Lab Worker Held in Radioactive Assault

ORANGE COUNTY — In a case of an office rift that apparently escalated into chemical warfare, a former UC Irvine lab technician was arrested Thursday and charged with assault with a deadly weapon after he allegedly smeared radioactive material on a co-worker’s chair.

Andrew Andris Blakis, 32, of Los Angeles was also charged with unlawful disposal of radioactive material, the Orange County district attorney’s office said.

Authorities said Blakis retaliated because he thought a colleague at the university’s Gillespie Neuroscience Research Facility had contaminated him with P32 isotope, a waxy, colorless substance used to test DNA.

On July 1, Blakis was conducting tests using the material when he felt a tingling in his lips, district attorney’s spokeswoman Tori Richards said. Using a Geiger counter, he detected radioactive material that had escaped at his work station.

He then allegedly spread P32 on the chair of co-worker Jingtong Zuo, Richards said. Zuo sat in the chair for a day and a half until a routine safety check discovered the contamination.

There was no evidence that Zuo had contaminated Blakis, Richards said.

If convicted, Blakis could receive a maximum of five years and eight months in state prison. Richards said this may be first case of its type in California.

Zuo, a postgraduate researcher at the university, is not experiencing any symptoms of radiation poisoning, Richards said, but the possibility of long-term side effects is not yet clear.

Blakis was being held Thursday at Orange County Men’s Central Jail with bail set at $25,000.