Becky McClain
Becky McClain worked as a microbiologist for pharmaceutical giant Pfizer where she developed a new technique for introducing novel genetic segments into viruses -- a powerful tool in the armamentarium of genetic engineering.
Then she was appointed to the company’s health and safety committee where she took her job much too seriously, raising issues that infuriated company officials. One complaint focused on a co-worker who had been working on a dangerous virus at her desk.
After company officials brushed off her concerns, she turned to the Occupational Safety and Health Administration (OSHA), setting off alarm bells with officials at the company’s Groton, Connecticut facility which lead to personal attacks against her. Then she got sick along with several other scientists at the Connecticut lab.
“Before I left, I was exposed to a genetically engineered virus that was left outside my office,” she said.
Finally, after eleven months away from work, she was fired. Becky sued, both for claims resulting from the illness and for whistleblower retaliation.
In searching for expert witnesses to testify about her illness, she discovered that most of the academic researchers she hoped would help were compromised by Pfizer funding, while the lead expert recruited by Pfizer headed a program which had received $450 million of the company’s money.
But it didn’t matter. The judge threw out her illness claims, in part because she couldn’t get an accounting of the pathogens to which she might have been exposed. Pfizer successfully argued that production of the list would violate trade secrets, and the judge agreed.
Without a full accounting of the organisms to test against her own blood, she was unable to show that her illness resulted from workplace exposure, a legal Catch 22.
However, the federal court jury found that Pfizer had retaliated against her for raising concerns and speaking out against corporate practices, awarding her $1.37 million in April, 2010.
Then came the revelation that the judge, Vanessa L. Bryant, was caught in a conflict of interest: Her husband, as attorney for Guardian Life, had retained the same law firm that represented Pfizer in Becky’s case. A new judge, Warren Eginton, took over the case and awarded Becky an additional $450,000 in legal fees and $460,000 in punitive damages bringing the total to
$2.3 million.
In December, 2010, Becky was awarded the
Joe A. Callaway Award for Civic Courage.
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