By Steve Neavling
ticklethewire.com
A physics professor who claims she was retaliated against for alerting the FBI to illegal activities at the California Institute of Technology’s NASA lab sued the school Thursday, the Associated Press reports.
Sandra Troian alleges in the suit that the school violated the whistleblower policy by trying to drive her out. She claims she was falsely accused of wrongdoing and that the school kept her out of events and lectures.
“Instead of resolving the issues around this incident and trying to get to the bottom of it, they decided to cover up the problem and turn up the heat, trumping up one charge after another,” Troian said at a news conference.
The allegations stem from a postdoctoral researcher whom Troian hired to work on a space propulsion system. She said the researcher sent out restricted data and made it available for others to see.
“Two weeks after my last contact with the FBI, my world came crashing down around me, as Caltech started a merciless campaign ongoing to this day of retaliation for my speaking to the FBI,” she said. “I’ve been humiliated, degraded, isolated, treated like a pariah on campus.”
