Star-Ledger: Able Labs fabricated test data

According to a report by George E. Jordan in the July 12 issue of the Newark Star-Ledger, Able Labs altered test data to cover up production of tens of thousands of tablets and capsules that did not meet FDA standards. The company "cut and pasted" computer files and swapped sample vials to eliminate evidence of weak or superpotent medications.

Separately, the Star-Ledger also reported on the fraud of Suprema Specialties, who wowed Wall Street by creating a carousel of fake invoices and shipments. Forbes Magazine called the Paterson, NJ-based company one of the country's best small companies and Fortune ranked it among the fastest growing.

That Forbes and Fortune were taken in by what amounted to a street-corner shell game reminds one of how the scientific journals Science and Nature were fooled by the fraudulent and basically-nonexistent work of Jan-Hendrik Schon of Lucent (Bell Labs).

The fraud of Suprema (and of officers Cocchiola and Venechanos) cost stockholders 700 million. In the case of Schon, there were hundreds of millions of dollars of funding to followup the fraudulent work.