March 22, 2016
By Alex Keown, BioSpace.com Breaking News Staff
WASHINGTON – The U.S. Food and Drug Administration permanently debarred Wesley McQuerry, a former DePaul University clinical trial coordinator, from working on any drug applications on Friday.
McQuerry was sentenced to three years in federal prison for creating fake patients for a drug trial and pocketing the trial money intended to pay trial participants. Last year U.S. Attorney Maureen Merin said McQuerry “created fake patients, used his own stool samples, faked lab work, forged doctors’ signatures and deposited more than 2,000 checks intended for participating patients into his own bank account,” the Chicago Sun Times reported. Had his actions not been uncovered, Merin said the false research could have tainted any data from the trial the FDA would have used in its drug-approval process. McQuerry was supposed to be working on an experimental drug to treat HIV-associated diarrhea. McQuerry suffers from HIV, the Sun Times said.
Over the course of the period he created the false patient accounts, McQuerry pocketed more than $2,300. However, his actions cost the drug company sponsoring the trial approximately $200,098 due to expenses to re-coup data due to McQuerry’s falsification of data, Retraction Watch reported yesterday afternoon. The drug company sponsoring the HIV drug trial was not identified.
“…between January and October 2008, Mr. McQuerry created fifteen to twenty fictional patients, whom he claimed were participants in the clinical trial. Mr. McQuerry falsified signatures of those patients on consent forms and falsified doctors’ signatures on medical evaluations for those patients. He provided his own blood, stool, and EKG results, which he claimed were provided by the fictional patients. He also transmitted false data and information to the administrator regarding these fictional patients and made and caused to be made false statements regarding their participation in the study and attendance at office visits, all of which he knew would be provided to the pharmaceutical company and to FDA,” the FDA said in its debarring notice issued March 18, which was posted on the Federal Register.
McQuerry’s falsification of data is not the first time he has been in legal trouble. When he was sentenced for the falsification of data, the Sun Times reported he had a previous conviction “for embezzling more than $364,000 from DePaul University when he worked in the school’s alumni relations department from 1999 to 2001.” He also has convictions for “ghost pay-rolling and credit card fraud schemes,” The Sun Times said. In addition to his three-year sentence for the falsification of trial data, McQuerry was ordered to pay $200,000 in damages. McQuerry is scheduled for release from prison in 2017, Retraction Watch said.
