Former Stanford clinical research coordinator Naheed Mangi was found guilty by a federal jury on Feb. 24 for altering patient records on a database for a study on breast cancer more than 10 years ago. Mangi’s actions allegedly cost the university thousands of dollars, and she faces up to 10 years in prison. Mangi is scheduled to be sentenced on July 21.
Her charges are in relation to intentional damage through a protected computer and accessing and obtaining information from that computer.
From 2012 to 2013, alongside monitoring ongoing research, Mangi was responsible for helping oversee patient appointments and the data collected through the research studies. Mangi’s role, which included entering this data and reporting patient experiences during the studies, granted her access to sensitive information.
According to court records, Mangi was terminated by Stanford due to a “work performance” issue on Aug. 19, 2013. Near the time of her termination, Mangi had been assigned to a study focused on examining the safety and efficacy of a potential treatment for patients with breast cancer.
Stanford staff recalled Mangi being visibly angry for having been terminated, according to court records. Although Mangi’s supervisor at the time requested the sponsor of the study — Genentech, a biotechnology company — to revoke Mangi’s credentials and system privileges due to possessing high-risk data, an entire day passed until the request was fulfilled.
By then, Mangi had already logged back in and edited the data which court records suggest were filled with falsehoods and inappropriate remarks about her former boss and physicians.
On that day, Mangi had also reportedly tried to cancel numerous patient appointments through contacting a patient scheduler who, out of suspicion, denied the requests.
In response to her actions, Stanford re-entered the accurate data from retrieved documents into the database which Mangi had altered and reported her to authorities.
Acting United States Attorney Patrick D. Robbins shared his thoughts on Mangi.
“Her senseless actions undermined a study into the safety and efficacy of a new treatment for breast cancer patients,” Robbins said, according to a press release by the U.S. Attorney’s Office, Northern District of California.
The Daily has reached out to the University for comment.
A previous version of this article stated that Mangi was fired in 2023, not 2013. The Daily regrets this error.