In another case of mismanagement at Los Alamos National
Laboratory, officials confirmed Wednesday that there was a
potentially major security breach in the University of
California-managed lab, one of the nation’s major nuclear
research centers.
Police stumbled across computer drives that belonged to the
laboratory during a drug arrest last week.
Los Alamos Police Sgt. Chuck Ney said police found classified
information from the lab on the computer of a former employee
during their search for evidence of a drug business, in which they
also found a sizable amount of methamphetamine paraphernalia.
The Los Angeles Times reported Thursday that the former employee
was Jessica Quintana. The drug arrest had not been for Quintana,
but an associate of hers.
UC officials said they are very concerned about the situation
and are keeping a close watch on it.
“We are working really close … and getting to the bottom
of this investigation,” said UC spokesman Chris
Harrington.
Security problems have plagued the New Mexico lab for some time,
beginning when scientist Wen Ho Lee was accused of leaking nuclear
secrets to China in 2000.
In July 2004, Los Alamos was shut down for the year when two
classified computer disks were reported missing and an intern was
injured in a laser accident.
It was later found that the supposedly missing disks were an
inventory error and had never existed.
The management of the lab is now being shared with other
companies such as Bechtel, an engineering corporation.
The lab has made efforts to improve security, but with the
recent breach it seems as though that may not have been enough,
said Bill Richardson, governor of New Mexico and former energy
secretary.
“We need to plug the leaks, we need to beef up
security,” the governor said Wednesday. “This
can’t keep happening.”
In a statement, Los Alamos director Michael Anastasio said the
lab is fully cooperating with the FBI to further investigate the
incident. Because of the nature of the situation, limited
information of the breach is to be released, he said.
Los Alamos spokesman Kevin Roark said Quintana’s
employment with the lab ended three weeks ago, but said that she
was not fired.
“It was the ending of a normal contract,” Roark
said.
Anastasio said the lab is taking immediate steps to address the
security concerns and to assess necessary immediate and long-term
actions.