Trio Pay Price for Blowing Whistle at UCI

It was only last week during a photo session with People magazine that Debra Krahel finally realized what being a whistle-blower was going to mean: The UC Irvine fertility scandal had taken on a life of its own, and inevitably, would change hers forever.

Aside from wondering how she happened to find herself between missives about Liz Taylor’s hip, Michael Jackson’s “HIStory”or the trials and tribulations of The Juice, Krahel became increasingly annoyed at the People person who kept treating her like a model.

“He kept telling us to smile,” she said of the session involving her and fellow whistle-blowers Marilyn Killane and Carol Chatham. “And I kept saying, ‘This is nothing to smile about,’ because it isn’t. And he said, ‘But, hey, it’s all over now.’ And I said, ‘No, it isn’t. It’s only just begun.’ ”

For three women who never imagined themselves at the forefront of such a controversy, what’s begun is the rest of their lives. Krahel, Killane and Chatham no longer work for UCI, which paid them a collective settlement of nearly $1 million, in the wake of allegations brought by the three former administrators against doctors at the Center for Reproductive Health.

They’re the ones who pointed the finger at the internationally renowned clinic and its famous patriarch, Dr. Ricardo H. Asch, who, along with his colleagues, Drs. Jose P. Balmaceda and Sergio Stone, have been accused of, among other things, stealing human eggs and withholding cash payments from the university.

Krahel, Killane and Chatham claim that Asch and his colleagues harvested human eggs and implanted them in other women without the consent of donor or recipient; conducted human-subject research without consent; engaged in financial irregularities; and prescribed an imported fertility drug not yet approved by the U.S. Food and Drug Administration. The doctors deny any knowing wrongdoing.

As for the women who blew the whistle--who risked careers and reputations “just to do the right thing,” as Chatham put it--the questions they’re asked most often have to do with money and what they’re going to do next.

Krahel, 39, was paid a lump sum of $495,000 from UCI. Killane, 56, was paid $325,000, but the vast majority of that amount--exactly how much she declined to say--will be parceled out over an eight-year period. Chatham, 44, was paid a lump sum of $96,000.

But all three lost their jobs, and in addition, had to forfeit their entire medical, disability and retirement packages. On top of that, each say they must extract taxes and attorney’s fees--which continue to rise--from the flat amount. The net, in other words, hardly resembles the gross.

“They act like we won the lottery,” Killane said with an air of disgust. “Me, I’m scared to death. I’ve got no idea what I’m going to do. This whole thing has cost me dearly. About the only thing left is my self-esteem.”

Chatham is working a temporary job near her home in San Diego County, but after November, when it expires, “I have no idea what I’m going to do. I don’t need to tell you, I’m terrified. Nothing like this has ever happened to me.”

Krahel, the former senior associate director for ambulatory services at UCI, received the largest sum, but, as fate would have it, is easily the least in need.

Before the crisis became public, her husband, a health-care entrepreneur, conceived of and marketed an ear thermometer that became the standard in emergency rooms and clinics nationwide. He sold the business last August for what Krahel calls “a comfortable seven figures.”

She says money was never the issue, nor is it now.

“The last thing I needed was to go through a year of hell and end up with $250,000, which is the most I’ll have after attorney’s fees,” said the mother of four. “I’m still consumed by the issue of bringing closure to this. I haven’t really thought about [the settlement fee]. I guess it’s given me a bit of a cushion because, career-wise, I don’t know if I’ll ever end up back on my feet. None of us do.”

Krahel’s concerns about alleged impropriety at the Center for Reproductive Health began in 1993 with what she said were the discovery of questionable financial arrangements between the school and Asch and his colleagues.

In the months that followed, she also learned of allegations by other employees that fertility doctors were using non-approved drugs and transferring eggs without consent. Her concerns culminated in a July 18, 1994, complaint that branded her the chief whistle-blower.

She was placed on administrative leave nine days later by Mary Piccione, the executive director of UCI Medical Center. Piccione and her deputy, Herb Spiwak--accused in a university audit of subjecting the whistle-blowers to “a common scheme of retaliation”--were fired on Thursday.

In June of last year, Krahel met with a nurse at the center, Norbert (Gil) Giltner, who recently told a state Senate committee that he had notified UCI authorities of the misappropriation of human eggs and embryos as far back as 1992 but that two years passed before anyone launched an investigation.

Krahel, he said, was the first person--indeed, the only person--who took his claims seriously.

“Since the day I met with Gil, there probably hasn’t been more than a four-hour time span other than sleep when I haven’t been consumed with this,” she said.

Until recently, the women also were bound by an agreement of confidentiality regarding the settlement with UCI. But Krahel and Killane were granted a waiver in testifying before the committee, chaired by state Sen. Tom Hayden (D-Santa Monica).

Since then, the three have even given interviews, such as the one with People.

“Every time I think of it,” Krahel said of the People experience, “I get sick to my stomach.”

Indeed, all three are in agreement that the media have taken some getting used to. Killane turned down interviews with ABC’s Barbara Walters and NBC’s “Dateline.” And both Chatham and Krahel, neighbors as well as friends, live in a quiet hamlet of San Diego County, where the two celebrate the fact that newspapers there have all but ignored the scandal.

“It’s been wonderful ,” Krahel said. “We’ve been able to go home and just hide. Nobody down there even seems to know about it.”

That isn’t the case in Orange County. In addition to a veritable tsunami of coverage here, Krahel also cited confusion about details of the role she played. For instance, in a June 21 Times article, she was inaccurately quoted as suggesting the Center for Reproductive Health should be closed.

Actually, Krahel’s predecessor at UCI, Stephany J. Ander, attributed that remark to Spiwak, during a July, 1994, conversation with university auditors. “I’ve never been of the opinion that any medical center activities should be closed down,” Krahel said.

For Krahel, a native Californian, the future is “a bit of a blur,” but she worries even more about Killane, who moved from her native New York in 1992 only to be engulfed by one of the worst scandals in UC history.

“Who’s hiring people at my age?” said Killane, a divorcee with four grown children, four grandchildren and no immediate job prospects. “They’re letting people my age go. My future is very uncertain.”

Their agreement with UCI keeps them from working elsewhere in the UC system, which Killane sees as grossly unfair. Killane, who managed the Center for Reproductive Health, suffered punitive actions from the UCI Medical Center after complaining that doctors were using the non-FDA-approved drug, HMG Massone.

“All I wanted from the very beginning,” she said, “was to be away from UCI. Just let me go to one of the other campuses, I told them. San Diego [UCSD] might be nice. But I don’t think it’s going to happen.”

A point in their favor occurred Thursday, however, when Glenn Campbell, a UC regent, publicly declared that, in the wake of the Piccione-Spiwak firing, all three women should be reinstated. But none have received a call from UC officials or any other prospective employer, and all are worried.

“I come from a close-knit, Irish Catholic, New York family,” said Killane, who lives in a small apartment in Irvine. “There was never any doubt in my mind about doing the right thing, and I’d do it all over again tomorrow. But as for getting rich, that’s laughable. As it is, I’m barely getting by. And the future is bleak.”

She paused and said, “I didn’t deserve to be treated like this. I can see why whistle-blowers have such a high suicide rate. I’ve been in therapy just to get through it all. It’s helped, because it reinforced that I did the right thing.”

“But, hey, remember,” Chatham said with a laugh, “Marilyn and Debra got a whole lot more. I was the cheap one.”

Chatham, the administrator for UCI’s outpatient clinics and private-practice pavilions, said her five-figure sum “basically covered the time I was out of work--and that’s it.” She was let go in late July of last year and given no reason for her dismissal.

“It’s all taken quite a toll,” said Chatham, who says she helped Giltner and Krahel document allegations of eggs being taken without consent. “My mom and dad live in Irvine, and every time I go up there I get butterflies in my stomach.”

As evidence of the worrisome psychology nagging her and her colleagues, Chatham often finds herself contemplating her future and how prospective employers might react when finding out about the role she played in exposing a scandal.

“You wonder if they’ll think, ‘Is this a pattern with her?’ I dread having to face those questions,” she said.

“Having to talk about UCI and how it ended . . . it’s very difficult, very traumatic. I hate even thinking about it. I’m not looking forward to taking the next step at all.”

Chatham also is puzzled by praise for what some call her integrity and courage.

“I don’t understand it,” said the mother of three, married to the same man for 23 years. “I’ve been the Girl Scout leader, the Cub Scout den mom, the Sunday school teacher. . . . This is what I do. This is who I am. This wasn’t something I looked for. A wrong had been committed--right in front of me. It was there, it had to be dealt with, it was wrong. And that’s all.”

The real victims, she said, were the patients, such as Debbie and John Challender, who went to the center to receive fertility treatments from Asch. During that time, the physician harvested 21 eggs in a procedure that led to the birth of the Challenders’ son in August, 1992. But without their consent, the doctor allegedly took 10 of the 46 eggs harvested by Debbie Challender, and implanted them in another woman, according to the couple’s testimony before Hayden’s committee.

“We can’t possibly take on the burden of the worry of every single patient to whom this might have happened,” Krahel said. “But, we decided, we could do our part in making certain that all the problems were brought to the surface, and were appropriately dealt with.

“I think I’ve lost a lot of respect for the due process of a given institution,” she said. “But as far as my altruistic feelings of what’s right and wrong, I actually feel re-energized. I know we did the right thing. We paid a price, but we did the right thing. And for the rest of our lives, we’ll know that.”