Would like to know more details. The headline implies that they were falsifying their research results, but the article maybe implies that there were financial/bookkeeping shenanigans going on instead.
EDIT: did some more snooping. They are indeed being charged with falsifying data. Ugh. Not good at all. Totally OK with them getting the book thrown at them.
Posts: 35388 | Location: West: North and South! | Registered: 20 April 2005
Duke University is paying the U.S. government $112.5 million to settle accusations that it submitted bogus data to win federal research grants. The settlement will also bring a $33.75 million payment to Joseph Thomas, the whistleblower who drew attention to the fraud when he worked for Duke.
Thomas, a former Duke lab analyst, sued the university on behalf of the federal government, saying that a Duke researcher fudged data to help the university win and keep lucrative grants from two agencies, the National Institutes of Health and the Environmental Protection Agency.
-------------------------------- We are all visitors to this time, this place. We are just passing through. Our purpose here is to observe, to learn, to grow, to love… and then we return home. - Australian Aboriginal proverb
Bazootiehead-in-training
Posts: 38020 | Location: Somewhere in the middle | Registered: 19 January 2010
The allegations were originally brought in a lawsuit filed by Joseph Thomas, a former Duke employee, under the qui tam, or whistleblower, provisions of the False Claims Act, which permit private individuals to sue on behalf of the government and share in any recovery. The Act permits the government to intervene in and take over the whistleblower’s suit, or, as in this case, for the whistleblower to pursue the action on the government’s behalf. Mr. Thomas will receive $33,750,000 from the settlement.
Nice work when you can find it.
-------------------------------- If you think looting is bad wait until I tell you about civil forfeiture.
Posts: 33808 | Location: On the Hudson | Registered: 20 April 2005
Originally posted by Axtremus: The incentive works as intended in this case, don't you think?
Unclear. It depends on the role the whistleblower had.
There are a number of cases where the whistleblower, while not involved, was in a position to stop the fraud from occurring but it was much more profitable to let it happen and then alert the feds.
-------------------------------- If you think looting is bad wait until I tell you about civil forfeiture.
Posts: 33808 | Location: On the Hudson | Registered: 20 April 2005
