A jury has awarded a former UC San Diego researcher with $39 million in damages in a case of alleged retaliation by the university.
During a two-month trial, the jury considered dueling lawsuits claiming fraud and defamation filed by UCSD and Dr. Kevin Murphy.
The former university oncologist has been embroiled in a long-standing legal dispute with the administration over a $10 million donation intended for research.
The university sued Murphy, alleging he took the $10 million donation from one of his former patients to benefit himself, while Murphy said the money was intended to fund clinical trials for his brain stimulation treatment known as Personalized Repetitive Transcranial Magnetic Stimulation, or PrTMS.
Murphy alleged the school tried to divert the funds away from his research and retaliated against him when he tried to speak out about it. The university declined to renew his contract in 2020 and Murphy countersued UCSD for wrongful termination and retaliation.
Murphy told KPBS, “I think the goal is to make an example of someone like me and that, of course, affects anybody else that wants to raise their hand and say I see a problem here, but I don’t want what happened to Dr. Murphy to happen to me.”
UCSD declined to comment on the jury verdict.
One of Murphy's attorneys, Mark Quigley, called his client "the epitome of a whistleblower who had the courage to expose corruption within the institution he dedicated his career to. This verdict reveals the truth behind UCSD's attempts to retaliate and defame him for simply doing the right thing."
In his lawsuit, Murphy said former patient Charles Kreutzkamp donated the $10 million just prior his death in 2015. Murphy alleged that Kreutzkamp was unambiguous about how he wanted the money spent, but the funds were earmarked for other purposes by leadership at UCSD's Moores Cancer Center. He alleged no clinical trials for PrTMS were conducted in the following years because of university interference and when Murphy was able to have the funds redirected from the cancer center, he was threatened. He alleged that after he was let go by the university, UCSD leakedfalse information to news outlets as part of a smear campaign against him.
UCSD denied any retaliation and alleged Murphy misappropriated the funds in order to support PrTMS research for the benefit of his own private businesses, which include a clinic and medical software company.
Jurors also awarded UCSD $67,000 for money Murphy earned outside of the university.
In the past several months, UC San Diego has been plagued by complaints of retaliation from unionized academic workers. The workers claim the university has violated new contracts that were ratified last December following a six-week strike.
"Although our cases are very different, this shows that retaliation is part of the administrative culture at UCSD," said Hiya Datta, who works in the Chemistry and Biochemistry Department and is the Recording Secretary of UAW 2865 at UCSD.
"It shows how much public money they’re willing to lose before they do the right thing."
