Dr. Saenger, described as “a pioneer in nuclear medicine and radiology,” didn’t feel he was doing anything unethical, according to what UC medical physicist Stephen Thomas told The Columbus Dispatch. 

“I know personally that he was affected deeply by that public reaction,” Thomas said. “I also know that he felt he had acted entirely within the realm of medicinal science as it was known at that time. He definitely felt that he had not overstepped any bounds, any ethics in the research.”

Regardless of his feelings about his work, the families of those who were experimented on did not agree. In 1999, he lost $3.6 million in a lawsuit initiated by multiple relatives of the cancer patients exposed to the potentially deadly amounts of radiation. Their argument was that the radiation exposure likely shortened their lives. The families also claimed their relatives were not informed that the treatments could kill them. What’s more, they were not told they were being used as part of military research, per The Columbus Dispatch. 

According to a 1972 paper on the study called “Radiation Effects in Man: Manifestations and Therapeutic Efforts,” Saenger and his colleagues reported that they thought only eight deaths were “possibly attributable to radiation.” However, a later report found that it was more like one-fourth of the patients involved died from radiation exposure, The New York Times reported.