewing and coordinating with
5 Sargent and Lundy contractors over documents, to go through.
6 They presented, they had a contract and they were given, the
7 documents were given to me after they were through with them to
8 see if they met, if they were okay to present to the NRC
9 because we were, it, supposedly at that time we were going to
10 start up Watts Bar.
11 Q And again, this is 198 -- I'm sorry, 1990?
12 A 1989 was whenever I was in the document control.
13 Q Oh, I'm sorry. 1989.
14 A I did not, I went back to construction in 19--, in
15 the spring of, late spring of 1990 under threat of dismissal.
16 Q What was the --
17 A I was on --
18 Q -- purpose of the threat? I mean what caused --
19 A Well, I was on loan to the Quality Assurance program
20 for the Document Control area and I'd filed two complaints plus
21 party to a class-action over safety issues. And I was, they
22 told me that if I didn't take the low level, less-paying job,
23 that I would be laid off, that I could not go back to my old
24 job.
25 Q And what occurred?
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1 A I told them that I would go back to my old job, that
2 a man was performing the duties, being paid twice what I had
3 been paid during that time and they sent me back and put me in
4 a corner, similar to this corner, and I sat --
5 Q When you say, sent you back, sent you back to --
6 A They sent me back to construction.
7 Q Okay.
8 A To the Employee Concerns organization.
9 Q The Employee Concerns Organization, is that the, is
10 that the euphemism for the team?
11 A Yes, sir. I didn't supervise anybody, though, at
12 that date.
13 Q Was there anything to do, was there work to do in the
14 Employee Concerns Organization?
15 A Oh, yeah.
16 Q What kind of work was done?
17 A By me?
18 Q Yes.
19 A None.
20 Q Why?
21 A They didn't assign me anything. Everything was by
22 assignment.
23 Q What, if anything, did you do about that? Or did
24 you?
25 A They told me, they, about once a week somebody would
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1 come by and say, are you going to leave or are you going to
2 take that job back over in QA, and I'd say no. And, I guess,
3 basically, we just kind of out-waited each other, because they
4 kept saying, you have to do this, and I said, you do what you
5 have to do and I'll do what I have to do. And at that point,
6 my desk was repeatedly ransacked. Money was stolen out of my
7 pocketbook at my desk. They followed me to the bathroom.
8 Everywhere I went on the job site, for whatever, even if they
9 sent me, somebody followed me to see where I went to and what I
10 was doing.
11 Q How did that standoff resolve itself?
12 A Well, in June or July of 1990, I was in the QA
13 records building, in the vault area, and Mr. Kingsley was
14 coming down the hallway and I saw him and we became engaged in
15 conversation. And I said, I know who you are. And he said, he
16 just kind of said, yeah. And I said, and you know who I am.
17 And he just kind of bopped his head like yes, in agreement.
18 And we stood and talked for a few minutes and I told him that,
19 he and I talked about whether, you know, about issues. And I
20 said, why, can we sit down and talk, and he said, yeah, I think
21 we need to sit down and talk. And he said, when do you want to
22 do that, and I said, well, you make the date, and I'll keep it.
23 And he said, you'll come down to Chattanooga, and I said, yes,
24 sir. And I said, I will bring documents with me, because, I
25 said, I think there's things that we need to talk about.
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1 Q And did you go down to Chattanooga?
2 A I went to Chattanooga and visited with him in his
3 office, maybe late September, early October. I can't remember
4 the exact date. That's been a year or two. And we spent
5 several hours together at his office with two other people
6 taking notes about issues that needed to be fixed.
7 Q And these issues came out of, were quality assurance
8 and employee key concerns, or --
9 A Well, they were quality assurance problems that were
10 raised, not only by quality assurance people, but by engineers,
11 by management, by various levels of people in the organization.
12 Some of them were as a result of NRC violations. There's all
13 kinds of things that generated what was going on with this.
14 Q How was it you had access to these kinds of documents
15 from so many different areas? Why is it you had all of these
16 documents?
17 A Probably because I worked on the employee concerns
18 electrical team, because I was deeply involved in trying to
19 resolve issues so that we could move forward in '88, '89. I,
20 at one time, I guess I was kind of like the poster child for
21 hard work. I did all the work. I stayed late, worked long
22 hours, made sure that everything met whatever the NRC needed so
23 that we could package it so that we could give it to them so
24 that we could get one more item taken off the list. It was
25 important that we take off all the problems because we couldn't
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1 go to license, or request license again if we didn't have
2 issues dealt with.
3 Q Did you feel you were successful --
4 A Yes, sir.
5 Q -- in getting these things or issues off the list?
6 A Yes, sir.
7 Q How long is the list that you had to work with?
8 A The one that I had in electrical?
9 Q Yes.
10 A Up front, I should tell you that some of them were
11 problematic issues, instead of just single items like --
12 Q I understand.
13 A -- and I think there was several hundred.
14 Q What was the outcome on this two-hour meeting with
15 Mr. Kingsley?
16 A He asked me if I'd be willing to settle these issues.
17 That was his last question as I go out the door. And I told
18 him, I'd be more than happy and willing to make some sort of
19 effort to settle all the issues and all the complaints and
20 everything. And he said, well, I'll contact the head of
21 employee concerns at Watts Bar.
22 So, I went back and immediately there was the head
23 of, one of the heads of personnel from Human Resources and the
24 head of employee concerns at Watts Bar, and we began to have
25 meetings and sat down and started to try to work out some sort
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1 of agreement that was agreeable to everybody.
2 Q And was an agreement reached?
3 A An agreement was reached and I signed it in November
4 of 1990.
5 Q And it dealt with substantive issues that you
6 brought, related to these documents, to this meeting with
7 Mr. Kingsley, is that correct?
8 A It dealt with the acts against me for raising these
9 issues.
10 Q I'm sorry. It wasn't, it weren't the issues
11 themselves, it's what you, am I correct, it's what you felt was
12 happening to you because of raising these issues?
13 A That's correct.
14 Q So this was a settlement of your complaint, whatever
15 it was?
16 A Several complaints. We rolled them all up in
17 together.
18 Q And what, if anything, was done about the issues
19 raised about, or employee issues that you brought to
20 Mr. Kingsley's attention? If you know?
21 A Those issues were dealt with by somebody else during,
22 and I can't remember the exact date, but I met with the NRC
23 during that time also for out of Region 2, and the Senior
24 Resident Inspector plus an Investigator. And we sat down and
25 we got on the books everything that was a safety issue that had
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1 been caused me heartburn and that had caused me problems, plus
2 the things that happened to me personally. And there was like
3 pages and pages and all kinds of stuff like that, but those
4 issues were given to the NRC and then the NRC and TVA,
5 together, worked on them to resolve those issues some, through
6 some manner of either fixing them right then or writing up a
7 notice of, it was document that would, with a single item on
8 it. I can't remember what it was called at that time, but it
9 was an adverse action document, and it had to be dealt with and
10 the NRC would have to sign off on it, TVA would have to sign
11 off on it.
12 And then, at the time, in I think it was, I can't
13 remember, but it was not that year, but like two, three years
14 later, the NRC sent me a document making an answer to all my
15 allegations. And all of them were substantiated.
16 Q I see. Did you have an opportunity to observe
17 Mr. Kingsley's commitment to quality assurance safety issues
18 when he came to TVA?
19 A Well, things had gotten very lax prior to him coming,
20 and he was touted, or promoted as being the answer to starting
21 up the plant.
22 Q All right.
23 A And that he would correct all these problems. And
24 everybody went with the idea that we would see some relief from
25 the way that things had been being done. And it took about,
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1 probably about a year-and-a-half to two years to where a lot of
2 people decided that was not going to happen. In fact, it was
3 going to get worse.
4 Q What do you mean by get worse?
5 A Well --
6 MR. GROSS: I'm going to object and ask that the
7 answer be stricken as to what other people decided.
8 JUDGE LESNICK: I'm not sure, I followed the answer
9 myself. I'm not sure if it should be stricken. Why don't you
10 just ask the question again and, what was the question?
11 MR. McDERMOTT: My question was, what do you mean by
12 it could get worse.
13 JUDGE LESNICK: That part I understood, but before
14 that, the question before.
15 MR. McDERMOTT: That's the one you're asking to be
16 stricken?
17 JUDGE LESNICK: Yes.
18 MR. McDERMOTT: My client answered the question.
19 MR. GROSS: Yes, and she answered. With her answer
20 is what I'm asking to be stricken because she's talking about
21 what other people decided.
22 MR. McDERMOTT: What was your answer again? I
23 believe --
24 MR. GROSS: -- for the record --
25 MR. McDERMOTT: I believe the witness' answer was,
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1 Mr. Kingsley had been touted as getting the plant on line,
2 which, I think she started off by saying, things had gotten
3 lax. Well, if I recall her testimony, this is now the
4 sixteenth year of construction for this place, and she said
5 things had gotten lax and when he came, people expected a
6 change and things would get better, but they changed their
7 mind --
8 JUDGE LESNICK: Okay. I -- her understanding is sort
9 of general thoughts and her general feeling of the plant, for
10 what it's worth. Your objection referred to weight rather than
11 usability. So I'll allow it to stand.
12 MR. GROSS: And then the next one is --
13 JUDGE LESNICK: Next question is --
14 MR. GROSS: What do you mean by getting --
15 JUDGE LESNICK: -- mean by getting worse.
16 MR. GROSS: Yes.
17 JUDGE LESNICK: Go ahead. Answer.
18 THE WITNESS: As a manager, we had meetings, a staff
19 meeting every week in their division and then we had with the
20 site, Vice President, there's all kinds of meetings all the
21 time that we went to. And we were constantly being told that
22 everybody was going to have to pull their own weight. Security
23 was going to tighten up because we were going to go on, was
24 going to start up the plant. The QA was going to have to start
25 doing it's job. This was things that we'd heard all through
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1 the years, but nobody ever really carried it through, that we
2 could see, or the people that was doing a lot of the work.
3 In the years previous, there had been a safety review
4 board. All those people had ended up in the Congress and in
5 the media and the, because the head of TVA and the head of
6 construction didn't think that they had valid issues. And then
7 the, whenever Mr. Kingsley came on board, we were told things
8 were just going to get better, and everybody just thought that
9 was going to happen. But there'd been the, I think up until
10 198-- I want to say May of 1988, that might not be the exact
11 date, there was a list of people that had filed complaints with
12 the Department of Labor and there was less than 40 of them. In
13 the '91, '92, there was hundreds were filed with the Department
14 of Labor.
15 Now that's the ones that are on the records of the
16 Department of Labor that I saw that was presented to me and I
17 understood, and I understand now, that if an investigator does
18 not send out an official, a response about his investigation
19 today, that those things don't count as a filing with the
20 Department of Labor. So they don't count. So I don't know how
21 many actually were there that were just dealt with before they
22 ever got to, for a formal reply to the agency and to the NRC.
23 BY MR. McDERMOTT:
24 Q So you know that prior to Mr. Kingsley there was a
25 list of people from one year or two years that --
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1 A That was the entirety from, I think the first one was
2 filed in like 1979, and that would be up through 1988.
3 Q And that would be how many complaints, or how many --
4 A I think there was like maybe, I want to say the
5 number was 36. I know it was less than 40, but it was thirty-
6 something. I can't give you exact numbers now. We called it a
7 Blackball List because it was spread around everywhere.
8 Anybody that walked up to document control could get a copy of
9 it. In fact, I was one of them that did and my name was on it.
10 Q You were one of thirty-plus --
11 A Yes.
12 Q Names. And then that list had it's origins in what
13 year through what year?
14 A From 1979, maybe it was, it was eighty-eight or
15 eighty-nine, I can't remember the exact date.
16 Q And in either '89, '90 or '90, '91 --
17 A It was 1991, '92 whenever the numbers began to leap.
18 I think '91 or '92 they went to over 100. The next year they
19 went, they were over 100. And the bulk of these was from Watts
20 Bar. There were some from Sequoia and I think maybe less than
21 half-a-dozen from Browns Ferry. Those are the three nuclear --
22 we've had --
23 Q And again, did these, when you say these hundreds,
24 did these hundreds get translated into a name on a list?
25 A Not after we complained about the Blackball List that
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1 was put out.
2 Q And that, you made that complaint some time after
3 1988?
4 A Complaint --
5 Q About the Blackball List?
6 A About the Blackball List, it became a class action
7 about all the people who was listed on it.
8 Q All right.
9 A It was in '89 that we complained about that.
10 Q Again, did you observe Mr. Kingsley's attitude
11 towards Quality Assurance and nuclear safety?
12 A What I and a lot of others that were concerned about
13 it were observing was that the PR was saying one thing but we
14 were seeing and being dealt other things in meetings, in the
15 conferences and in the, seeing people just disappear over night
16 because they had raised an issue that they then said it cost
17 too much money, we don't want to fix that, don't worry about
18 it, we'll deal with that another day. Things just, they
19 virtually rewrote the Quality Assurance program. People from
20 outside the valley came onboard from other nuclear plants where
21 there'd been problems and they were brought in by Mr. Kingsley.
22 Q When you say, the valley, you mean the Tennessee
23 Valley?
24 A I'm sorry.
25 Q That's all right.
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1 A I apologize. Tennessee Valley Authority covers
2 eight, seven states and eight million people.
3 Q All right.
4 A I'm sorry.
5 Q All right. That's fine. So foreigners came in from
6 other places?
7 A Well, Palo Verde had had its problems and they
8 brought in a QA manager from Palo Verde.
9 Q Where's Palo Verde, California?
10 A In Arizona. There was problems down at Houston
11 Lighting and Power and it was kind of like we swapped managers.
12 We took some of our bad ones and shipped them down there and
13 they sent some of theirs up to us.
14 Q Do you mean bad both ways?
15 A Yes.
16 Q I see. You say PR's saying one thing and --
17 A Well the philosophy in the day-to-day things that you
18 see. I mean, there was banners put up everywhere about that
19 employee abuse over safety issue would not be tolerated, was
20 not condoned. If you have a problem, you're to go to Employee
21 Concerns, or to the NRC, or come to your supervisor. And
22 people quit going to their supervisor because they found out
23 that was a one-way out the door.
24 Q And that occurred after '88?
25 A Yes, sir.
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1 Q Had it occurred prior to Mr. Kingsley being there?
2 A No, sir. Not to my knowledge.
3 Q For as long as you stayed with the NRC and you, I'm
4 sorry, the Tennessee, the TVA, I'm going to have to start using
5 words, because three letters are losing their meaning to me.
6 For as long as you stayed with the Tennessee Valley
7 Authority, that was till when?
8 A September 1997.
9 Q Did any of this PR, did any of what you just
10 testified to change? The display of banners?
11 A No. We just, there was window dressing that went up
12 new every year, said the same words, they just changed the
13 colors of the posters. There was a lot of letters to the NRC
14 to show cause why they shouldn't be dealt with over violations.
15 They were the most inspected nuclear site in America by virtue
16 of being, they'd been trying to get it online for so long. And
17 they had the most fines of any utility in the country over
18 employee abuse. That was through '97. And now, it's added up
19 to even more. There was last accounting that I did along with
20 an NRC investigator, he showed me the documents, and those
21 documents said that they'd been over $5 million through 1996.
22 Q Through 1996?
23 A Yes, sir.
24 Q Beginning when? Beginning in '72?
25 A Beginning in, no. Beginning in '79, because that was
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1 when the first one had been complained. The first safety
2 advocate that went to the Department of Labor.
3 Q I see.
4 A And the NRC has a limit, they have a ceiling, they
5 cannot fine more than $200,000 for any one transgression at any
6 one time. I don't know if that's changed now or not. In fact,
7 I don't think so. I think it still stands. Somebody else may
8 know more than me.
9 Q You sat for a telephone deposition in this case this
10 past Sunday, did you not?
11 A Yes, sir.
12 Q And although, and it's impolite of me, I didn't
13 personally introduce you to Mr. Gross. This is Mr. Gross over
14 here. But then, he didn't get up and introduce himself either.
15 So we both failed that manners test for the record.
16 A Who's the gentleman, other gentleman sitting?
17 Q That's Mr. Russ Bastyr. He's a manager with
18 Commonwealth Edison.
19 A I just kind of like to know who I'm talking to. I'm
20 sorry.
21 Q That's fine. And the other young gentleman, the
22 other younger man, younger than me, that is, was the second
23 attorney, who just got up and left --
24 A Okay.
25 Q -- was the second attorney who was in the, and this
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1 is Mr. Shirani. Have you ever met Mr. Shirani?
2 A No, sir.
3 Q All right. That was one of the questions I had. My
4 taking care of the politic and admitting to my impoliteness,
5 this is Mr. Oscar Shirani. He's the complainer in this matter.
6 You were asked a series of questions during that
7 deposition, do you recall? Am I correct?
8 A Yes, sir.
9 Q And you've given Mister, for me, you last night read
10 a copy of your deposition transcript and then took possession
11 of the original earlier today and gave, completed the errata
12 sheet, is that correct?
13 A Yes, sir.
14 Q You also, during that deposition, told Mr. Gross that
15 if you, if something else came to your recollection or if you
16 remembered something, that you'd let him know. For the
17 purposes of disposing of any of that, in reading your
18 deposition transcript a couple of hours ago, did anything come
19 to your recall as to something you would add to a question that
20 was asked you by Mr. Gross?
21 A Mr. Gross, you asked me if I'd had any contact with
22 Mr. Kingsley since I left in '97. Mr. Kingsley and I met at
23 the airport Hilton in '98 for a deposition prior to going to a
24 hearing for the Department of Labor Judge, and I didn't
25 consider that a meeting. I'm sorry. Your words are different,
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1 but that was the only, then I put it on the sheet, everything
2 that I remember because I wanted to make sure that I didn't
3 leave out anything. And that, so that was all. And the other
4 things was some spelling of words.
5 Q Did the plant, I'm back on my portion there. I just
6 wanted to give Mr. Gross his due since you promised you would
7 do that.
8 MR. GROSS: Mr. McDermott, before you continue, do
9 you know about how much longer you have with this witness --
10 MR. McDERMOTT: Just five minutes and I'll be
11 finished here.
12 MR. GROSS: Okay.
13 BY MR. McDERMOTT:
14 Q When did Watts Bar come on line?
15 A They were given a license to load fuel in November of
16 1995. And they went critical, or they contaminated the plant,
17 unit 1, in January or first of February of 1996 and then they
18 went to 100 percent power of May of 1996. Unit 1. Unit 2 has
19 never started up and it is, in effect, has been set aside by
20 TVA to never start.
21 Q Seventy-two to ninety --
22 A Ninety-six.
23 Q -- six.
24 A People say '95, but really, we don't count until it
25 contaminates. They load fuel, you know. It's a matter of
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1 semantics.
2 Q Are you familiar with the term, power up rate?
3 A Yes, sir.
4 Q Where did you learn the term, power up rate?
5 A From Mr. Kingsley. That was one of the words that
6 came to TVA with him.
7 Q Do you know what Mr. Kingsley's definition of power
8 up rate was?
9 A Have I personally heard him say it? No. I just know
10 what was given to us as managers.
11 Q And what was given to you as managers?
12 A That that was to increase the power of, at a plant,
13 of production of electricity. Well, that's the way that it was
14 proposed.
15 Q Could a definition be it means you increase the
16 thermal output of the reactor and you increase the inductrical
17 output of the generator?
18 A Yes, sir. I'm not an engineer, so I don't keep up
19 with all of those things. I'm sorry. I just remember the
20 words. I just remember the verbiage.
21 Q Well, metaphysically, that's about as simple as it
22 could be said, is that correct?
23 A I would think so.
24 Q Thank you. A reactor can operate at capacity, am I
25 correct?
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1 MR. GROSS: I'm going to object as to questioning
2 this witness about technical issues on the reactor.
3 JUDGE LESNICK: Did she give any relevant answers
4 here to that?
5 MR. McDERMOTT: If you'd give me just a minute. I've
6 lost, for some reason, I've -- place that I discussed with --
7 JUDGE LESNICK: Can you hear her from where she is?
8 You can proceed. If you feel comfortable standing, that's all
9 right.
10 BY MR. McDERMOTT:
11 Q As a manager in a birthing power plant, as you said,
12 apparently it's almost an adult when it's born, did you become
13 familiar with certain kinds of nomenclature, the use of certain
14 kinds of words to explain when a plant is running and when a
15 plant isn't running? That a plant is down under certain
16 circumstances and it's up under other circumstances?
17 A You have to become familiar with the jargon with the
18 engineering terminology that's used around you or you just fall
19 flat on your face. You don't keep up. And you're exposed to
20 so much of it that it becomes part of your every day. I mean,
21 I talked about the valley. I mean it's that sort of thing. It
22 just becomes part of your every day language.
23 Q If I said, Dresden was on line 90 percent of the time
24 during a 10-day period, what would that mean?
25 A That means that it was in a position for it to make
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1 power --
2 Q For 90 percent of the time --
3 A -- nine out of the ten days. Not how much, but that
4 it was available. It could. They may be working on it.
5 There's lots of things there that --
6 Q So within the industry when they say that they're
7 working at 95 percent capacity, it means that of the plant or
8 plants, 95 percent of the time, however that time is measured,
9 the plant could do 2 megawatts or 200,000 megawatts?
10 A Well, not 200,000. We don't want to go there.
11 Q All right.
12 A But it could make from 1020 down to 10 percent of
13 what it's capable of. So that would mean a capacity, it had
14 the capacity and that capacity factor is just that it's
15 available to make power. It's not that it is making power,
16 that much --
17 Q It means the lights are on at the plant?
18 A Yes.
19 Q All right.
20 A They could be working on it or they could be, it
21 could shut down for refueling. It's not making anything.
22 Q I understand.
23 A So that's what comes in.
24 MR. McDERMOTT: I'm finished.
25 MR. GROSS: And I have no questions on cross
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1 examination.
2 JUDGE LESNICK: All right. You're excused now.
3 THE WITNESS: Thank you.
4 MR. GROSS: And Your Honor, for the record, to
5 preserve our right, we will move to strike this testimony as
6 irrelevant. I understand -- a motion at the outset.
7 JUDGE LESNICK: Okay, and I --
8 MR. GROSS: Just to preserve our right.
9 JUDGE LESNICK: And you've done so. Thank you.
10 MR. McDERMOTT: Can, this witness' testimony is over
11 with, he's made his characterization of the witness testimony -
12 - again now for the record. She'd like to stay and --
13 JUDGE LESNICK: She's welcome to stay, sure. She's
14 not going to testify again?
15 MR. McDERMOTT: No, sir.
16 JUDGE LESNICK: You may be seated. Sure. Off the
17 record.
18 (Off the record.)
19 (On the record.)
20 (Whereupon,
21 DAVID HELWIG
22 was called as a witness by and on behalf of the Complainant,
23 and after having been first duly sworn, was examined and
24 testified as follows:)
25 JUDGE LESNICK: You may question the witness.
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1 DIRECT EXAMINATION
2 BY MR. GROSS:
3 Q Could you please state your full name for the record
4 and spell your last name?
5 A Yes. David Raab Helwig, H-e-l-w-i-g.
6 Q Who is your current employer?
7 A InfraSource Corporation.
8 Q And what relation does InfraSource Corporation have
9 with Exelon Corporation?
10 A InfraSource is an independent company that is 95
11 percent, approximately 95 percent owned by Exelon Corporation.
12 Q When did you first come to Commonwealth Edison
13 Company?
14 A January of 1998.
15 Q From where?
16 A From General Electric Company.
17 Q And why did you decide to leave General Electric to
18 come to Commonwealth Edison Company?
19 A I was recruited to Commonwealth Edison Company by
20 Oliver Kingsley, who had just come as the Chief Nuclear
21 Officer.
22 Q Can you tell me when Mr. Kingsley first contacted you
23 to recruit you to come to Commonwealth Edison Company, to the
24 best of your recollection?
25 A Yeah. Mr. Kingsley first contacted me about
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1 Commonwealth Edison Company around Thanksgiving of 1997 at the
2 time when he first had accepted, had been recruited and
3 accepted the job to come to ComEd. As the General Manager of
4 GE's Nuclear, Global Nuclear Services Business, ComEd was a
5 customer. I had a professional relationship with Mr. Kingsley
6 of many years and he sought me out for insight on ComEd Nuclear
7 and input and advice and then, eventually, our discussions lead
8 to discussions of strategy and eventually an offer from
9 Mr. Kingsley to come implement that strategy.
10 Q Can you turn to Exhibit 26.
11 (Whereupon, the document referred
12 to as Respondent's Exhibit No. 26
13 was marked for identification.)
14 BY MR. GROSS:
15 Q Can you tell me what that is?
16 A It's an Exelon computer form. It's an internal
17 resume.
18 Q And it's an internal resume for yourself?
19 A Yes.
20 Q Who wrote the handwriting on this sheet that
21 identifies a position in August of '99, 1999 and has a
22 different university?
23 A I did.
24 Q With those changes, is the document, Exhibit 26, an
25 accurate characterization of your employment history with
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1 Commonwealth Edison Company and the successors?
2 A I believe so.
3 MR. GROSS: Move to admit Exhibit 26, Your Honor.
4 JUDGE LESNICK: Any objection?
5 MR. McDERMOTT: No objection, Your Honor.
6 JUDGE LESNICK: Accepted.
7 (Whereupon, the document referred
8 to as Respondent's Exhibit No. 26
9 was received into evidence.)
10 BY MR. GROSS:
11 Q You started with Commonwealth Edison Company in what
12 position?
13 A As a vice president, it's a little bit of complexity
14 on titles. I think when I first came, my title was a Vice
15 President of ComEd and Senior Vice President within the Nuclear
16 Generation Group.
17 Q And you reported to whom?
18 A Oliver Kingsley.
19 Q Can you describe what your duties generally were in
20 that position you started at?
21 A I was responsible for, essentially, all of the what
22 we called support and services, the corporate office functions
23 that support the operating nuclear plants.
24 Q How many employees directly reported to you in that
25 role?
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1 A It varied from time to time. I basically had the
2 same responsibilities through a number of organizational
3 changes and changes in title, but essentially the same span of
4 responsibilities. It would have varied from seven to ten at
5 different periods of time, different forms of the organization.
6 Q And
7 A Generally, vice presidents that reported directly to
8 me.
9 Q Generally vice presidents?
10 A Yes.
11 Q Can you tell me approximately how many employees you
12 were responsible for in the organization as a whole during the
13 time period you --
14 A On the order of 2,000.
15 Q And in 1998, was Mr. Shirani one of those employees?
16 A In 1998, I don't believe so.
17 Q What supervisory authority, if any, did you have over
18 Mr. Shirani when you started in January of 1998?
19 A None.
20 Q Are you aware of an organization within Commonwealth
21 Edison Company that was called Quality Assurance?
22 A Yes.
23 Q Who oversaw Quality Assurance when you began your
24 employment with Commonwealth Edison?
25 A When I began my employment, I believe Lon Waldinger
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1 was the gentleman's name that was in charge.
2 Q To whom did he report at the time?
3 A To Mr. Kingsley. He was a peer on Mr. Kingsley's
4 staff, peer of mine on Mr. Kingsley's staff.
5 Q During your entire tenure since January of 1998, did
6 the Quality Assurance organization ever report to you?
7 A No, it did not.
8 Q Did Mr. Waldinger ever report to you?
9 A No, he did not.
10 Q Could you please turn to Exhibit 10.
11 (Whereupon, the document referred
12 to as Respondent's Exhibit No. 10
13 was marked for identification.)
14 BY MR. GROSS:
15 Q Do you recognize that document?
16 A I do.
17 Q What does this particular memorandum, dated June 12th
18 of 1999 announce?
19 A An organizational change that realigned the reporting
20 relationship of the supplier-evaluation services group from the
21 Quality Assurance organizationer, as it was called at the time,
22 Nuclear Oversight to report through the supply, the Procurement
23 and Supply organization.
24 Q And what responsibilities did you have over the
25 Procurement and Supply organization in June of 1999?
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1 A The vice president of that function reported, was one
2 of my direct reports.
3 Q What was the effective date of the organizational
4 change you just described?
5 A It indicates, as indicated on the document, June,
6 1999.
7 Q When was Mr. Shirani first in your supervisory chain
8 in your organization?
9 A I believe it would have been at that time.
10 Q Who were the supervisors between yourself and
11 Mr. Shirani after this organizational change, at the outset?
12 A At the outset. There would have been Tom Joyce, who
13 was the vice president. There would have been a supervisor of
14 the Supplier Evaluation group. I'm not clear at this point if
15 that reported directly to Tom. I suppose it did. And I
16 believe a gentleman, Russ Bastyr, perhaps was in charge of it
17 at the time.
18 Q Okay.
19 A And then I believe Mr. Shirani worked within that
20 group.
21 MR. GROSS: I'd like to move Exhibit 10.
22 JUDGE LESNICK: Any objection?
23 MR. McDERMOTT: No objection.
24 JUDGE LESNICK: Received.
25 (Whereupon, the document referred
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1 to as Respondent's Exhibit No. 10
2 was received into evidence.)
3 BY MR. GROSS:
4 Q If you could turn the tab to Exhibit 11.
5 (Whereupon, the document referred
6 to as Respondent's Exhibit No. 11
7 was marked for identification.)
8 BY MR. GROSS:
9 Q And could you tell me if you recognize this
10 memorandum?
11 A Yes, I do.
12 Q Okay. Can you explain what change occurred that's
13 reflected in Exhibit 10 in January of 1999?
14 A It's transferring the budgetary financial, or
15 budgetary responsibility from the Quality Assurance or Nuclear
16 Oversight organization to the Manager of Nuclear Supply.
17 Q And did that then transfer the budgetary
18 responsibility that you've described to your organization?
19 A Yes, it did. Budgetary responsibility, it indicates
20 in the letter that this is an administrative change being made
21 pending the approval of a revision to the Quality Assurance
22 program to -- to sanction or accept that change.
23 Q The change meaning the move from Nuclear Oversight to
24 Supply?
25 A Yes.
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1 Q Prior to January of 1999, did you have any budgetary
2 responsibility over SES?
3 A No, I did not. In fact, this letter in January
4 indicates exclusively that the functional reporting structure
5 would remain as it was until revision of the QA topical report.
6 Q Okay. Referring you now to October, 2000, when
7 Exelon Corporation was formed. Since we haven't yet heard, who
8 merged to form Exelon Corporation?
9 A In the vernacular, ComEd and PECO.
10 Q But in the --
11 A There's dozens of corporate entities that ended up
12 getting merged and I would not get them precisely correct.
13 Q And at that merger time, you had a role in nuclear,
14 correct?
15 A Yes. At the time of the merger, I was Senior Vice
16 President of ComEd and Senior Vice President of Nuclear Support
17 and Services.
18 Q Until what point did you have responsibilities over
19 nuclear after the merger?
20 A What was the date of the merger?
21 Q October, 2000.
22 A October, 2000 until approximately Thanksgiving, 2000.
23 Q And at that point what position did you take?
24 A I changed responsibilities and I became Executive
25 Vice President of ComEd Operations.
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1 Q And --
2 A Which was transmission and distribution, wires and
3 substations.
4 Q And with the merger, ComEd no longer had any
5 responsibilities over nuclear?
6 A That's correct.
7 Q And do you know what company the nuclear operations
8 moved to with the merger?
9 A Exelon Generation.
10 Q After you moved to ComEd, around Thanksgiving of
11 2000, at any time after that, did you have any responsibility,
12 oversight or control over nuclear operations or the SES group?
13 A No.
14 Q After November of 2000, did you have any supervisory
15 responsibility, direct or indirect, over Mr. Shirani?
16 A No.
17 Q After November, 2000, did you have any say in any of
18 the decisions regarding who would be placed into any particular
19 position in nuclear?
20 A No.
21 Q After the merger, who owned the nuclear power plants?
22 What corporate entity?
23 A Again, in a vernacular, if I may, Exelon Generation.
24 Q And who held the licenses that the NRC provided?
25 A Exelon Generation.
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1 Q When did you leave Exelon to go to InfraSource?
2 A In March of this year, March of 2000.
3 Q Let's talk about the time period during which
4 Mr. Shirani was within your --
5 MR. McDERMOTT: Judge, this isn't a deposition. He
6 doesn't have to preface the question. I'm going to object to
7 the form of the question, let's talk about.
8 MR. GROSS: I'm just trying to --
9 MR. McDERMOTT: It's, you know, it's friendly, but
10 unnecessary.
11 JUDGE LESNICK: Unless it suggests an answer --
12 MR. GROSS: Okay.
13 BY MR. GROSS:
14 Q During the time period the SES group was within your
15 responsibility, did you have any role in Mr. Shirani's
16 performance evaluations?
17 A No direct role.
18 Q Did you have an indirect role?
19 A I was responsible for the assemblage of performance
20 evaluations of all the employees that worked for me.
21 Q And what specific input did you have in any of
22 Mr. Shirani's evaluations?
23 A None.
24 Q Did you ever direct or suggest to any of
25 Mr. Shirani's supervisors that they rate him or evaluate him in
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1 any particular way on a performance evaluation?
2 A No, I did not.
3 Q Prior to the merger in October of 2000, can you
4 explain to us generally what restaffing process occurred? In
5 nuclear?
6 A Yes. We spent the better part of the summer of 2000
7 designing an organization for the management of the now
8 combined, or to be combined nuclear fleet of both ComEd and
9 PECO, and including the management of some nuclear plants that
10 ComEd was part owner in, that were owned in an entity called
11 AmerGen. So it was a fleet of plants. We designed the
12 organization for the plants and the support and management
13 structure. We developed staffing numbers for them and
14 conducted a formal restaffing program, starting with the top of
15 the organization from, you know, once Mr. Kingsley chose the
16 executives at my level, then the executives at my level worked
17 as a team to select the vice presidents at the next level and
18 so on and so on. It was a cascading process to restaff the
19 organization.
20 Q What specific positions during that restaffing
21 process did you select individuals for?
22 A My direct reports.
23 Q The vice presidents?
24 A Yeah, the vice, there were a mixture of vice
25 presidents and general managers by title, but my direct
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1 reports. Basically vice presidents.
2 Q And what role did you have in the decision making as
3 to who would fill the positions that reported to the vice
4 presidents?
5 A I had oversight of them, not direct input. There
6 were peer teams, other executive peers at my level had input to
7 the selection of my staff, my direct reports. At the next
8 level, there were a similar peer process of peer involvement in
9 selection of personnel.
10 Q And below that level --
11 A Successively through the organization.
12 Q Did you have any role in any of the positions that
13 Mr. Shirani sought during that restaffing process in 2000?
14 A No, I did not.
15 Q Did you ever direct or ask anyone to not select
16 Mr. Shirani for any particular position during that entire
17 restaffing process?
18 A No.
19 Q Do you know Ruth Ann Gillis?
20 A I do.
21 Q Can you just tell me how you know her?
22 A As a peer on the ComEd Executive Management Team.
23 She was a Senior Vice President with -- responsibilities than
24 mine, so I would know her through, I guess at the time we
25 called Executive Team Meetings, peer meetings held with the
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1 president of the company and other business and social
2 interactions.
3 Q Did you ever have any discussion with her at any time
4 about Mr. Shirani?
5 A I did not.
6 Q Did you ever direct her, ask her or even suggest to
7 her that she try to get Mr. Shirani to leave nuclear?
8 A I did not.
9 Q Did you ever ask her or suggest to her or direct her
10 that she offer Mr. Shirani a position in her organization?
11 A No.
12 Q The -- day you began with ComEd in 1998 and time you
13 left nuclear in November of 2000, how frequently did you talk
14 to Mr. Shirani?
15 A Half a dozen times perhaps.
16 Q Do you recall the first conversation?
17 A I do.
18 Q Can you tell me what happened in that conversation?
19 A Sure. First conversation was soon after my arrival.
20 I'd had some professional interactions with Mr. Shirani before
21 that and went out of my way to talk with Mr. Shirani and let
22 him know that I did not harbor any feelings of ill will towards
23 him.
24 Q How did Mr. Shirani respond in that conversation?
25 A Seemingly favorable, favorably. Excuse me.
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1 Q After that first conversation, you indicated there
2 were a number of other conversations?
3 MR. McDERMOTT: Can we have a foundation, Judge? I'm
4 going to object as to foundation and ask that that last one be
5 stricken. You know, I don't know when any of this happened.
6 MR. GROSS: He already said it was shortly after he
7 arrived.
8 MR. McDERMOTT: Well, the first five minutes? The
9 first five days?
10 JUDGE LESNICK: Well, I think he did say, but, you
11 know, why don't you ask him?
12 BY MR. GROSS:
13 Q Do you have more specific recollection as to when,
14 relative to your arrival in January of 1998, that first
15 conversation occurred?
16 A Certainly within the first month. I have not gone
17 back and searched a calendar to look for an appointment, but
18 certainly within the first month.
19 Q And the subsequent conversations, can you tell me
20 what topics were discussed, generally?
21 A Yes. Mr. Shirani sought me out on a number of
22 occasions for discussions of career, advice, professional
23 advice and career advice.
24 Q What did he ask you?
25 A I had, although I was never directly responsible for
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1 Quality Assurance or Nuclear Oversight at ComEd, I did have
2 responsibilities for that function previously at PECO, within
3 their nuclear program and I had some considerable experience
4 with auditing and oversight functions. So we, on occasion,
5 talked about different techniques in the conduct of evaluations
6 of that nature, and techniques for conduct, not only conduct of
7 audits, but in presentation of findings.
8 Q How many times did Mr. Shirani solicit your advice on
9 seeking other positions within the company?
10 A I can think of two different occasions when we had
11 discussions such as that.
12 Q What did you advise him?
13 A In the, I believe it was the first instance,
14 Mr. Shirani was, I believe, seeking a position in the
15 engineering organization, which was part of one of the
16 functions that reported to me. And we talked about his
17 professional credentials and experience and he sought my
18 support for his consideration for that position. I didn't have
19 much cognizance of his technical experience at the time, so I
20 listened and indicated to him that I would have no objection to
21 his seeking that position or being considered for it.
22 Q Did you have any further involvement in his effort to
23 obtain that position?
24 A I did not, either with him or with any of the
25 management that would have been doing the selection.
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1 Q You mentioned there was a second time you had a
2 conversation with him about his efforts?
3 A On the second occasion, he indicated that he was
4 considering a position in Ruth Ann Gillis's organization,
5 within the, I'm not certain exactly what title it was at the
6 time, but basically the internal auditing function.
7 Q What did you tell him, if anything, in that
8 conversation?
9 A My conversation at that time, again, went to
10 credentials and experience. By that time, as I indicated, knew
11 Mr. Shirani's technical experience and credentials and I
12 questioned if he had experience and credentials in the
13 financial side, which is what I believe most of the internal
14 auditing responsibilities would be about. I don't remember
15 that he, my recollection is that he didn't have particularly
16 strong credentials or experience in that area, and I did
17 express some concerns or reservations to him that he should
18 consider that in his choice, if he were given that choice.
19 Q Did you encourage him to take that position at all?
20 A No. In fact, I think I cautioned him that it would
21 be moving to an area where he was not known and did not have
22 the same degree of professional credentials.
23 Q Was Lon Waldinger ever in your supervisory chain?
24 A No, he was not.
25 Q Do you know who Ed Netzel is?
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1 A Yes.
2 Q Did you have any involvement whatsoever in his
3 separation from Commonwealth Edison Company?
4 A No.
5 Q Do you know whether he retired, quit, was terminated?
6 A I do not.
7 Q Did you have any involvement in any decision
8 regarding Lon Waldinger's separation of employment from
9 Common --
10 A I did not.
11 Q Do you know who Paul Zurowski is?
12 A I don't think so.
13 Q Did you have any involvement in any decision
14 regarding his separation from employment with Commonwealth
15 Edison?
16 A No. I recognize the name. I wouldn't be able to
17 pick him out as an individual. Can't remember that I ever had
18 any direct experience with him --
19 Q Do you --
20 A -- of any sort.
21 Q Do you know who Kombiz Salehi is?
22 A Yes.
23 Q Do you recall whether you had any role whatsoever in
24 his separation from Commonwealth Edison Company?
25 A As you just asked me the question, I learned that he
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1 separated from the company.
2 Q You first learned that today?
3 A Yes.
4 Q So you had no involvement in the separation?
5 MR. McDERMOTT: Objection, Judge. Asked and
6 answered.
7 THE WITNESS: I did not have any involvement in the
8 separation.
9 JUDGE LESNICK: I'll allow it.
10 BY MR. GROSS:
11 Q After Mr. Shirani left nuclear in January of 2001,
12 did you ever have any conversation with him?
13 MR. McDERMOTT: Judge, counsel is now testifying.
14 Shouldn't he ask him if he knew when Mr. Shirani left nuclear?
15 I'm sure he knows.
16 JUDGE LESNICK: He did step a few, jump a few steps.
17 BY MR. GROSS:
18 Q Sure. Do you know approximately how long after your
19 conversation with Mr. Shirani about an opportunity in finance,
20 Mr. Shirani left nuclear?
21 A Within a matter of months.
22 Q And after he left, did you have any conversation with
23 him?
24 A Not that I recall.
25 Q Did you ever have any conversation with Ellen Dee
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1 Caya about Mr. Shirani?
2 A No, I did not.
3 Q Did you ever ask Ruth Ann Gillis, Ellen Dee Caya or
4 anyone else to not select Mr. Shirani for any position in
5 Exelon VSC?
6 A I did not.
7 JUDGE LESNICK: Off the record.
8 (Off the record.)
9 (On the record.)
10 JUDGE LESNICK: Any objection to the offer of Exhibit
11 11?
12 MR. McDERMOTT: Exhibit 11 is the January, 1999 where
13 is the money coming from or going to exhibit?
14 JUDGE LESNICK: -- supplier evaluation services
15 department --
16 MR. McDERMOTT: Yeah, department code, that the
17 finance of SES. I have no objection.
18 JUDGE LESNICK: All right. Exhibit 11 is accepted.
19 (Whereupon, the document referred
20 to as Respondent's Exhibit No. 11
21 was received into evidence.)
22 JUDGE LESNICK: Proceed.
23 BY MR. GROSS:
24 Q Did you have any role whatsoever in any decision to
25 terminate Mr. Shirani's employment with Exelon DSC?
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1 A Did not.
2 Q Did you ever ask, direct or even suggest to anyone
3 that Mr. Shirani be terminated from Exelon DSC?
4 A I did not. I only learned he had been separated or
5 left after the fact.
6 Q I'd like to talk now about the GE audit. Prior to
7 your arriving at Commonwealth Edison Company, you indicated you
8 had worked for General Electric Nuclear Energy?
9 A Yes. GENE, General Electric Nuclear Energy.
10 Q And when did you begin working for GENE?
11 A In the, late in 1996.
12 Q What position were you hired into at GENE?
13 A I was General Manager of GENE Global Nuclear
14 Services.
15 Q Did you remain in that position throughout your
16 tenure with GE?
17 A I did.
18 Q Can you just tell me generally what your
19 responsibilities were in that position?
20 A My responsibilities were to lead all of the GE
21 functions supporting nuclear power plant operations,
22 construction, modifications, except for fuel and new plant
23 construction. I had responsibilities for all of the technical
24 and business functions supporting the global fleet of GE
25 nuclear plants and others.
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1 Q During your tenure with GE, you were aware that key
2 customers, such as ComEd, audited GE?
3 A Yes. When I was responsible for the quality
4 assurance function at PECO previously, we audited General
5 Electric, as did all of the companies that GE provided services
6 to.
7 Q Can you tell me, during your tenure with GE, how
8 frequently customers audited GE?
9 A Two to three times a week. Generally an audit was a
10 multi-day process, two to five days. At the entrances to the
11 offices in San Jose, there was a sign, you know, welcoming the
12 customers that were there, business and auditing. And, you
13 know, every day, there were two or three names on the board.
14 Q How many times did any customer issue a Stop Work
15 Order on GE during your tenure there?
16 A Just once.
17 Q And which company was that?
18 A It was Commonwealth Edison as a result of the audit
19 that Mr. Shirani conducted.
20 Q Could you turn to Exhibit 27 please.
21 (Whereupon, the document referred
22 to as Respondent's Exhibit No. 27
23 was marked for identification.)
24 BY MR. GROSS:
25 Q Tell me if you recognize this document.
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1 A Yes, I do.
2 Q What is that?
3 A This is several pages from a PowerPoint presentation
4 that I made to a series of all-hands meetings, we called them
5 open forums. All-hands meetings were the global workforce of
6 GE Nuclear Services.
7 Q And you were the presenter of this presentation?
8 A I was. Actually, in January, 1997, this was
9 basically my first address to the entire organization. And as
10 you'll see as you flip through this and look at the agenda,
11 first order of business was to close the year 1996, provide the
12 organization feedback on its business performance during 1996
13 and communicate to the workforce my first impressions, having
14 been at GE now, at this point in time, just under a month.
15 Q If you could turn to the third page of Exhibit 27,
16 and tell me what presentation you made with respect to this
17 slide?
18 A Yeah. Throughout this message, my very first and
19 every other presentation that I gave, nominally, on a monthly
20 basis throughout the year I was there, there was a consistent
21 theme of the need for improvement in the quality of General
22 Electric's work. On page, on the third page that you have
23 excerpted here, among my four points, my four top points on
24 first impressions in the category 'Limiting', or 'Limitations
25 of the Organization', as I've circled here, are a variable
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1 quality, a serious problem that the, quite frankly, until I
2 arrived there, the organization had not faced up to and had
3 been denying. And third, a subset of that or related issue to
4 that is, I call it, 'Procedure/Process Discipline'. That's the
5 thoroughness and completeness of procedures and the discipline
6 to follow them.
7 Q If you could turn two pages later to the page that
8 starts, 'However'?
9 A Yeah, in between I say, you know, quality is
10 imperative to the organization for our business success, our
11 customer reputation and the professional requirements for our
12 work and then I say, and we all recognize that, been doing a
13 lot of work on it, however, we've got delivery problems, we
14 have a high cost of quality, which means our profitability was
15 not as it should have been because of rework and inefficiency,
16 that our customer perceptions of our work was becoming
17 increasingly negative, that the company had been slow to
18 acknowledge and correct those problems and that underlying
19 that, I thought were weaknesses in fundamentals.
20 Q What fundamentals were you referring to?
21 A Fundamentals in river, for example, completeness of
22 procedures, completeness of documentation, things like that.
23 Q If you could turn now to the tenth page, page that's
24 numbered 10 on the bottom left.
25 Tell me what time line you're setting there?
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1 A Yeah. This is our schedule. It's for a presentation
2 to, you know, a thousand people all over the world, so it's
3 kind of growth, top level and graphical, but it shows a build
4 from a first step in improving our procedures and a time line
5 for doing it. The first step block, it's a little hard to read
6 there, it builds going up. The first block is assessing the
7 situation, called assessment. The second is training, teaching
8 people what is required and the third is then, what's required
9 for the current procedures, and in the third step is then
10 improve those procedures.
11 Q Is the time line that's indicated on here starting in
12 January through June reflecting your expectations in 1997?
13 A That's correct. In fact the next page says 1997
14 challenges. This is all, this is January 1997. So this is the
15 plan for the year. Starting in January, through this open
16 forum, this was the program that we intended to follow in order
17 to improve.
18 MR. GROSS: I move to admit Exhibit 27.
19 JUDGE LESNICK: Any objection?
20 MR. McDERMOTT: I do object, Judge. I think it's
21 interesting, in order, as far as I know, General Electric
22 Nuclear Energy is now a Defendant, is a Respondent to this case
23 -- done by myself before being sworn -- the bar -- necessarily
24 -- impact on my skill -- as a lawyer. I don't know how any of
25 this is relevant.
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1 JUDGE LESNICK: Mr. Gross.
2 MR. GROSS: If, if Mr. Shirani's audit in 1997 is
3 relevant, then surely what Mr. Helwig had done relating to the
4 issues in that audit prior to that is relevant.
5 MR. McDERMOTT: Prior to that?
6 MR. GROSS: Yes, prior to the audit.
7 MR. McDERMOTT: Your Honor, my only observation is,
8 you know, it gets into Respondent's hands, it's obviously the
9 property of General Electric, unless Mr. Helwig forgot to be
10 asked and forgot to answer that, I keep these things as guide
11 lines for new jobs and what came out of my personal records.
12 It wasn't delivered to us until last week. And for the life of
13 me couldn't figure out what it meant and I don't believe
14 there's any kind of foundation that can be laid as to who he
15 talked to, who liked him, who didn't like him at General
16 Electric and what he set for their goals and objectives. We
17 know he's there for a year.
18 MR. GROSS: I can respond to a number of points that
19 he made there.
20 JUDGE LESNICK: Okay.
21 MR. GROSS: No document request was ever made that
22 relates to this, and this was produced pursuant to your --
23 memorandum requirements, so -- it was produced appropriately.
24 Mr. Helwig has already explained the issues of quality and how
25 they relate. I'm not sure why he needs to, could certainly go
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1 into more detail on that, and again, if Mr. Shirani was trying
2 to create this impression that Mr. Helwig somehow harbored some
3 -- relating to this audit in 1997, we're certainly entitled to
4 bring in evidence that shows that that did not happen.
5 JUDGE LESNICK: I'm going to allow the document.
6 Exhibit 27 will be admitted.
7 (Whereupon, the document referred
8 to as Respondent's Exhibit No. 27
9 was received into evidence.)
10 MR. McDERMOTT: Over the objection -- thank you,
11 Judge.
12 BY MR. GROSS:
13 Q If you could turn to Exhibit 28, Mr. Helwig.
14 A Yes.
15 (Whereupon, the document referred
16 to as Respondent's Exhibit No. 28
17 was marked for identification.)
18 BY MR. GROSS:
19 Q Can you tell me what meeting this was?
20 A The April version of the same sort of forum. A
21 management meeting where I'm addressing the organization,
22 reporting to them on issues, providing feedback to them on
23 operations.
24 Q If you could turn to the page that's entitled --
25 Expectations and -- It's under 2943 on the bottom right.
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1 A Yes.
2 Q Can you explain this? What you're saying in this
3 particular part of the presentation and how that relates to the
4 later audit by Commonwealth Edison Company?
5 A Oh, yes. At this point now in April, we'd felt we'd
6 completed the assessment and providing clear expectations,
7 about to enter the stage per my time line of training and down
8 the improvement path and providing here, directly from me to
9 all hands, all managers and all individual contributors what
10 the expectations are. That compliance with procedures and
11 process is not optional. They have to follow the procedures
12 and identify problems with them if they have them; express a
13 management commitment that we will fix and improve processes;
14 that we're going to focus our quality improvement, the term was
15 6 Sigma, efforts at that; and that we were not going to take on
16 any work or perform any work that we could not do with quality.
17 Q And did your presentation in this context relate your
18 concerns that procedure compliance, process compliance,
19 processes and quality were not up to your expectations.
20 MR. McDERMOTT: Objection, leading.
21 THE WITNESS: That's exactly the point. This is my
22 address to the workforce.
23 JUDGE LESNICK: It is leading, but I'll allow it.
24 MR. McDERMOTT: Thank you, Judge.
25 BY MR. GROSS:
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1 Q Next page refers to NUPIC/PECO audits.
2 A Yeah, it's a good, NUPIC is a, I'm going to forget
3 exactly what it stands for, it's been NUPIC for so long. It's
4 an association of utilities in the nuclear business that pool
5 their resources in order to perform audits.
6 Q Nuclear Users Procurement Issues Committee combined
7 54 nuclear utilities, page 46 --
8 A I've known it as NUPIC for quite a few years. There
9 had been, so these utilities all pooled their resource, put
10 together teams to conduct audits and then share the results of
11 those audits with each other to avoid duplication of effort and
12 improve the quality of the oversight that's conducted.
13 At this point in time, I was referring to a number of
14 audits that had performed under the, been performed under
15 auspices of NUPIC and by PECO. I wanted those utilities that
16 had conducted audits separately. They had recently been
17 conducted at that point in time. I indicate in my remarks here
18 that the reports and the debriefs on them had validated that
19 there were some signs of improvement, we're two months in or
20 three months into an improvement program at this point; that a
21 SCAQ, Significant Condition Adverse to Quality, that's like a
22 step below a stop work in severity, had been issued because of
23 prior history of incomplete corrective actions; that there were
24 continuing to be issues of procedure non-compliance; that the
25 line management wasn't yet accepting responsibility and being
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1 accountable for the quality of the work that was being done
2 under their supervision and that corrective actions had been
3 incomplete and untimely and self-assessments were weak. Self-
4 assessments being the self examination processes to critically
5 assess one's performance, identify problems and, presumably,
6 lead to self identified improvement efforts.
7 Q The next page has a management oversight chart. Can
8 you tell me generally what you were explaining with this chart
9 in that April presentation?
10 A Yes. As part of our assessment, we did a review of
11 all of the internal and external audits or assessments that had
12 been done of our performance. And what I'm attempting to do
13 here, we put those all together, identified causal factors and
14 then the categories, attributes, if you will, relating to, in
15 this case, management oversight. On the vertical axis, week
16 work scope definition, internal coordination problems, external
17 interface weaknesses, et cetera, et cetera. And then this is
18 really showing an excess of those causal factors that had been
19 derived from these different reports and these general themes,
20 if you will.
21 Q Do these causal factor letters and numbers have any
22 explanation in this document? Could you just --
23 A Yeah, the next page is a summary of what they are. I
24 don't know that the cross, the numbers, the causal factor 1(a),
25 1(b), et cetera came from the internal study of all of those
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1 assessments and the categorization of that, of those findings.
2 The 'X's just indicate the nexus between the particular causal
3 factors and the themes relating to management oversight that
4 are on the left.
5 Q Are the causal factors negatives or positives on GE's
6 performance?
7 A Negatives. They were causes, causal factors means
8 it's a cause of deficiency. There's, on the next page, there's
9 a summary in text form of the gist of the major themes of
10 causal factors, the root causes, corrective actions and what
11 measurement systems were going to be put in place to make sure
12 that they were effectively implemented.
13 Q Did the ComEd audit that Mr. Shirani performed later
14 that year find any of the same deficiencies reflected on this
15 management oversight --
16 A They did.
17 Q Can you identify some of those areas?
18 A Procedure compliance, certainly. I think the ComEd
19 audit focused on a particular, particularly narrow slice of the
20 overall functions or scopes of work that were performed and in
21 our analysis, found evidence there of, basically, all of these
22 problems that had manifest themselves in that narrow area.
23 MR. GROSS: Move to admit Exhibit 28.
24 JUDGE LESNICK: Any objection?
25 MR. McDERMOTT: Same objection.
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1 JUDGE LESNICK: I'll accept it.
2 (Whereupon, the document referred
3 to as Respondent's Exhibit No. 28
4 was received into evidence.)
5 BY MR. GROSS:
6 Q If you could turn to Exhibit 29, please.
7 A Yes.
8 (Whereupon, the document referred
9 to as Respondent's Exhibit No. 29
10 was marked for identification.)
11 BY MR. GROSS:
12 Q Tell me what this document is?
13 A These are presentation materials, again, used
14 internally in my remarks to the management team at General
15 Electric.
16 Q And this related how to the Stop Work Order that
17 Commonwealth Edison issued as a result of the issue that NUPIC
18 did -- Mr. Shirani?
19 A This is, this presentation is discussing the
20 specifics of the Stop Work Order; what issues came out of the
21 ComEd audit; how they related to our existing improvements; our
22 different improvement initiatives and then outlined specific
23 action steps that were to be followed in order to directly
24 address the ComEd audit.
25 Q Turning to the relationship to existing improvements
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1 page, which is number 2954.
2 A Yes.
3 Q Can you tell me how that chart reflects the
4 relationship to the ComEd Stop Work Order and the existing
5 improvements?
6 A Yes. This is similar in format to the previous
7 chart, showing a nexus between causal factors. In fact, the
8 generic issues down the left-hand side of the previous page,
9 happen to be the same ones across the top: procedure
10 compliance, work scope definition, internal coordination,
11 etcetera. On the right-hand side, in this case, were the
12 findings of this particular ComEd audit. So the attempt here
13 is to graphically show that the, as it says at the bottom in
14 the little box, most issues identified in this case from the
15 ComEd audit map, meaning there's a nexus to existing
16 improvement areas.
17 Q And then the page, excuse me, the text on that page,
18 New Area for Evaluation, if you could explain it?
19 A Yes.
20 Q You know what I'm referring to?
21 A Yes, I do. Technical audits here was an area that
22 had been identified as being weak in the ComEd audit, that we
23 had not previously identified and focused on. So it's distinct
24 in that there's no 'X' showing a nexus to existing improvement
25 initiatives. So it was highlighted as a new area for
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1 evaluation.
2 MR. GROSS: I move to admit Exhibit 29.
3 JUDGE LESNICK: Objection?
4 MR. McDERMOTT: It would be the same, but the witness
5 was testifying to 02954, am I correct?
6 MR. GROSS: He's testified regarding the whole
7 document, but he specifically answered questions on that page,
8 yes.
9 MR. McDERMOTT: That's what he was talking about
10 last, am I correct?
11 MR. GROSS: I'm sorry?
12 MR. McDERMOTT: That's what he talked about last, was
13 that what he was --
14 MR. GROSS: Yes.
15 MR. McDERMOTT: And his testimony, as I understand
16 it, I'm just trying to think if I heard it right, because there
17 was no 'X' anywhere on this technical audit's linear line, that
18 that meant --
19 MR. GROSS: I can paraphrase him or he can answer
20 himself.
21 THE WITNESS: I'll be happy to answer. It was
22 singularly the area of new findings.
23 MR. McDERMOTT: Okay.
24 MR. GROSS: Again, move to admit Exhibit 29.
25 MR. McDERMOTT: Same objection, Judge.
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1 JUDGE LESNICK: I'll accept into the record Exhibit
2 29.
3 (Whereupon, the document referred
4 to as Respondent's Exhibit No. 29
5 was received into evidence.)
6 BY MR. GROSS:
7 Q If you could turn now to the tab 39, which, for the
8 record is Complainant's Exhibit 5, and I'll refer to it as
9 such. The August 19, 1997 letter from ComEd to GE related to
10 the Stop Work Order. Do you see that document?
11 A I do.
12 (Whereupon, the document referred
13 to as Respondent's Exhibit No. 39
14 was marked for identification and
15 received into evidence.)
16 BY MR. GROSS:
17 Q Can you refer to the first bullet point down on that
18 first page?
19 A Yes.
20 Q Did GE comply with that portion of the Stop Work
21 Order?
22 A We did.
23 Q Second bullet. Did GE comply with that portion of
24 the Stop Work Order?
25 A We did.
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1 Q Did GE comply with the ComEd Stop Work Order bullet?
2 A Certainly. Yes.
3 Q Did the Stop Work Order affect GE in any way?
4 A Not in any material way. We continued with our
5 corrective action program. We communicated to our other
6 customers that, in fact, the Stop Work Order, had ComEd deemed
7 it necessary to impose a Stop Work Order on their work, none of
8 the other customers chose to follow suit. So we added some
9 additional administrative controls and steps, as requested by
10 ComEd, for their work that was in process.
11 Q If you could turn to Exhibit 30.
12 (Whereupon, the document referred
13 to as Respondent's Exhibit No. 30
14 was marked for identification.)
15 BY MR. GROSS:
16 Q Do you recognize that document?
17 A Yes, I do.
18 Q What did this document do?
19 A This is a letter from ComEd acknowledging the
20 corrective actions that had been taken, their effectiveness and
21 lifting the Stop Work Order in November of 1997.
22 MR. GROSS: I move to admit Exhibit 30.
23 MR. McDERMOTT: No objection, Judge.
24 The August 19, 1997 letter from ComEd to GE related
25 to the stop work order. Do you see that document?
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1 JUDGE LESNICK: Accepted.
2 (Whereupon, the document referred
3 to as Respondent's Exhibit No. 30
4 was received into evidence.)
5 BY MR. GROSS:
6 Q The audit that Mr. Shirani's team conducted of GE in
7 1997, was the audit, in terms of how it was conducted, in any
8 way unreasonable, from your perspective?
9 A Yes. I believe it was.
10 Q How?
11 A First of all, for the dozens and dozens of audits
12 conducted of General Electric during that year, this was the
13 singular occasion when my staff came to me with concerns about
14 the manner in which the audit was being conducted and the
15 demeanor of the discussions between them and the audit team.
16 Q Do you recall any specifics about what those concerns
17 were?
18 A Very specifically, the concern was that Mr. Shirani
19 was being very narrow in his thinking, did not show a
20 willingness to review our existing program of improvements and
21 self-identification of issues, that he was quite persistent,
22 perhaps belligerent about a very narrow view of the issues.
23 Q How many managers or other GE employees registered
24 these concerns with you during the audit?
25 A Five or six.
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1 Q Did you take any action when they raised these
2 concerns with you?
3 A I met with them behind the scenes to listen to their
4 concerns, coach them through how to handle the interactions in
5 a way that would not be antagonistic or defensive. So I
6 provided them with coaching on the interaction.
7 Q Anything else you recall you did during the week?
8 A Also, during, or at the conclusion, there's
9 traditionally an exit interview at the end of the audit. So
10 this is when the audit team is leaving, they've either
11 concluded and reached their findings or are almost there, the
12 only thing that's left is to write up the report. In the
13 entire year, I attended a total of three exit interviews, this
14 being one of them.
15 Q What did you observe at that exit interview?
16 A I observed first-hand the behaviors that my staff had
17 described to me. Mr. Shirani was very stilted, read a fixed
18 script, was not discussional, did not entertain discussion or
19 interaction, was very dogmatic in his approach and conviction
20 of the factual basis of his conclusions and adamantly not
21 willing to consider that they were most likely part of a
22 broader pattern of performance that had been previously
23 identified.
24 Q What did you say at that exit meeting, if you recall?
25 A I asked that they, I asked that they not conclude on
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1 the matter before they had reviewed our assessments and
2 findings and corrective action programs so that their findings
3 could be considered in the context of those.
4 Q Why did you consider that to be important, or even
5 part of Mr. Shirani's role?
6 A Sure. One of the most important things in the
7 nuclear power business is the ability of an organization to be
8 self correcting, to be effective in self-assessment, to find
9 its own problems and to take corrective actions. It's kind of
10 a principle of the profession that we strive for and very
11 important to one's reputation in the business and the
12 effectiveness of their operation that that culture and the
13 know-how to do that is in place.
14 So, generally, it is probably perhaps the most
15 important attribute that an auditing organization will look at
16 about a service provider much more important and much more
17 fundamental than any specific problem.
18 Q At any time during that exit meeting did you
19 challenge or disagree with the findings Mr. Shirani's audit
20 team had made?
21 A I did not. I accepted the findings as fact and
22 indicated that I was not surprised by them, that they would be
23 consistent with our own findings. Important to note, that
24 many, many of the materials that were audited were work product
25 that was performed before this problem was self-diagnosed and
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1 our corrective action program undertaken. So, yeah, my
2 characterization that I wasn't surprised at all, didn't even
3 have to look at the facts, would, you know, the evidence, would
4 accept them at face value as consistent with our own findings
5 and conclusions was natural.
6 Q Did that audit impact your position at GE in any way?
7 A I guess the straight forward answer to that would be
8 no. But more likely answer would be yes, that, in fact it
9 enhanced my reputation and, for finding problems, pointing out
10 their seriousness where they had not been recognized by the
11 organization before and having organized the company around
12 them.
13 Q Turning to the companies Holtec and U.S. Tool and
14 Die, do you have any knowledge as to any audits Mr. Shirani
15 performed of either of those companies during your tenure with
16 nuclear?
17 A Those two companies were manufacturers of a cask that
18 are used to store spent fuel assemblies outdoor, dry storage of
19 spent fuel assemblies. There was an industry-wide problem with
20 the quality of work being performed by the suppliers of those
21 cask in that time frame. ComEd and others, ComEd, NUPIC and
22 other companies had performed audits that identified
23 deficiencies, programmatic deficiencies. We were a part of the
24 problem identification. It was an industry-wide problem that
25 the NRC eventually took on and very closely managed performance
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1 improvements in each of those suppliers.
2 Q Did you have any role in the audits that Mr. Shirani
3 was involved in --
4 A No.
5 Q -- during his tenure at ComEd?
6 A I only became, I certainly knew that we were doing
7 those supplier evaluations. I only had knowledge, specific
8 knowledge that Mr. Shirani personally was involved in those
9 audits much after the fact when he pointed that out to me by
10 way of seeking credit and validation for doing some noteworthy
11 work. At the time of the audits, I had no knowledge of his
12 personal involvement in them.
13 MR. GROSS: I have no further questions.
14 JUDGE LESNICK: All right. Let's take a 10-minute
15 recess.
16 (Off the record.)
17 (On the record.)
18 JUDGE LESNICK: You may proceed with your cross
19 examination, Mr. McDermott.
20 MR. McDERMOTT: Thank you, Judge.
21 CROSS-EXAMINATION
22 BY MR. McDERMOTT:
23 Q Mr. Helwig, why did you leave PECO in '96 and go to
24 Common, I'm sorry, GENE?
25 A I was recruited by General Electric.
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1 Q So you were recruited away from PECO?
2 A That's correct.
3 Q All right. And I take it you received an increase in
4 salary for doing so, correct?
5 A I had to move to California. Yes, sir.
6 Q Well, the cost of living's so much easier in
7 California than it is in the Philadelphia area, is that right?
8 A Yeah, right.
9 Q Right. Early in your testimony you said, Oliver
10 Kingsley came to you for insight on Commonwealth Edison?
11 A That's correct.
12 Q How is it you had this insight with respect to
13 Commonwealth Edison?
14 A I had many business dealings with Commonwealth Edison
15 and Commonwealth Edison --
16 Q From PECO?
17 A From PECO, historically, but contemporaneously with
18 General Electric.
19 Q Well, when did Mr., when did Mr. Kingsley come to
20 you?
21 A Within a week of his acceptance of the job at
22 Commonwealth Edison, and before he arrived at the company.
23 Q I understand. Did he come to you for two purposes,
24 for your insight or for your presence? Or were they
25 synonymous?
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1 A I don't understand the distinction.
2 Q He's recruiting your mind and body for a job, right?
3 A No, sir. In the beginning our discussions were about
4 my insights with regard to Commonwealth Edison. Commonwealth
5 Edison happens, happened to have more General Electric nuclear
6 units than any other United States utility.
7 Q Any other state utility.
8 A There's only one other utility in the world that has
9 more General Electric boiling water reactors than Commonwealth
10 Edison. So it's quite natural that I would have had extensive
11 business interactions with Commonwealth Edison, since I was
12 leading General Electric's nuclear services business.
13 Q But less than nine months?
14 A That's correct.
15 Q I mean, how much interaction outside of the, this
16 particular audit, which had been --
17 A Extensive. They were my second largest customer in
18 the world.
19 Q How many times did you come to Illinois --
20 A Probably about monthly.
21 Q -- for the nine months that --
22 A That's correct.
23 Q -- nine months prior to Mr. Kingsley talking to you?
24 A That's correct.
25 Q And they were all open and giving of information to
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1 you as a vendor, you were able to glean this information from a
2 customer?
3 A We had extensive business interactions. They are my
4 second --
5 Q I'm not saying you didn't. But you only had nine
6 months worth, right, before this man begins to talk to you?
7 A That's correct.
8 Q All right. And the GENE audit, to be conducted as a
9 special audit, not a NUPIC, this was mandated by the NRC in
10 '96, correct?
11 A I don't know.
12 Q Didn't you get any information related to that
13 special audit while you were at GE in '96?
14 A I was with GE in '97.
15 Q Oh, I'm sorry, that's right. So you didn't even know
16 that this NRC mandated audit was in the works and that ComEd
17 had to do this --
18 A I --
19 Q -- prior to the audit itself?
20 A I learned while I was with General Electric that
21 ComEd, as a result of deficiencies in its programs, where they
22 had not maintained seemingly, or allegedly anyhow, had not
23 maintained adequate oversight of their vendors and suppliers.
24 Q Right.
25 A Was required by the NRC to conduct a program of such
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1 audits. I learned about that in the spring of that year, well
2 before the audit of General Electric because, on a number of
3 occasions, we had provided resources to, from General Electric
4 to support ComEd in the conduct of those audits of other
5 parties.
6 Q Conduct of audits of other parties?
7 A Yes, other --
8 Q And who would they have been?
9 A Other companies that supplied services to them. I
10 don't recall who?
11 Q And when would that have been?
12 A During the year.
13 Q Prior to your company being paid $5,000 because of
14 the requests to, for these documents?
15 A I don't know anything about $5,000.
16 Q All right. Is it possible your company was, asked
17 for and received an additional requisition, or I'm sorry, a
18 purchase order or a payment of $5,000 to gather together the
19 documents that Mr. Shirani had requested?
20 A I wouldn't have a clue.
21 Q Is that something that could have happened that you
22 would not have known about?
23 A I don't have any knowledge of that.
24 Q I'm sure --
25 A -- could have happened, if I don't know about it. I
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1 don't have any knowledge of that.
2 Q Was it routing that GENE would charge people to
3 reproduce documents, get those together for their two or three
4 audits that you were experiencing each and every week?
5 A Not to my knowledge.
6 Q Not to your knowledge?
7 A Nothing that ever came to my attention in that
8 regard.
9 Q So nobody ever asked for any money to, I'm sorry,
10 nobody in GENE asked for any money for time and trouble to
11 participate and meet audit requirements?
12 A No. I said that nobody ever consulted with or
13 informed me of that.
14 Q Well that was your responsibility to know this,
15 wasn't it?
16 A No.
17 Q Oh, I'm sorry. That's okay.
18 A A $5,000 billing or expenditure would have been well
19 below my threshold of attention.
20 Q You had no need to know?
21 A That's correct.
22 Q Did you ever read what's been marked as Complainant's
23 Exhibit Number 4, the about 195-page GENE audit, or have you
24 ever seen it?
25 A Except that what you've handed me is a collection of
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1 all sorts of different papers, not the audit. There's
2 correspondence,
3 Q -- what your lawyers gave us and said that was the
4 GENE audit.
5 MR. GROSS: That's a misrepresentation --
6 THE WITNESS: Here's the audit. The audit report is
7 contained herein. There's other materials here as well. I'm
8 familiar with it. I reviewed many of the materials in here, if
9 not each and every page.
10 BY MR. McDERMOTT:
11 Q The purpose of that question is did you review them
12 while you were on the GE clock or on the ComEd clock?
13 A I don't understand.
14 Q Were you employed at GE when you --
15 A Yes, I was an employee of General Electric.
16 Q And that is before Mr. Kingsley seeks your insight
17 into issues at Commonwealth Edison, correct?
18 A Yes.
19 Q Thank you. Now you said Mr. Shirani had a couple of
20 conversations with you, oh, I'm sorry, back to the audit. This
21 is August of 1997, in fact it's late August, the twenty-
22 something, right? Maybe the 20th of August?
23 A I don't recall.
24 Q Okay. Do you recall attending a exit meeting,
25 correct?
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1 A As I indicated earlier.
2 Q Do you recall ever hearing from any of the members of
3 your professional staff made available for this audit, did you
4 hear a report of entrance meeting problems?
5 A No.
6 Q So if Mr. Shirani testified that it took six hours of
7 constant communication back and forth between Downers Grove and
8 San Jose over the issue of GENE claiming proprietary
9 information because they didn't like the jib on, a couple of
10 jibs on some auditing members, that would come as a complete
11 surprise to you?
12 A Correct.
13 Q And yet, it is your testimony that certain members of
14 your group complained about Mr. Shirani's --
15 A That's correct.
16 Q -- demeanor?
17 A Demeanor.
18 Q Demeanor.
19 A Yes.
20 Q Anything more than demeanor?
21 A They characterized him as argumentative and narrow-
22 minded.
23 Q Have you ever met an IRS investigator?
24 A I've had many occasions. I've had entire staffs of
25 quality assurance auditors under my direct supervision in a
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1 prior job assignment.
2 Q That wasn't my question. What were you answering?
3 A I was answering as I thought was fit. I thought you
4 were drawing an analogy to behavioral traits of auditors or
5 investigators. I have experienced many --
6 Q I think --
7 A -- and they're responsible --
8 Q -- my question and ask the Court to remind you to
9 just answer the question that's asked.
10 JUDGE LESNICK: Well, I thought, Mr. McDermott, you
11 weren't asking, you were asking him to draw an analogy between
12 other auditors.
13 MR. McDERMOTT: Well, I think that might have been
14 three steps down the line. I don't mind him --
15 JUDGE LESNICK: But, if you want him to answer that
16 question --
17 THE WITNESS: Do I know any IRS auditors? I suppose
18 I've met one or two in my life. I've never had a personal
19 interaction of substance.
20 BY MR. GROSS:
21 Q Okay. Now, could there have been a problem on the
22 entrance meeting that you never heard about?
23 A Sure.
24 Q All right. How many people did you assign to attend
25 the entrance meeting, and were those the same people you
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1 assigned to attend the exit meeting, or did Mr. Nicholls have
2 all that responsibility himself?
3 A Mr. Nicholls was my director or manager, whatever it
4 was, of quality assurance at General Electric. He would have
5 made the arrangements for attendance at both meetings.
6 Q And since you had responsibility for quality
7 assurance at PECO --
8 A Yes.
9 Q -- which is now a part of Exelon, correct?
10 A Yes.
11 Q And is now, for the purposes of vendor assessment
12 under Mr. Bastyr's responsibility, correct, as manager of the
13 SES?
14 A I've actually lost track.
15 Q You've lost track. I see. Oh, that's right, you're
16 not with --
17 A Nuclear. No. Haven't been for several years.
18 Q Okay. With respect to the personnel, those people
19 would have been the choice of Mr. Nicholls? The people
20 attending the entrance meeting and the exit meeting?
21 A Typically, yes.
22 Q Would they be the same people?
23 A Not necessarily.
24 Q Would they, did these complaints that came to you,
25 did they come to you through Mr. Nicholls, or did somebody jump
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1 over Mr. Nicholls and come to Mr. Helwig?
2 A Mr. Nicholls was in a staff function. I heard
3 directly about issues from Mr. Nicholls and from a number of
4 the line managers.
5 Q In what order? Did you hear it from people who were
6 interacting with Mr. Shirani or did you hear it from
7 Mr. Nicholls who said these people had interacted with
8 Mr. Shirani and they found him to be whatever?
9 A I heard it from both.
10 Q So worker bees came directly to you?
11 A Not worker bees. Managers on my staff.
12 Q Oh, I see. People who reported directly to you?
13 A Yes.
14 Q Nobody other than somebody who had the authority and
15 responsibility to report directly to you complained about
16 Mr. Shirani's behavior?
17 A No. Mr. Nicholls did as well. Mr. Nicholls did not
18 report directly to me. Mr. Nicholls reported to me
19 functionally, but reported to the president of GE Nuclear
20 Energy. He was responsible for quality assurance in the fuels
21 and new plant construction agreements as well as services. So
22 Mr. Nicholls, in that respect, was a peer and not a direct
23 report.
24 Q -- SES became ultimately in --
25 A I don't understand the analogy to SES. It would have
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1 been the equivalent of Mr. Waldinger heading up the quality
2 assurance organization and being a peer of mine reporting to
3 Mr. Kingsley.
4 Q But that changed subsequently?
5 A No. Quality assurance, as we covered before, never
6 functionally reported to me.
7 Q I'm not talking about you. I'm not talking about you
8 particularly. It was finally changed so that quality assurance
9 reports through supply, am I correct?
10 A Only the supplier evaluation group section or branch,
11 whatever we called it. Throughout the industry, it's, there,
12 about half the time it's done one way, half the time it's done
13 the other way with reporting to, quality assurance reporting
14 through the supply organization.
15 Q Do you have anything to back, you said that in your
16 deposition. Do you have any statistics or can you point me to
17 anything that'll, I don't mean --
18 A At the time we had researched it and determined that
19 there were any number of organizations that had it so arranged.
20 Q Would you be surprised if I had told you that
21 independent research with the NRC has disclosed that only
22 Exelon and one other reactor in the 103 reactors in the United
23 States have the reporting pattern that you say is only half of?
24 A My recollection is that at the time there were
25 considerably more than that.
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1 Q There has never been any more than one until Exelon
2 made its change.
3 A I don't know that. My recollection is --
4 Q What research did you use, and I'm just --
5 A I had a rather large staff that did research,
6 actually not under my direction, that's what I was told as part
7 of the evaluation done by the quality assurance organization in
8 that time frame.
9 Q And who would have been during that work in the
10 quality assurance?
11 A Somebody working for Mr. Waldinger or his successors.
12 Q And his successors would have been?
13 A There's a series of individuals. I believe Mr. Perry
14 was responsible for nuclear oversight for some period of time.
15 Subsequently an individual, Jeff Benjamin was responsible for
16 quality assurance. And exactly the chronology of who was
17 responsible at what point in time, I don't recall, although the
18 evidence here that we've already looked at would indicate that
19 Mr. Perry was responsible at the time the responsibility was
20 transferred.
21 Q And it's your belief that somebody told you the
22 research existed, though you didn't do the research, did you
23 read anything? Somebody told you that about half the 103
24 reactors that live and breathe in the United States --
25 A To could be more precise, it was not uncommon, was
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1 the characterization.
2 Q Well, before the change, and it wasn't Exelon at the
3 time, am I correct?
4 A ComEd.
5 Q It was ComEd.
6 A That's correct.
7 Q We're talking about 12 worker reactors, right?
8 A At the time there were 10 operating reactors.
9 Q All right, 10 operating reactors. When you made the
10 change, there was only one out of 103, leaving 102.
11 A I don't have any factual basis to agree or disagree.
12 Q Okay. Thank you. It's just my research differs from
13 your research. You said that within the first month of your
14 arriving, you went out of your way to communicate with
15 Mr. Shirani, correct?
16 A That's correct.
17 Q What made you think you needed to do that?
18 A Just because of our past interaction.
19 Q Your past interaction? Just because you felt that
20 people had complained to you about his demeanor? Just because
21 you felt that you thought him stiff and didactic? Just because
22 you had bad or impure thoughts about him, but you didn't act
23 out, you were nothing but a gentleman, so you felt you had to
24 seek him out to apologize for how bad you had been behaving?
25 A Well, I am not going to, I mean we'd have to go
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1 through that list of adjectives to decide. I never said any of
2 those things. I certainly didn't say anything about impure
3 thoughts.
4 Q Oh, no. What I'm saying is --
5 A I don't appreciate the characterization.
6 Q -- you gave testimony about him being stiff, stilted,
7 adamant. Those are what you said you saw --
8 A The words that I --
9 Q -- at the exit meeting.
10 A The words that I say, I will stand behind as my own
11 experience.
12 Q That's right. But what made you, within a month,
13 after you had the observation of this individual while you were
14 being a gentleman, what made you seek him out?
15 A Because there was a potential that there could have
16 been feelings of ill will or misunderstanding.
17 Q Because you were a gentleman?
18 A I did. I disagreed with him. I had emphatically
19 disagreed with him over --
20 Q Oh, you had emphatically disagreed with him?
21 A That's correct, emphatically disagreed --
22 Q And had you raised your voice at all?
23 A I don't generally raise my voice.
24 Q Did you on this occasion?
25 A Not that I recall.
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1 Q Did you slam your hand on the table, perhaps?
2 A I don't know.
3 Q Did your behavior in any way force an epidemic of
4 silence on the part of every GENE person in the room?
5 A It was a formal meeting, nobody, the people weren't
6 talking, you know, over each other.
7 Q I'm sorry?
8 A It was a formal meeting. People would not talk over
9 each other. I'm not sure --
10 Q Did anybody seek your permission or Mr. Shirani's
11 permission to speak at the exit meeting? It was you and him,
12 right?
13 A I don't understand.
14 Q It was just you and Mr. Shirani speaking, correct?
15 A Oh, I don't believe so.
16 Q Did somebody else speak?
17 A I'm sure they did.
18 Q Do you recall who that was?
19 A I would expect that my recollection is that
20 Mr. Nicholls did, perhaps Jim Klapproth, who was the
21 engineering manager. There were some --
22 Q It is your recollection, you're sure they did?
23 A To my recollection. It's been a few years.
24 Q So there wasn't an epidemic of silence?
25 A It was not a, as I indicated before, the manner in
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1 which Mr. Shirani conducted the exit was not discussional in
2 nature and was not conducive to discussion. In fact, my
3 emphatic insistence was, as I indicated, not at all a
4 disagreement over the specifics of the findings, but a emphatic
5 request that it be considered more broadly in the context of
6 what we had already been doing.
7 Q Do you recall receiving procurement plans from GE,
8 I'm sorry, from Commonwealth Edison, pursuant to the audit's
9 Stop Work Order?
10 A I'm not sure what you're referring to.
11 Q Did you do no business with Commonwealth Edison?
12 A We did lots of business with Commonwealth Edison.
13 Q Let me finish my question. Did you do no business
14 with Commonwealth Edison between the 29th of August and the
15 19th of November?
16 A No, that's not correct at all.
17 Q You continued to do business?
18 A We continued to do extensive work for Commonwealth
19 Edison.
20 Q And the Stop Work Order had no business impact on
21 you, correct?
22 A That's correct.
23 Q Thank you. Aside from your seeking Oscar out to make
24 sure that there was no ill will between him for being didactic
25 and stiff and you being, you're admitting now maybe a little
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1 direct?
2 A I have said consistently that I was insistent.
3 Q Insistent, all right. You had a conversation with
4 him by telephone or in person another time?
5 A I estimated half a dozen times in person.
6 Q Half a dozen times in person. Appointments?
7 A Some.
8 Q He made appointments with you?
9 A Some.
10 Q You made appointments with him?
11 A I don't recall.
12 Q You don't recall? Anything refresh your
13 recollection?
14 A A review of my calendars for the period would be able
15 to establish where there were appointments, but in the mix, I'm
16 certain there were casual interactions, you know, unplanned,
17 unscheduled as well.
18 Q You said Oscar approached you, Mr. Shirani approached
19 you and sought your advice about a job he was offered, is that
20 correct?
21 MR. GROSS: Objection. Mischaracterization of his
22 testimony.
23 BY MR. McDERMOTT:
24 Q I'm sorry. You were asked if you knew who Ruth Ann
25 Gillis was?
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1 A Yes.
2 Q And --
3 MR. GROSS: By me.
4 MR. McDERMOTT: On direct examination.
5 MR. GROSS: I'd like it clear.
6 BY MR. McDERMOTT:
7 Q And on direct examination you said Mr. Shirani
8 approached you and asked you or had a conversation with you
9 about that particular offer being made to him by Ms. Gillis, is
10 that correct?
11 A No. I did not say that. I said he approached me to
12 discuss his potential pursuit of a position in the, what I
13 believe was called, the internal audit function.
14 Q His potential pursuit?
15 A Yeah. He was considering pursuing a job, I don't
16 have, I don't recall that he had an offer of a job. He was
17 seeking a job at the point we were discussing it. I wouldn't
18 recall. I mean, I don't know if he had an offer or if he was
19 considering applying for or was being considered for.
20 Somewhere in his pursuit and consideration of that job we had a
21 discussion.
22 Q And do you recall when that was?
23 A Somewhere in his consideration or pursuit of that
24 position.
25 Q Well, there is no evidence before the Court about his
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1 pursuit of that --
2 A I don't know the specifics of his --
3 Q Well if you had a conversation with him --
4 A That's correct.
5 Q Do you know where it was?
6 A It was in my office --
7 Q Where was your office at that time? That'll help us.
8 A It was in Downers Grove.
9 Q Okay, and in which building?
10 A The building where my office always was in Downers
11 Grove.
12 Q Okay.
13 A I don't remember the name of it right now.
14 Q And you don't remember the number. That's okay.
15 That's all right.
16 A Whatever the address of -- headquarters was, outside
17 of Mr. Kingsley's office, in that building, in the northeast
18 corner.
19 Q All right. And do you remember the time of year?
20 A Not especially, no.
21 Q And could it have been 1999?
22 A It would have been while I was in nuclear. I would
23 have been --
24 Q And your time in nuclear is when?
25 A We went over that. My time in nuclear was from
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1 January of 1998 through, as it's on the record, nominally
2 through November of 2000. However, there was a 90-day period
3 from July of '99, running for 90 days when I was assigned as
4 a --
5 Q To transmission.
6 A -- doing the crisis management after the blackouts in
7 downtown.
8 Q All right.
9 A In transmission distribution. So, even in that
10 period, there was a three-month time when I was not active and
11 did not have responsibilities in nuclear.
12 Q So if he saw you, it was some time before July of the
13 year 2000 and, about this issue I'm saying --
14 A That's correct.
15 Q -- right, in this, his pursuit, not a job offer, his
16 pursuit of a job?
17 A Yes.
18 Q So it would have been some time before July of the
19 year 2000, but certainly not before you came in January of
20 1998?
21 MR. GROSS: I'll object as to the mischaracterization
22 of his testimony. He just told you he was in nuclear until
23 November of 2000.
24 MR. McDERMOTT: No, except for --
25 THE WITNESS: Except for a 90-day period --
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1 MR. GROSS: In '99.
2 BY MR. McDERMOTT:
3 Q In '99 or in 2000?
4 A In '99.
5 Q Oh, I'm sorry. I thought it was, you said 2000.
6 A No, it was August, the day of infamy, August 12th or
7 13, 1999 the Loop was blacked out.
8 Q Part of it.
9 A Yeah, well --
10 Q Not our part.
11 A -- this part of it was.
12 Q But you can't tell me when it was you had this
13 conversation?
14 A No, I can't.
15 Q But you know it was in your office?
16 A I do.
17 Q And you know how long the conversation took?
18 A It was fairly brief, you know, on the order of 15
19 minutes or something.
20 Q I asked you in your deposition if you knew what, if
21 you knew that Oscar had the same degree level, Master's and
22 Bachelor's degree that you had and you said you didn't know
23 that.
24 A Right.
25 Q If you didn't know it three weeks ago, how could you
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1 have known anything about him to give him counsel about this
2 kind of thing in the year 2000?
3 A I ask him. I asked the question, the provocative
4 question that says, well, geez, Oscar, you've told me about
5 your professional credentials and experience in the engineering
6 side and the technical arena. This is really different. This
7 is likely to be real different. Do you have the credentials
8 there. I would have no way of knowing either unless he told me
9 about them.
10 Q And isn't it true, you were asked in a deposition
11 about three-and-a-half weeks ago, Mr. Helwig, do you know that
12 Mr. Shirani has exactly the same Master's Degree you have and
13 you --
14 A I still do not know that. I only know that you have
15 told me that. I have no factual knowledge of that.
16 Q I didn't tell you he did. I just asked you the
17 question and you answered it that --
18 A That I didn't know.
19 Q -- you didn't know.
20 A I still don't know.
21 Q You still don't know, but you felt competent enough
22 to give him this testimony, I'm sorry, give him this advice in
23 your office in response to a meeting he asked you to attend,
24 I'm sorry, he asked to attend with you about his career choices
25 because you and he were close?
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1 MR. GROSS: I'll object as to the mischaracterization
2 of his testimony.
3 JUDGE LESNICK: -- the answer should clarify.
4 THE WITNESS: He asked for the appointment. He told
5 me of his consideration of a job outside of nuclear and asked
6 me what I thought.
7 BY MR. McDERMOTT:
8 Q Were you told what the job was?
9 A He said it was in auditing.
10 Q And did he tell you with what company?
11 A With Exelon. Quite simply, he asked, told me he was
12 considering it, we discussed it to, we probably now discussed
13 it longer than the conversation took.
14 Q But he said it was in --
15 A Internal auditing.
16 Q In Exelon?
17 A Yes.
18 Q And if it were proven more probable than not that
19 that offer couldn't have occurred, couldn't have been made and
20 had never been discussed prior to December the 7th, the year
21 2000, could you have had the meeting with him while you were
22 still in nuclear?
23 MR. GROSS: Objection. Calls for speculation and
24 mischaracterizes the testimony about an offer.
25 JUDGE LESNICK: Can you answer the question?
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1 THE WITNESS: Well, I'd have to go back over number
2 one, I have no recollection and don't believe I knew at the
3 time, and still don't, whether there was an offer that had been
4 proffered or not at the time.
5 BY MR. GROSS:
6 Q I understand that.
7 A It was in pursuit of a job. I have no recollection
8 as to the specific time frame. My recollection is that it took
9 place in my office in nuclear.
10 Q And your recollection it had to do with internal
11 audit in --
12 A That's correct. In Exelon.
13 Q -- in Exelon. That's your recollection?
14 A That's correct.
15 Q And I'm only asking you that if it were proven
16 reasonably that that job existence was not made known to
17 Mr. Shirani until December the 7th, the year 2000, could you
18 have had that meeting?
19 A I, see, I don't even know that --
20 Q That's not my question.
21 MR. GROSS: Objection. Calls for speculation.
22 THE WITNESS: I wouldn't know because I don't even
23 know that there was a specific job that was offered, posted or
24 otherwise, or whether he was just expressing an interest in
25 seeking such a job. It was hypothetical. It was not about a
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1 specific job offer, to my recollection, nor was it about a
2 specific posting, to my recollection. It was about a change of
3 career, if you will.
4 JUDGE LESNICK: Mr. Helwig, if you will -- take this
5 as a hypothetical question from Mr. McDermott. Whether it's
6 true or not, given the facts that he gave you, could you have
7 had that meeting?
8 MR. McDERMOTT: I think he answered --
9 THE WITNESS: Sure.
10 MR. McDERMOTT: -- no, and then -- the rest.
11 THE WITNESS: No, no. My answer -- hard to follow
12 the question here. We could have discussed a change of career
13 to a job outside of nuclear, a different type of auditing
14 function at any point in time. So I wouldn't know how to
15 develop a logical construct around that.
16 BY MR. McDERMOTT:
17 Q But, that's not your testimony. Your testimony is
18 very specifically that he was going to either pursue, you know,
19 at first I thought you heard, I heard he had had a job, there
20 was a job offer. Then you clarify that to me he was going to
21 pursue a job.
22 A Consider, pursue, whatever.
23 Q Right. Consider, pursue. But you haven't, am I
24 correct, changed your testimony with respect to that being a
25 position in internal audit in Exelon?
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1 A That's correct.
2 Q All right. And the hypothetical the Judge is trying
3 to help me with on this one is, hypothetically, if I can prove
4 that that was a string of words position in Exelon internal
5 audit that couldn't have been known to Mr. Shirani until
6 December the 7th, could you have had your meeting on that
7 subject --
8 A December the 7th of?
9 Q 2000.
10 A Sure. Could have had the meeting.
11 Q You were still in your office in December?
12 A Well, I would have been, chronologically, in the
13 process of moving to transmission distribution at that point in
14 time.
15 Q Transmission and Distribution was what, in Oakbrook
16 Center?
17 A Well, at the time it was in Willowbrook.
18 Q I'm sorry, in Willowbrook.
19 A Yeah, that would have been right at the transition
20 time. If Thanksgiving is kind of close to December,
21 Thanksgiving weekend, we can check the transcript of when I
22 heard that, of when I actually transferred over, but that would
23 have been right at the time of transition. My movement back
24 to, so to speak T & D was developed and agreed upon the week
25 after Thanksgiving, and then completed subsequently. So it
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1 would have been right at the -- it could have been -- it was
2 right at the transition time.
3 Q I'm going to have to, I'd have to look at that.
4 A That would be plausible.
5 Q I would like to look at that. It's your Exhibit
6 Number --
7 MR. GROSS: Twenty-six or twenty-one.
8 MR. McDERMOTT: Is it 10 or is it 26?
9 MR. GROSS: Are you talking about the resume?
10 MR. McDERMOTT: The electronic resume.
11 MR. GROSS: Twenty-six.
12 THE WITNESS: So if you do the timing, November 20th
13 I went to energy delivery November 20, 2000.
14 BY MR. McDERMOTT:
15 Q And this is a payroll code, am I correct?
16 A This is the official record of what would have been
17 payroll transfer, sure.
18 Q That's what I mean, if this is payroll, you could --
19 A Sure, I would have been in transition both before
20 and, perhaps before and definitely after that. You know,
21 transitioning my --
22 Q Assuming another hypothetical, that this offer for
23 that, those storage words that included internal audit was made
24 on December 7th, you could have been in your office, and yet,
25 strike that.
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1 MR. McDERMOTT: I have no other questions.
2 MR. GROSS: Can I have a second, Your Honor?
3 JUDGE LESNICK: Yes.
4 MR. GROSS: I have no further questions, either, Your
5 Honor.
6 JUDGE LESNICK: All right, you may step down,
7 Mr. Helwig. Thank you.
8 Mr. Shirani, back up.
9 MR. McDERMOTT: Could we have a two-minute break?
10 JUDGE LESNICK: Sure.
11 (Off the record.)
12 (On the record.)
13 MR. McDERMOTT: Thank you, Judge.
14 Mr. Shirani, even though you're my client, let me
15 just acknowledge --
16 JUDGE LESNICK: Let me just -- you were previously
17 sworn and you're still under oath.
18 (Whereupon,
19 OSCAR B. SHIRANI
20 was recalled as a witness by and on behalf of the Complainant,
21 and after having been previously sworn, was examined and
22 testified as follows:)
23 DIRECT EXAMINATION
24 BY MR. McDERMOTT:
25 Q I do apologize for the interruptions, but that
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1 assists both sides in accommodating people who have other
2 things to do.
3 I believe we left off with how long it took and how
4 many pages the first portion of this GENE August audit was, and
5 I'd like to just clarify, something gets published within a few
6 weeks and it's not a complete document, but it is out and
7 circulating, correct?
8 A Yes, sir.
9 Q All right. What, if anything, happened immediately
10 upon the release of the news of this audit?
11 A There was a complaint from Mr. Bob Nicholls to
12 Commonwealth Edison through the lawyers which came to me from
13 Ed Netzel that this audit has been hurting GE's reputation,
14 created chaos in the industry, that sort of stuff that, and
15 ComEd has, you know, have discussed these issues. We were, my
16 boss, Edward Netzel instructed me that if utilities call you,
17 you cannot discuss the details of the finding, just read from
18 the titles.
19 Q All right, when you say, read from the titles, read
20 from the titles of the findings?
21 A The title of the findings, which was massaged.
22 Q Did you receive telephone calls?
23 A Yes.
24 Q Do you recall how many?
25 A Roughly about 26 utilities lead auditors called me.
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1 Q And they knew of your participation?
2 A They knew it from the NUPIC News that it was put out
3 by Mr. Edward Netzel.
4 Q And did GENE make some changes?
5 A They did not send me any responses up until September
6 or October of 1997 and before that come up was since they
7 complain about the NUPIC and all the other utilities are
8 nervous, they all want to come the same time, everybody in the
9 industry is worried about and everybody want to know what
10 happened to their calculations. ComEd decided to send a NUPIC
11 representative to the NUPIC to discuss these issues with GE.
12 Q And who did they send?
13 A They did send a NUPIC representative. I'm not sure
14 if it was Russ Bastyr or Paul Zurowski, but one of them went.
15 I ask I should be going there because I was the lead auditor
16 and I was not allowed to go.
17 Q Did you see any documents come in from GENE in
18 compliance with any of the recommendations in the audit report?
19 A They just came up with a bunch of vague statements,
20 promises, you know, things that even if work is all accurate,
21 because their quality assurance program has been suspended, I
22 need to verify, Criteria 16 of 10 C.F.R. tells me that the
23 deficiencies shall be promptly corrected, the cause and the
24 corrective action taken to prevent recurrence and follow-up
25 should be performed to verify the adequacy.
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1 So, even if they put the face value, the best
2 solution, I cannot trust it because their program is suspect.
3 Q You heard Mr. Helwig testify that it didn't, the Stop
4 Work Order did not interrupt the business between ComEd and
5 GENE?
6 A Yes.
7 Q Is that your experience of what happened during this
8 period of time?
9 A Yes.
10 Q And did you try to do anything within your
11 organization to strengthen the Stop Work Order?
12 A Yes.
13 Q What did you do?
14 A I discussed with Mr. Edward Netzel on the day, on the
15 week before they wanted to remove the Stop Work and I told him
16 that I'm going to be on a vacation and I'm not going to come
17 back until Monday. If they requesting for you to go lift the
18 Stop Work, I cannot lift the Stop Work without seeing something
19 and verify. So, once I came Monday, they said last Friday they
20 told us 6 o'clock to be Chicago-O'Hare, go to San Jose and
21 Edward Netzel, Kombiz Salehi, Jack Bunner, three of them, they
22 were going on behalf of Commonwealth Edison, trying to talk to
23 Mr. Helwig. And Mr. Kombiz Salehi and Edward Netzel had spent
24 hours talking to him and he says business has as usual. Your
25 company is the one wanting the Stop Work. We're doing business
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1 as usual.
2 Q And that's what you heard him testify to here today?
3 A Right.
4 Q All right.
5 A It's a violation of the code.
6 Q There's no question.
7 A Sorry.
8 Q The Stop Work Order was finally lifted, correct?
9 A Yes. And I --
10 Q Do you remember when that occurred?
11 A Yes.
12 Q When did that occur?
13 A November 19, 1997 and I objected to it.
14 Q You mentioned the name Kombiz Salehi. He's a witness
15 for testimony tomorrow, is that correct?
16 A Yes, sir.
17 Q I ask you to look at our Exhibit No. 8.
18 (Whereupon, the document referred
19 to as Complainant's Exhibit No. 8
20 was marked for identification.)
21 BY MR. McDERMOTT:
22 Q You just look at it.
23 A Yes.
24 Q Just tell the Court what that is?
25 A This is a status of the GE Stop Work Order from
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1 Kombiz Salehi, Engineering Assurance Supervisor and Ed Netzel,
2 Supplier Evaluation Services Director to Distribution list and
3 it's distributed to almost all the B-level -- sites and
4 impacted managers. And it has the checklist that I was talking
5 about.
6 Q I understand. That's the checklist that you thought
7 should accompany the procurement orders, is that correct?
8 A Yes. The checklist which is per NC standard
9 requirement, yes.
10 Q And this was, this document was circulated within
11 Commonwealth Edison, is that correct?
12 A Yes, sir.
13 Q And what's the purpose of a letter from Mr. Netzel
14 and Supply Evaluation Services as Director and Mr. Salehi as
15 Engineering Assurance Supervisor? Why are they both writing to
16 everybody on the inside?
17 A Mr. Kombiz Salehi came from the left side of the
18 equation, as I explained this morning, before --
19 Q Right.
20 A -- and Ed Netzel from the right side of the equation.
21 Q So this is a wedding of the left and the right side?
22 A Yeah. To reinforce the implication and the serious
23 of the Stop Work Order and should not be any procurement
24 activity with GE. If any product or services or any
25 calculations done by GE should be umbrellaed and their approved
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1 quality assurance program which, at that time was only
2 Commonwealth Edison. GE quality assurance program was
3 suspended under a Stop Work Order.
4 Q All right.
5 A So any work under that is a suspect for the public
6 safety.
7 Q Please take a look at Exhibit No. 9.
8 A Yes.
9 (Whereupon, the document referred
10 to as Complainant's Exhibit No. 9
11 was marked for identification.)
12 BY MR. McDERMOTT:
13 Q What is Exhibit Number 9?
14 A That's lifting of the Stop Work Order on GE.
15 Q And it bears the date, what was the date on that?
16 A November 19, 1997.
17 Q And the communication within Commonwealth Edison, as
18 you put it in language, from the right side and the left side
19 was dated what day, if you recall?
20 A November 19, 1997.
21 Q No, no, no. The prior exhibit.
22 A Stop Work Order?
23 Q No. The Salehi-Netzel -- want to take a look?
24 A Yeah. October 24, 1997.
25 Q So less than three weeks later, after these people
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1 take their trip, come back and communicate, the Stop Work Order
2 is lifted?
3 A Yes.
4 Q Why did they bother to lift it if nobody was paying
5 any attention to it?
6 MR. GROSS: I'll object as to the mischaracterization
7 of the evidence and the request to read someone else's mind.
8 BY MR. McDERMOTT:
9 Q Did Mr. Netzel tell you why it was lifted?
10 A They were saying that it was to the best interest of
11 Commonwealth Edison and GE because Commonwealth Edison does not
12 have expertise to do the analysis like GE does, because they're
13 very complex. They don't have the resources and then also, GE,
14 we heard it that they are very adamant about their proprietary
15 information and going to outside contractors. So ComEd have
16 two choices, either bring the calculation and do it in-house,
17 which they don't have the capability, or transfer it to
18 outside, like Sargent and Lundy or others who are competitors
19 to GE, and GE would not allow it. So the best way is to
20 violate it to make sure production continues.
21 Q Directing your attention to the very next year, did
22 anything else of, anything else unusual occur towards the end
23 of 1999?
24 A You mean 1997?
25 Q I'm sorry, the end of 1997.
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1 A 1997. We were hearing rumors that we were going to
2 move from, the Supplier Evaluation Services group is going to
3 move away from the quality assurance and go to the left side of
4 the equation.
5 Q When did you start hearing those rumors?
6 A Around January time frame of 1998.
7 Q Early '98?
8 A Yes. And did not happen until June, July time frame
9 of 1998, roughly around that time frame, that we moved to a
10 facility called CTEAM.
11 Q All right. Prior to this July time frame as you call
12 it, where was SES located?
13 A SES, at that time, was located still as 1400 Office
14 Place --
15 Q Second floor?
16 A -- no, Suite 300 --
17 Q Suite 300.
18 A -- Third Floor, Downers Grove, Illinois 60515.
19 Q All right. And then, at that time, in early 1998,
20 how many auditors or professional staff members were there in
21 Supply Evaluation Services?
22 A I believe that we were around 10 or 12.
23 Q Between 10 and 12?
24 A Yes.
25 Q And you moved to a place called CTEAM?
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1 A CTEAM.
2 Q CTEAM?
3 A Yeah. THE name is deceiving. Is the name of the
4 facility that it looks like it's a good name from a good
5 productive group. It's not. It's the CTEAM facility is, is a
6 big huge facility that ComEd receives the raw material, inspect
7 it and store it and then ship it to the nuclear sites.
8 Q Is it a central storage kind of thing?
9 A Central store, yeah, inventory, yeah.
10 Q It has trucks coming in and out?
11 A Yes. In and out.
12 Q It's a little more muscle kind than OPUS Place,
13 right?
14 A It's a production side.
15 Q It's a little more blue-collar, right?
16 A Right.
17 Q And when, I take it somebody had planned this move,
18 is that correct?
19 A Yes.
20 Q Who planned it, if you know?
21 A I believe that Mr. Netzel was just giving us the
22 message that we are going, that's what he heard, and I believe
23 that other team members heard it from either Mr. Bastyr or some
24 other people.
25 Q Who claimed the move? I'm talking about the physical
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1 move.
2 A Oh, physical move?
3 Q Yeah.
4 A That time, Ed Netzel was the director and Russ Bastyr
5 was the supervisor that I believe that's how they, who told
6 them, I don't know. But they told us we're going.
7 Q Right. You don't know who told them to move, but
8 they were the people who planned the move, as much as you know?
9 A I mean I could suspect, but I don't --
10 Q When you say the 10 or 12, does that count Mr. Bastyr
11 and Mr. Netzel at the time?
12 A Yes.
13 Q And Mr., who is it else you keep talking about?
14 A Mr. Paul Zurowski?
15 Q Yes.
16 A He left and his job was given to Mr. Bastyr.
17 Q All right. How long did the supply, the SES occupy
18 the CTEAM quarters?
19 A I would say till seven, eight months. Nine.
20 Q Seven or eight months?
21 A Seven to eight, nine months. Something like that.
22 Q Were you welcomed by anybody when you went over
23 there?
24 A Yes.
25 Q Who?
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1 A Ms. Myra Burgess. She was the Supply Vice
2 President/Director. One of the two. But she is on the left
3 side of the equation.
4 Q And when you say she welcomed you, how did she do
5 that?
6 A We had a meeting on the second floor, actually they
7 had the regular monthly meeting on the second floor of the
8 CTEAM, so they gather from, you know, all the other suppliers,
9 the procurement, the people who deal with the suppliers to get
10 the best cost, best procurement process, buyers and all that
11 stuff. So we were welcomed, because the SES world is kind of
12 deceiving itself. Supplier Evaluation Services, when she hear
13 that name, you don't even think that it should be part of QA.
14 That's why they name it so confusing that nobody could know
15 that is this really is a QA function or is it a supply
16 function.
17 But I want to go on the record to say that the
18 Supplier Evaluation Services, as its function, is involved with
19 the Nuclear Quality Assurance program of the subcontractors and
20 the vendors of architect engineering services, NSSS services,
21 manufacturing, suppliers of all these that provide a safety-
22 related 10 C.F.R. 50 Appendix B program and important to
23 safety, 10 C.F.R. 71 and 72.
24 MR. GROSS: I'll object only to the portion where he
25 says that he used the word supplier to deceive, without a
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1 foundation.
2 THE WITNESS: The name, it's --
3 MR. GROSS: That was pure speculation.
4 JUDGE LESNICK: I'll let it stand, but your
5 objection's on the record.
6 BY MR. McDERMOTT:
7 Q I was going to wonder how he did that.
8 You think the naming of SES was intentional?
9 A I would say the SES name, as I mentioned before --
10 Q It was intentional, correct?
11 A To the best of my knowledge --
12 Q It existed before you got there?
13 A Right.
14 Q And it exists now, after you're gone, right?
15 A Yes.
16 Q All right. Were you and other members of your
17 organization, after you moved to CTEAM, given responsibilities
18 other than quality assurance responsibilities?
19 A Yeah.
20 Q What were these responsibilities?
21 A We were helping Tom Joyce organization with some
22 inventory items, go to the sites, try to make friends with the
23 suppliers and try to help their stations to see how they can
24 get rid of the backlog, scrap the items, things like that which
25 has nothing to do with the QA, and I thought it was just
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1 wasting our time and effort to be doing something non-QA.
2 Q Who gave you these assignments?
3 A Through Mr. Bastyr from Mr. Tom Joyce.
4 Q Where did Tom Joyce come from? I thought you said,
5 when did he come on the scene?
6 A Once Ms. Myra Burgess left, I believe it was either
7 short time went to Mr. Alan Hahn, but I never saw Alan Hahn
8 over there, but immediately, like the fall of 1998, it then --
9 Q The fall of when?
10 A 1998.
11 Q All right.
12 A Mr. Tom Joyce also had second meeting, another
13 meeting that we went on the second floor of the CTEAM and he
14 again reiterated that the Supplier Evaluation Services is part
15 of our group and they are part of the family, so now we were
16 part of the supply organization, SES is one part, procurement
17 is the other part, buyers and all the other supply part of the
18 supply organization.
19 Q And it's at this time that mister, you believe it's
20 Mr. Joyce, but you know it's Mr. Bastyr, was sending you out
21 to, when you say sites, you're talking about the actual reactor
22 sites, correct?
23 A Yeah.
24 Q The plants, right?
25 A Nuclear plants.
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1 Q And you're doing inventory?
2 A Inventory.
3 Q How many days would it take you to do an inventory?
4 A I probably went about five times minimum that I can
5 recall. And each time was taking three to four days to go and
6 interview people and then come back and generate the report
7 that Mr. Tom Joyce can put his graph for his managers about the
8 production and how things coming --
9 Q You saw these graphs?
10 A We create it because of those interviews we did.
11 Q Did they reduce your workload in any way? Your other
12 workload?
13 A No.
14 Q So your workload that you testified to earlier in the
15 morning remains the same?
16 A Remains the same.
17 Q Seventy suppliers, approximately?
18 A Approximately 70.
19 Q -- the big ones like GENE?
20 A Yes. I have them, the biggest one and the most
21 important in terms of services and the items manufactured
22 because of my design background.
23 Q All right. You're also doing audits externally?
24 A Yes.
25 Q Supplier audits --
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1 A Supplier, yes.
2 Q In the year 1999, do you recall any of the important
3 audits, or 1998, do you recall any of the important audits you
4 did? 1998.
5 A Yeah, I mean if I am responsible for 70 suppliers
6 every other years, the audits of the NUPIC comes and your
7 internal audits --
8 Q Do you recall what they are?
9 A I, I, I --
10 Q Do you know? If you're tired, I'll ask you this
11 tomorrow, but --
12 A I mean I have to see my calendar. I --
13 Q Is your recollection, is it exhausted? You can't
14 recall?
15 A Nineteen --
16 Q Ninety-eight. The year --
17 A Oh, okay. 1998. I was, yes, I remember one of the
18 very important. It was the NUPIC audit of GE that there was
19 supposed to be done on September 28th through October, the
20 first week of October. I remember that. And Tom Dey, the lead
21 auditor from PECO, called me and said, Oscar, we cannot vaguely
22 know about your issues of 1997, so what we're going to do is,
23 we're going to give you a team of like, a huge team of
24 technical specialists to look at the design section, because
25 you guys did a good job with the five, six people, you guys get
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1 a lot of good results, and I think NUPIC was very weak in the
2 design. So what we're going to do, we're going to assign you
3 to the design and I'm going to get you seven or eight technical
4 specialists and you will lead that section of the audit. I
5 said fine. That's very good.
6 So once I go to the audit, the night before they have
7 big, huge meetings and 27 auditors there, and only three
8 technical specialists. I was surprised. Because, you know, GE
9 does engineering, why do they need 24 auditors and only three
10 technical specialists.
11 Q But you participated in it --
12 A I did participate in it.
13 Q And your participation was narrowed?
14 A They changed my scope.
15 Q All right. Any other audits during 1998?
16 A Can I add one more thing to that audit?
17 Q No. Any other audits in 1998?
18 A I could have done Sargent and Lundy, yes.
19 Q All right. What was the Sargent and Lundy audit?
20 A Sargent and Lundy NUPIC audit was because, and I
21 think Mr. Bastyr was familiar with that audit, Northern State
22 Power, NSP, went and was the lead auditor of Sargent and Lundy
23 in 1997. Once the audit came and I was not part of the audit,
24 it was, came to me to do the third-party review. And then once
25 I reviewed that, I found out that the technical specialist did
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1 a very good job in documenting all the code violation and all
2 that stuff, but the lead auditor and their management didn't
3 understand what it meant, so they cut and pasted and put in the
4 audit. As soon as I review it, I showed it to Mr. Edward
5 Netzel. I said these are six code violations.
6 Q This is '98?
7 A This is 1998.
8 Q And Mr. Netzel is still there? So this is early '98?
9 A Yes.
10 Q Okay.
11 A So then once the, we gave all the input to
12 Mr. Netzel. Mr. Netzel wrote a letter to NSP and the NUPIC and
13 said we found six major findings in the design that you guys
14 mixed. So I think Mr. Bastyr went there and he, I remember he
15 came and told me that it was a heated discussion, Northern
16 State Power and Mr. Phillip, the lead auditor, I don't remember
17 his last name, that he, they were very upset about ComEd. They
18 thought that we are trying to embarrass them. But he said this
19 is not personal issue. Once it gets to the code issue, we
20 cannot be flexible, be nice and friendly. You have to address
21 the code issues.
22 Q What other audits did you do in 1998?
23 A So NUPIC decided that I should lead an audit of
24 Sargent and Lundy two years on the row, because Sargent and
25 Lundy first was on the problem --
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1 Q Two years in a row, is that what you said?
2 A 1998, 1999 and I believe 2000 I also went as part of
3 another NUPIC audit to help them as a technical specialist. So
4 three years on the row we went to Sargent and Lundy. In
5 addition to those, I also, the Quad Cities nuclear station had
6 some problem with the Sargent and Lundy calculations and they
7 called me and they said why don't you investigate that. And I
8 did another separate audit of the Sargent and Lundy, but to a
9 point over repeated request from Exelon, Respondent, we did not
10 receive the NUPIC audit of Sargent and Lundy, which was 1998,
11 because it was discovering a lot of design information that
12 they'd missed and we caught it. That was another audit that I
13 can recall, Sargent and Lundy.
14 Q Did the GENE audit require or trigger another audit
15 of internal operations at Commonwealth Edison?
16 A Yes. Yes. I think once we came up with the Stop
17 Work against GE, because I, before I would say that I have to
18 get something from the code, the code says that if you are
19 doing an audit of the supplier, you have to make sure that you
20 focus on the importance items that you are doing. So once we
21 found out that ComEd rely on the suppliers QA program and found
22 out that the QA program, they have accepted QA program, ComEd
23 doesn't have to do any excess. We came back with a message to
24 ComEd that we found a lot of problems with Sargent and Lundy,
25 Bechtel, Stone & Webster, GE, so based on criteria on 7 --
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1 failed, because you don't have any processes to catch that.
2 Q Well, did you, what is, exactly did you do?
3 A So what I did, I came and gave a level one finding as
4 the quality assurance program significant, quality assurance
5 program breakdown to all ComEd engineering and all nuclear
6 sites as a result of that. Because we couldn't just blame GE.
7 We're ultimately responsible.
8 Q And when did that finding --
9 A That was immediately after we came and they lift the
10 Stop Work in 1997, I start writing that in January 1998.
11 Q So that is also an audit from 1998?
12 A It was not an audit, it was a result of all the
13 audits that we did. You don't have to go to audit to write
14 findings. If you find out that a problematic breakdown exists,
15 you don't say let me go to the audit to give you findings.
16 Q So you're not calling that an audit?
17 A No.
18 Q You're issuing findings based upon GE, I'm sorry,
19 Commonwealth Edison's responsibility?
20 A Because one of those findings that we gave on --
21 Q I understand.
22 A -- GE was directed to Commonwealth Edison that they
23 had sent unapproved design input to Westinghouse, to GE.
24 Q Was there any reaction to your findings --
25 A Mr. Hoffman, direct report to Mr. Helwig, was saying,
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1 he wrote on the cover letter of my car B-U-L-L-S-H-I-T. I
2 would not want to say it. I just spell it for you. So I took
3 that message to Larry Spears.
4 Q And who is he?
5 A Larry Spears was one of the QA managers, that I
6 believe was kind of transitioned in to take Ed Netzel's
7 position, and prior to showing that, I convinced him and he
8 agreed with that level one finding. I believe I also discussed
9 that with Mr. Bastyr and he accepted that -- 7 is violated
10 because it says -- 7 says control of -- component and services.
11 Services means -- So he agreed and Larry Spears agreed.
12 So I took it there and then they call a meeting. Two
13 days later, I believe, around February time frame, early
14 February time frame, I enter a room on the fourth floor of that
15 1400 Office Place on the fourth floor, room number 470. I
16 entered the room and I see wow, about 20 to 25, all the chief
17 engineers, all the managers from engineering, they all are
18 sitting there, is all the people that I was referring to,
19 because I was an engineer.
20 Q And what was the purpose of the meeting?
21 A That I wanted them to challenge or they wanted to
22 challenge the finding.
23 Q -- to do that?
24 A Yeah.
25 Q And what occurred? Not what was said, what was the
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1 result?
2 A The result is I prevailed. I told them about the
3 codes and -- violated the codes and they accepted it.
4 Q Was Mr. Salehi present?
5 A Yes.
6 Q Did Mr. Salehi say anything that was of significance?
7 A Mr. Salehi actually convinced them that I was right
8 because he was --
9 Q How?
10 A -- he was the ex-NRC. So once all the managers were
11 kind of trying to, you know, putting more labor on me and
12 looking at the actual code violations, they were just, it was
13 easier to say no, you are just an engineer, want to put all the
14 i's and the t's crossed and dotting all the i's. You know, and
15 -- an accusation. And I said, I just go with the code. They
16 says, the code, and you have not, so then they said to
17 Mr. Kombiz Salehi they said, as a NRC agent, would you buy his
18 argument. And Mr. Salehi and all the -- in that room was from
19 the left side of the equation, I was the only one from the
20 right side of the equation. And I was used to it. I knew
21 people. I like you, but you have to defend what you believe is
22 the code.
23 Q Right. So you prevailed in that?
24 A Yeah.
25 Q Anything else of significance learned by you in 1998
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1 with respect to your role in SES?
2 A Yes. I believe that we were told that we have to
3 rewrite our application and my job was, my particular job for
4 me that it was Quality Assurance Administrator changed to
5 Senior Lead Auditor. I think I described that before. But it
6 was the same level, no increase, there was no promotion or
7 nothing. The same.
8 Q But the Quality Assurance words were removed?
9 A Right.
10 Q Did the title become more specific or more generic as
11 far as you're concerned?
12 A I would say is more alluding that you're part of the
13 supply.
14 Q Pardon me?
15 A Part of the supply.
16 Q You think it carries a connotation, is that it?
17 A No. Because I knew, people knew there is a rumor out
18 there that we are moving to the left side of the equation very
19 soon and we did. So I think that was the pretext to make sure
20 that the paperwork is in place, that it will not be strange,
21 that the quality assurance administrator -- the supply manager.
22 Q Did you rewrite your job description?
23 A We were told to. We have to rewrite and we just did
24 it like a new application just to maintain the position with a
25 new title.
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1 Q And did it go down on a Management Opportunity Form,
2 if you know?
3 A Yeah. I believe that announcement number was 97-12-
4 25.
5 Q I'll ask you to look at what's marked, what we have
6 marked as Exhibit Number 32.
7 (Whereupon, the document referred
8 to as Complainant's Exhibit No.
9 32 was marked for
10 identification.)
11 A Yes. This is the announcement 97-12-25. This is
12 called Management Career Opportunity Applications, Management
13 Opportunity Information, Position Title is a Senior Lead
14 Auditor, Downers Grove.
15 Q And, did you, in fact, complete that?
16 A Yes.
17 Q And at whose request did you complete that?
18 A My supervisor, which was I think Mr. Bastyr.
19 Q And is, at the bottom, is Dr. Sandra Gold, Downers
20 Grove listed?
21 A Yes.
22 Q There's Russ Bastyr listed as -- is that correct?
23 A Yeah.
24 Q He isn't even listed as quality, I'm sorry, supplier
25 evaluation services, is he?
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1 A No, he's a CTEAM.
2 Q You didn't put that part in, did you?
3 A No.
4 Q You gave him the body of this information, correct?
5 CTEAM existed in '97, correct?
6 A Yes, sir, it did.
7 Q And there were rumors in that -- in December of 1997
8 that you'd be moving?
9 A Around December to January time frame.
10 Q Does this document possibly indicate that Mr. Bastyr
11 already made this move in his head?
12 A I think at --
13 MR. GROSS: I'll object on the -- levels. Calls for
14 speculation. Calls for reading his mind. Are you withdrawing
15 the question?
16 MR. McDERMOTT: I'll withdraw the question at this
17 time.
18 JUDGE LESNICK: Mr. McDermott, will you offer
19 Exhibits 8, 9 and 32?
20 MR. McDERMOTT: I'm sorry, Judge?
21 JUDGE LESNICK: Exhibits 8, 9 and 32 have been
22 discussed but not offered.
23 MR. McDERMOTT: I'd like to move for 8 & 9, yes,
24 Judge.
25 JUDGE LESNICK: Any objections?
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1 MR. McDERMOTT: And 32.
2 MR. GROSS: Eight --
3 MR. McDERMOTT: Eight, nine and 32. The October
4 24th --
5 JUDGE LESNICK: Eight is the Salehi and Netzel --
6 MR. McDERMOTT: Right. Salehi.
7 MR. GROSS: No objection to 8.
8 JUDGE LESNICK: And 9, the Stop Work Order.
9 MR. GROSS: That's already been admitted, Your Honor,
10 as Respondent's Exhibit.
11 JUDGE LESNICK: Okay.
12 MR. GROSS: But we can do it again. Fine.
13 JUDGE LESNICK: Are they identical? Any differences
14 at all?
15 MR. McDERMOTT: Yes, they are.
16 JUDGE LESNICK: All right, then we'll leave it out.
17 MR. McDERMOTT: All right. Whenever you need to
18 write something, it's always easier if I know what mine is --
19 JUDGE LESNICK: We could do it. Actually, it's six
20 of one and half-a-dozen of the other. All right, so 9 is in.
21 MR. McDERMOTT: All right. And 32?
22 MR. GROSS: No objection.
23 JUDGE LESNICK: All right. Admitted. Eight, nine
24 and 32.
25 (Whereupon, the documents
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1 referred to as Complainant
2 Exhibits Nos. 8, 9 and 32 were
3 received into evidence.)
4 JUDGE LESNICK: And again, for the record, 9 is
5 identical to which exhibit?
6 MR. GROSS: Respondent's Exhibit 30.
7 JUDGE LESNICK: You keep calling them Respondent's
8 and I call them employer's. Why don't we just remark
9 everything as Respondent's. I see you have marked them as
10 Respondent's, the rest of them, so we'll call them
11 Respondent's.
12 MR. McDERMOTT: I have now just misplaced my notes,
13 Judge. If you give me a minute. It's just I feel I'm getting
14 tired, aside from the fact I am. Here they are. Thank you.
15 JUDGE LESNICK: We are going to push to 6:00 p.m., if
16 that's --
17 MR. McDERMOTT: Is that what you're going to do?
18 JUDGE LESNICK: I did check with the guards. They
19 said we could actually stay till 9:00, but I think 6:00 will do
20 it.
21 MR. McDERMOTT: It'll sure do me. It puts me in a --
22 train, too.
23 BY MR. McDERMOTT:
24 Q In addition to being assigned duties other than
25 quality assurance, like inventory control and writing reports
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1 on inventory for Mr. Joyce, were you assigned to any other
2 agencies?
3 A Yeah. Engineering also, they were requesting that we
4 have shortness of construction engineers and then we need you
5 to walk down some of these piping at the Mark 1 piping at the
6 Quad cities. So I think --
7 Q What's a walk-down, Mr. Shirani?
8 A Walk-down means that you go to the scene, take the
9 drawing, match it with what's installed and if it's not
10 installed, you propose the engineering solution.
11 Q The drawing of what?
12 A That the ASME drawing of the plant component systems
13 and such.
14 Q So it could be anything in the plant?
15 A Yeah. Anything. Any items, components, structures.
16 Q All right.
17 A Scaffolds, gradings, different floors, different
18 support structures.
19 Q Is this the kind of job you get in your car and drive
20 there in one day and come back?
21 A I think I believe one night I had to stay over night,
22 but you could just go and come back and the next day, go.
23 Q And you would be going from Glen Ellyn to Byron?
24 A To Byron, Braidwood, Quad cities, Dresden.
25 Q And would you write a report for engineering?
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1 A Yeah.
2 Q Did that take time out of your day?
3 A Of course.
4 Q In SES?
5 A Yeah.
6 Q Did you ask to do, were you asked to do anything else
7 outside of prior, outside of SES prior to 1997 in December?
8 A Yeah. I think, you know, I was also teaching,
9 because I created a design audit course and I also advertised
10 it to the stations. I gave that training to SES people first.
11 Then once Tom Joyce found out, some of his staff was also
12 trained. And then from different stations they were sending
13 this and then also the DSQG, the Dry Cask Storage Quality
14 group, as part of the NUPIC, they also requested for my company
15 to go to State of Maine to give that training, and I gave that
16 to like 26 utility members and they recommended it to the
17 NUPIC. And Mr. Bastyr received that request from Mr. Gill,
18 that they said they highly recommend that training for all the
19 NUPIC members. So I try to help the industry, share my
20 knowledge, learn and share knowledge.
21 Q And this is happening in 1998?
22 A 1998, 1999 time frame.
23 Q All right. And what was the staffing level in 1998
24 in SES?
25 A It went down to, included Mr. Bastyr, to four.
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1 Q You, Mr. Bastyr and two others?
2 A Yes.
3 Q What became of the other eight people?
4 A They were reduced.
5 Q I'm sorry?
6 A The reduction in force.
7 Q They were RIF'd?
8 A I would say.
9 Q Did anybody retire?
10 A No, I think it was involuntary separation.
11 Q Who were those people?
12 A I think one of them was Mr. Bill Betourne, he was a
13 procurement manager. He was a part of the SES before. He was
14 let go. Mr. Sam Bakhtiari, Mr. John Kellerhalls. I think
15 Patti Weiger either left before that, Steve, I mean I guess
16 Mike Salva must have just left a few months before that.
17 Q Some were voluntary, I take it?
18 A I would say Mike Salva is the only one that I think
19 he left on his own. But the other ones, they were involuntary
20 separation.
21 Q When the staff was reduced from 12 to 4, was your
22 responsibility, I mean you're doing these other things as well
23 now, you're teaching school for engineers, correct?
24 A Right.
25 Q You're training them.
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1 A Right.
2 Q You're going and doing site inventories at reactor
3 sites. You're also doing walk-throughs for engineering.
4 A Walk-downs.
5 Q Oh, I'm sorry, walk-downs. Did they correspondingly
6 reduce your number of vendors that you had to supervise?
7 A Actually the other way around. It would increase
8 because you have less people doing more work. But I have to
9 add that the suppliers, they went down from 900 to around
10 roughly 360 to 400. So it was a big reduction in the suppliers
11 and also a major reduction in the work force. So I, me and
12 Mr. Bastyr and two other gentlemen, Roger Spoul, I believe, and
13 Stan Mitchell had to do maintain all this 360 to 400 suppliers,
14 including Mr. Bastyr himself, who was the supervisor --
15 Q So there were three of you doing this?
16 A Three plus Mr. Bastyr.
17 Q Three plus Mr. Bastyr?
18 A Yes.
19 Q And are you still handling the GENE's and the Sargent
20 and Lundy and --
21 A Have to maintain, yes.
22 Q -- Holtec's --
23 A Holtec, U.S. Tool and Die. 1999 I was loaded with
24 another --
25 Q I'm just talking about the 1998 time frame at this
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1 point.
2 A Oh, 1998, U.S. Tool and Die. Holtec was not in the
3 picture, in my view. It was supervised by five people, Mr. Ed
4 Martin, Mr. Paul Zurowski, Jim McIntyre and two other
5 contractors. It was managed by five people full time dry cask.
6 Q What changed with respect from them between 1998 and
7 1999?
8 A I think I remember Mr. Bastyr was very happy to make
9 a good business case to Mr. Tom Joyce that if we transfer that
10 job to Oscar, we don't need those five guys. So with the 20
11 percent his work, he could do the work of all those five
12 people. And he transferred that job on top of the other 70
13 vendors to me, and I said I would never refuse anything which
14 is challenge, and I think he says well this gives you
15 leadership ability that you wanted to have some day.
16 Q All right, so this is September of 1999,
17 approximately?
18 A -- yeah.
19 Q And it is, the dry cask storage project, not audit?
20 A No. That's the, the dry cask storage project
21 oversight.
22 Q Oversight.
23 A It means you're doing the oversight or the quality
24 assurance function on the right side of the eyes of the dry
25 cask. Because they have all the left side at the Dresden and
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1 corporate, you're the only one on the right side of the
2 equation.
3 Q What exactly did you have to do in the spirit of this
4 oversight?
5 A I have to frequently travel to Holtec and U.S. Tool
6 and Die --
7 Q Where's Holtec located?
8 A That's New Jersey. Martin, New Jersey.
9 Q All right. And where is U.S. Tool and Die located?
10 A That's Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania.
11 Q All right. Anything else?
12 A I have to, you know, because they have law problems,
13 I have to repeatedly go there and I also have to supervise one
14 person from U.S. Tool and Die, which was ComEd Quality Control
15 Resident Inspector, Mr. Tony Frazier, who previously was
16 reporting to Mr. Paul Zurowski and Ed Martin, and Mr. Bastyr
17 assigned that he will be report to me because I was the only
18 person who can have the oversight of them. So I was also
19 reviewing his biweekly or weekly non-conformance reports, which
20 was coming around 20, on average, every week or every other two
21 weeks about the problems of U.S. Tool and Die and Holtec
22 problems. So it was just like --
23 Q Are these the problems we heard Mr. Landsman discuss
24 this morning?
25 A Yes.
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1 Q And this is all happening at Dresden?
2 A This is for Dresden, but it's happening at outside
3 contractors that they are designing, constructing for Dresden
4 station.
5 Q And I didn't mean to -- but that also has to do with,
6 it all has to do with matters at Dresden?
7 A Yes.
8 Q Okay.
9 A Unit one --
10 Q Okay. Do you know how many dry casks are stored out
11 there right now?
12 A At the time I left, I think there were like three or
13 four sitting there. They have one prototype in the early 2000
14 and then immediately after that, I think they went into
15 production, I think they had like three or four. One or two of
16 them that it was sitting, two or three of them they were almost
17 coming. It was at the final stage of the production.
18 Q I see. Did you continue in this world as Dry Cask
19 Storage, what is it, supervisor?
20 A I was not given the title supervisor. I was in
21 charge of the oversight.
22 Q Oversight. Yeah, I don't want to call you an
23 overseer.
24 A Quality Assurance or oversight is interchangeably
25 used.
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1 Q Did you continue in this position up until the time
2 you left --
3 A Yes.
4 Q -- the SES organization?
5 A Yes.
6 Q Do you know who took that position after you left, or
7 took that responsibility?
8 A I believe that it was planned to be given to Stan
9 Mitchell, but I'm not sure.
10 Q You don't know who took it?
11 A Who took it.
12 Q You don't know, you don't know.
13 A I don't know.
14 Q What was your overall performance rating in 1997?
15 A Outstanding, 1-A.
16 Q What was your overall performance rating in 1998?
17 A Excellent, which characterized instead of A it was B.
18 Q Right. And you're given a 'B' based on assuming the
19 work of five other individuals, adding 20 percent of the
20 accounts. How many hours a week were you working in 1998,
21 after you take on this task?
22 A I would say average between 48 to 50.
23 Q Pardon me?
24 A On the average, between 48 to 50, not including the
25 weekends that you have to go on site to get cheaper rates for
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1 the airline tickets. Most, 90 percent of my flights has to be
2 on Saturday to save money for the client.
3 Q All right. Is it also the time you're wrapping up,
4 you get your audit, I'm sorry, your finding against
5 Commonwealth Edison engineering, right?
6 A Yes.
7 Q Your case load remains the same and there are fewer
8 people, in fact your case load increases, am I right --
9 A Yes.
10 Q -- as supplier management?
11 MR. GROSS: I'm going to object, Your Honor. A lot
12 of these questions are argument questions that rhetorical
13 questions. I think it's unnecessarily prolonging this and it's
14 repeating the information we've already gotten.
15 JUDGE LESNICK: I'll note the objection and -- allow
16 to continue.
17 MR. McDERMOTT: Thank you, Judge.
18 BY MR. McDERMOTT:
19 Q In 1999, did you conduct any serious audits, serious
20 new audits?
21 A Yes. 1999 I was continuing doing the performance of
22 other supply audits, in addition to more dry cast, Holtec and
23 U.S. Tool and Die --
24 Q Was this the year of the Omni audit?
25 A 1999, no, that was May, 2000 was the Omni.
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1 Q Let's just stay on 1999.
2 A Right.
3 Q Other than dry storage quality group materials, I'm
4 sorry. Other than the dry cast management, was there any
5 audits that created any kind of stir or a buzz that you know of
6 in '99?
7 MR. GROSS: I'll object to the use of the word stir
8 or buzz.
9 BY MR. McDERMOTT:
10 Q Attention. Supervisor attention.
11 A Could you just give me some clue, because my mind is
12 just so tired.
13 Q Are you getting tired?
14 A Yeah. I have to, if you can just give me some, is
15 this one of the audits I did that I can better remember,
16 because right now I'm just getting a little bit fatigued.
17 Q You're tired, you're tired. Do you want to take a
18 break for a minute?
19 JUDGE LESNICK: Want to take a break?
20 THE WITNESS: Yeah.
21 JUDGE LESNICK: All right. Five-minute break.
22 (Off the record.)
23 (On the record.)
24
25 (Whereupon, at 5:27 p.m., the hearing in the above-
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1 entitled matter was adjourned, to resume the next day, December
2 18, 2002.)
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C E R T I F I C A T E
This is to certify that the attached proceedings before the
Administrative Law Judge Robert J. Lesnick, Pittsburgh, PA
Insert Title of Officer Name and Office
In the matter of: Oscar Shirani v. Exelon Nuclear
Corporation
Case/Docket Number: 2002-ERA-28
Place: Chicago, Illinois
Date: December 17, 2002
were held as therein appears, and that this is the original
transcript thereof for the files of the Department of Labor.
Free State Reporting, Inc.
(Name of Reporting Company)
By
(Official Reporter)
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