AN inquest jury's verdict of unlawful killing on a young British airman who underwent secret nerve gas tests more than 50 years ago will come under fire from Ministry of Defence lawyers at London's High Court today.

Ronald Maddison, from Consett, Co Durham, died after having drops of the nerve agent Sarin dabbed on his arm at the Porton Down chemical warfare testing facility in Wiltshire in 1953, when he was 20 years old.

Mr Maddison's family claim that he and other military personnel were tricked into taking part in what they believed were harmless experiments.

In November last year, inquest jurors sitting in Trowbridge returned a verdict of unlawful killing after a 64-day hearing before Wiltshire coroner David Masters.

The jurors rejected the MoD's plea that all the servicemen who were tested at Porton Down were told beforehand that they were taking part in nerve gas experiments.

MoD lawyers will today take their case to the High Court, where Mr Justice Collins will be asked to open the way for a full-blown challenge to the verdict.

Mr Maddison, an RAF engineer based in Swindon, was one of many volunteers involved in tests carried out between 1939 and 1989.

Lawyers for his family claimed he believed he was being tested for drugs to cure the common cold.

Mr Maddison died in the medical examination room at the Porton Down facility on May 6, 1953.

Porton Down has spearheaded Britain's research into the use of chemical weapons for the last 85 years -as well as creating defences against those weapons.