appalled at this turn of events - journalists have done their job.
They have used a variety of sources to lay out the events, facts and
even opinions of the parties involved. Like reporting politics, that
is their job regardless of whether readers like or dislike the
situation the journalist are reporting about. (In general journalists
do not write the headlines - that job lies with the copy desk.)
Discredited chronic fatigue researcher in California jail
Patients rally around Judy Mikovits, accused of theft and conspiracy
By Trine Tsouderos, Chicago Tribune reporter
November 22, 2011
Two years ago, researcher Judy Mikovits was riding high atop a wave of prom=
ise.
She had published one of the most discussed papers of the year in one
of the most prestigious scientific publications in the world.
Her team's findings were hailed as a potential breakthrough for an
illness =97 chronic fatigue syndrome =97 that had long frustrated
researchers. She was invited to speak at scientific conferences around
the globe. Adoring patients crowded her at her talks.
Now, in a stunning twist, Mikovits is sitting in a California jail
cell, held without bond, awaiting an arraignment hearing Tuesday. An
arrest warrant issued by University of Nevada at Reno police lists two
felony charges: possession of stolen property and conspiracy.
She was fired in September, and this month her former employer filed a
lawsuit alleging she had wrongfully taken lab notebooks, a computer
and other proprietary data. Other researchers have discredited her
work, and the journal Science, which published her study, is
investigating whether the data were manipulated.
The only constant is the patients who continue to rally around her.
"Remember that we are behind you every step of the way, even whilst
you sit alone in jail wondering what will come next," one person wrote
on a blog called OslersWeb.
Mikovits' attorney, Lois Hart, wrote in a statement last week in
reaction to the lawsuit that Mikovits is innocent and her "integrity
goes to the bone."
"She did not take anything from her office or laboratory," Hart wrote.
Mikovits' rise began in 2006, when she was hired as director of
research by the fledgling Whittemore Peterson Institute for
Neuro-Immune Disease in Reno, Nev. The institute, known as WPI, was
started by a wealthy Nevada couple whose daughter was diagnosed with
chronic fatigue syndrome, or CFS.
Not long after she arrived, Mikovits' team announced a breakthrough.
The scientists said they had found evidence of a retrovirus called
XMRV significantly more often in the blood of patients diagnosed with
CFS than in blood from healthy peers. The journal Science published
their paper online Oct. 8, 2009.
"It was an incredibly proud day," Mikovits told the Tribune in 2010.
"I got calls from around the world. Dubai, China, you name it."
But as the Tribune reported, Mikovits and others quickly galloped
ahead of the findings, which had not been replicated by other
scientists. Though she lacked published data to back her up, Mikovits
began tying XMRV to autism and other mysterious disorders. A lab
offered an XMRV blood test. Patients took antiretroviral drugs meant
for HIV patients.
At the same time, other scientists began reporting that they could not
find evidence of the retrovirus in the blood of patients with CFS =97 or
in anyone else's. Researchers wondered publicly whether lab
contamination could explain Mikovits' results, and this summer one
scientific team published evidence that XMRV was, indeed, a lab
contaminant.
Mikovits vehemently denied contamination had occurred and attacked
scientists unable to replicate her findings. "Some are not trying in
completely good faith," she said in a 2010 interview with the Tribune.
Then, a study published in September showed that the WPI could not
reliably find evidence of XMRV in the blood of patients. On Sept. 29,
WPI fired Mikovits, according to court filings, and Science said a few
days later that it was investigating allegations of data manipulation.
On Nov. 7, shortly after the WPI sued Mikovits, a Nevada district
court judge signed a temporary restraining order prohibiting her from
destroying, altering or deleting any "misappropriated property."
The WPI also reported the lab notebooks and other materials as stolen
to the police force of the University of Nevada at Reno, which issued
a warrant for Mikovits' arrest Nov. 17, according to police chief Adam
Garcia.
Mikovits was arrested Friday in California on felony charges of being
a fugitive from justice, according to the Ventura County Sheriff's
Department. She is being held in county jail in Santa Paula.
"We sincerely hope that this serious matter is resolved quickly and
that the stolen materials are returned unaltered to the WPI,"
institute founder Annette Whittemore said.
Detailed logs of experiments, lab notebooks are key in disputes over
data like the one involving the work published in Science. "When there
is a dispute, the notebook is crucial to figuring out what actually
happened," said Columbia University virologist Vincent Racaniello.
Some patients reacted to the arrest by condemning Whittemore and her
husband, Harvey, toasted until recently as heroes.
But the WPI has been victimized as well, wrote Cort Johnson, who runs
the website Phoenix Rising. "I'm sure (they) had a huge emotional
investment in that data. That is what, after all, they hoped could
cure their daughter."
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