A former Iowa State University researcher who admitted he faked data to make it appear an experimental AIDS vaccine was working will serve nearly 5 years in prison.
Fifty-seven-year-old Dong Pyou Han had been charged with four counts of making a false statement and ended up pleading guilty to two counts. Prosecutors say Han spiked the blood of rabbits with components of human blood to make it appear the AIDS vaccine he was testing was working.
Han admitted in his plea that the false data was reported to the National Institutes of Health, which had provided 19 million dollars for the research. He was sentenced to 57 months in prison and ordered to pay back just over 7 million dollars.