Washington University in St. Louis conducts a lot of research, especially in the fields of medicine and medical technology. Research of that nature is critical and is also extremely expensive. Fortunately, the federal government supports research at Washington University and many other research institutions by providing them with funding for their research through federal grants and contracts, to the tune of hundreds of millions of dollars each year.
Some of the federal money that Washington University receives is just given to the university by the government, to use as the university sees fit. Other funds are given with strings attached. There is personnel at the University that work with the contract money, individuals who do the job of purchasing supplies for the various research projects in accordance with any requirements that are attached to the funding.
One woman who did that type of work for Washington University is Beth Owen. Beth worked as a contract management liaison for the University from 2014 to 2015. As part of her work, Beth was responsible for overseeing purchase orders that were associated with money that had been given to the University on the condition that a specific percentage of purchases be made from minority-owned vendors and service disabled veteran-owned businesses.
While she was performing her job duties, Beth was instructed by her supervisor to approve any and all purchase requests for a Mississippi-based company called RAS Enterprises. RAS is a business that is certified as a minority-owned vendor and a service disabled veteran-owned business, and it supplies laboratory equipment to the University. As Owen went about her work, she became concerned about the price structure that RAS was using, so she decided to look into it by approaching a University administrator and asking them about the details of the equipment pricing. The administrator told Owen that RAS didn’t provide the laboratory equipment, but they were paid a handling fee to ship equipment to the University that was purchased from Fisher Scientific. This did not sit right with Owen, who believed that using RAS as a middle man to comply with the requirements that were attached to the federal funding was illegal. Owen brought the issue to the attention of her supervisor, and she was subsequently fired. Owen has filed a lawsuit in connection with her termination, claiming that in firing her, the University violated provisions of state law that protect whistleblowers who have a good faith belief that their employer has broken the law.
The Mississippi Whistleblower Attorneys at Barrett Law PLLC support brave individuals like Beth Owen who try to address possible wrongdoing when they see it happening in their workplaces. If you lost your job after attempting to work with others in your company to investigate or correct possible improper business activity, you might qualify for legal protection as a whistleblower. To learn more, call the Mississippi Whistleblower attorneys at Barrett Law PLLC at 1 (800) 707-9577 to arrange a free, initial consultation.