A jury awarded $1.35 million Monday to a professor who said he was ordered to work in unsafe conditions at the Beckman Research Institute at City of Hope and eventually fired for complaining about illegal conduct by a department chairman.
The Los Angeles Superior Court jury deliberated for about three weeks before finding that Dr. Ahmad Besaratinia was the victim of wrongful termination, retaliation and defamation.
The panel also found that the institute acted with malice, triggering a second phase of trial to begin Tuesday to determine if the research scientist should be awarded punitive damages.
The lengthy trial dealt in large part with the conduct of Gerd Pfeifer, chairman of the Department of Cancer Biology within the Duarte-based BRI. He allegedly pushed to be named as corresponding author of a work-related manuscript on genetic mutations in human melanoma, even though he did not make any actual contribution.
In an email to Besaratinia — whose genetic theories were the focus of the manuscript — Pfeifer warned that if he and the plaintiff’s colleague, Stella Tommasi, did not comply and he lost federal grant money as a result, then “yours and Stella’s salary can no longer be supported,” according to a separate lawsuit that she filed.
Besaratinia’s lawyers maintained Pfeifer made numerous false statements to others about the plaintiff, including that Besaratinia was leaving City of Hope to “dismantle his research team and paralyze his research activities;” that he was “careless in his handling of cancer-causing chemicals and endangered the health and well-being of others”; and that he was “dishonest and a fraudulent scientist who misrepresented the results of his experiments.”
Pfeifer has denied any wrongdoing. In his attorneys’ court papers, they stated that their client began to question Besaratinia’s scientific integrity after finding “a number of questionable statements, figures and materials … Pfeifer knew he was required to report suspected research misconduct. Pfeifer did so.”
Pfeifer was a party in Besaratinia’s case, but was dismissed as a defendant in Tommasi’s lawsuit, which is before another judge.
In a sworn declaration, Tommasi said she and Basaratinia told Pfiefer that because he had made “no scientific or academic contribution to the melanoma transcript, we could not and would not list him as the last and corresponding author.”
Besaratinia filed his lawsuit in September 2012. According to the complaint, he began working for the City of Hope in March 2001 and by December 2008 was promoted to associate research professor in the Department of Cancer Biology in 2007.
Besaratinia was often praised by his superiors and co-workers, including Pfeifer, and received frequent promotions based on his work performances, according to his court papers.
Things began to change after Pfeifer demanded that Besaratinia add his name as a co-author on the manuscript, prompting the plaintiff to report Pfeifer’s conduct to the administration in September 2011, his suit alleges. Three hours later, Pfeifer told the plaintiff he should look elsewhere for employment, the suit states.
Two months later, Pfeifer relocated Besaratinia to an isolated work building that was under construction and had “completely unsafe and unhealthy working conditions,” the suit alleges.
The City of Hope administration demanded that Tommasi sign documents falsely stating that her research was done on projects exclusively funded by Pfeifer’s grants so that the institution could continue receiving such monies, according to her suit.
The City of Hope gave Besaritinia notice in February 2012 that he was fired effective six months later, his suit states.
— City News Service