TURBOTVILLE — The widow of a man electrocuted in Baghdad in September received some good news Friday morning.
Janine Sivak Hermanson said she got a telephone message from U.S. Sen. Robert Casey Jr. (D-PA) that an amendment to the 2010 Defense Appropriations Bill he co-sponsored would require contractors to fix dangerous deficiencies, such as improperly grounded electrical wires, they discover that threaten the safety of military personnel and contractor employees.
The amendment was approved late Thursday night.
But the amendment is small comfort to Hermanson, whose husband, Adam Hermanson, 25, was electrocuted while taking a shower in his quarters at Camp Olympia, inside the Green Zone in Baghdad on Sept. 1. She’s still trying to find out just how he died.
He worked for Triple Canopy, a security firm with offices in Herndon, Va. Triple Canopy took over several security contracts from the notorious Blackwater organization earlier this year. He was there on a short-term contract to earn enough for the couple to buy a home in the central Susquehanna Valley and was to return to Pennsylvania in November, according to published reports.
The first report she received said he was found dead near his bunk, but a later report said he died in the shower. There have been two autopsies, but no death certificate has been issued, and the State Department has taken over the investigation and isn’t revealing anything.
Services were held on Sept. 12 in Delaware.
No answers
“There are numerous investigations going on,” she said, “but no one is saying what happened.”
She makes almost daily calls to the U.S. Army’s Criminal Investigations Division headquarters in Virginia and to the Department of Defense and the State Department in Washington.
“I call, they give me the runaround,” she said Friday night. “They tell me someone will call me back, but they never do. It’s just not on their priority list.”
She said she feels like she is on auto-pilot most of the time. She works as a dental assistant in Pennsdale, but she is just going through the motions.
“When I’m at work, I’m missing opportunities to call people to get answers,” she said.
Adam Hermanson was the 19th case of electrocution in the shower in Iraq. All those who have died were either military personnel or contract workers. Almost 300 people have been electrocuted in Iraq due to faulty wiring in buildings erected by military contractors.
Loophole closed
The amendment, sponsored by Casey and Sen. Dick Durbin (D-Ill.), closes a loophole that has left shoddy electrical work and other problems on American military bases uncorrected. Under current law, contractors that inspect and discover deficiencies are not explicitly required to immediately correct such problems. This amendment would ensure that the Defense Department reviews all contracts to ensure that the language of the contract clearly requires contractors to immediately correct deficiencies, such as improperly grounded equipment or facilities, which could cause death or serious bodily harm.
Hermanson, a 2002 graduate of Warrior Run High School, met her husband in October 2003 while both were military police serving in the Air Force. They would have been married four years in September and had two deployments to Iraq together.
Janine Hermanson left the service in January, 2007, and her husband was discharged in October, 2008. They lived in Las Vegas, where her husband’s family lived. He worked as a bodyguard until he accepted a position with Triple Canopy in June. He left for Iraq on July 6, and Janine returned to her parents home in Lewis Township.
Adam Hermanson was a native of San Diego, Calif. and had enlisted in the Air Force at age 17. He had three deployments in Iraq and one in Uzbekistan when he left the Air Force with the rank of staff sergeant.
Casey has been working on the electrocution issue since 2008, when a Pittsburgh soldier, Ryan Maseth, was electrocuted while taking a shower in Iraq in January, 2008.
Maseth’s mother, Cheryl Harris, contacted Casey and was a tenacious advocate for the amendment, said Hermanson.
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Accidental death in Iraq: Too little, too late
Passing of legislation little comfort for military widow
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