Before him, the last researcher in the United States to receive a prison term for fabricating data was Scott Reuben, a pain specialist in Massachusetts who in 2010 spent six months in federal penitentiary for health care fraud.
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A ex- Iowa State University researcher was sentenced to more than four and a half years in prison on Wednesday after he was found guilty of faking H.I.V. vaccine research that earned more than $7 million in federal grant money.
Prosecutors say prison time was needed to serve as a fraud deterrent. The case has made waves nationally because it’s rare for a scientist to face criminal charges for fraudulent research – and even rarer for one to go to prison for it.
[Citing ‘misconduct, ‘ accounting journal retracts 25 articles by once-renowned scholar].
Han was sacked by the university in 2013 after officials realized that he had fabricated or falsified data in several ongoing HIV vaccine studies. The USA Office of Research Integrity slapped him with a 3-year ban on pursuing federal research grants.
Such an uncommon fate is the result of Senator Charles Grassley (R-Iowa) catching wind of Han’s fraud and being shocked by the scale of wasted funds.
And with that, Han became a cautionary tale.
In June 2014, Han was charged with four felony counts, each carrying five years of jail.
Ex- Iowa State University scientist sent to prison this week.
Han pleaded guilty in February to two counts of making false statements to the NIH. Test results from Cho’s lab showed that rabbits who were injected with the vaccine GP41 showed signs of antibodies in the blood, suggesting that the vaccine had prompted an immune response against the HIV. And, in 1998, Richard Borison, a psychiatrist in Georgia, received a 15-year jail term, along with more than $4.2 million in fines and restitution, for his role in a scheme to defraud the Medical College of Georgia and various drug companies.
[The Disneyland measles outbreak and the disgraced doctor who whipped up vaccination fear].
Cho’s team continues to work on the vaccine at ISU and has subsequently obtained funding, reported the Daily Mail.
Although Han’s bogus results in as much as $20 million in NIH grants, the sentence doesn’t seem to be entirely related to the amount of money.
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That is when Han’s problems really began. After all, Jérôme Kerviel, the so-called “London Whale”, received a three-year sentence – which ended after just 114 days – for his role in a $6.3 billion trading scandal. For years, he had apparently been spiking the blood with human antibodies.
