Saturday, October 24, 2009

"He hired a team of lawyers to punish me for voicing my opinions"

IPBiz has been discussing the matter involving K.Y. Cha and Bruce Flamm. See for example:


Flamm prevails over Cha on November 20, 2007



Cha's suit against Flamm is back



K.Y. Cha's suit against Flamm tossed by Superior Court (again!)


K. Y. Cha was a co-author of an article published in
the Journal of Reproductive Medicine claiming that prayers from the United States,
Canada, and Australia caused a 100% increase in pregnancy rates among
infertility patients in Korea. Dr. Bruce Flamm spent much time attempting to get
the journal to re-evaluate the basis for this article. He was stonewalled.
The basis for the Cha's lawsuit against Flamm involved comments made by
Flamm in Flamm's article "Prayer Study Author Charged With Plagiarism" published in Ob. Gyn. News,
with the charge of plagiarism relating to a DIFFERENT paper co-authored by Cha.
The asserted plagiarism related to a multiple publication in more than one journal
of the same results. There were some questions of "who" the proper authors were.
[There is an entirely different legal saga relating to the interplay of K.Y. Cha with one
Dr. Kim, but that is a separate story.]

The most recent news event in the Flamm story is that the California Appellate Court has
affirmed the decision of the Superior Court, which had tossed Cha's lawsuit.

Although this case has a very convoluted fact pattern, the superficial issue was whether
suggesting someone was a plagiarist amounted to defamation. The matter went on for more than
two years and had to have been unpleasant for Dr. Flamm. In a press release about
the appellate victory, Dr. Flamm noted:

"Today's ruling is a victory for science and evidence-based medicine.
Scientists must be allowed to question bizarre claims. Cha's
mysterious study was designed and allegedly conducted by a man who turned out
to be a criminal with a 20-year history of fraud. A criminal who steals the
identities of dead children to obtain bank loans and passports is not a
trustworthy source of research data. Cha could have simply admitted this
obvious fact but instead he hired a team of lawyers to punish me for
voicing my opinions. Physicians should debate their opinions in medical
journals, not in courts of law. Judges have better things to do with their time
and taxpayers have better things to do with their money."

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