A University of Georgia (UGA) microbiologist and whistleblower at the Environmental Protection Agency is suing the university Board of Regents, the university research foundation, and five faculty members for accepting federal grant money to publish fraudulent research, according to court documents.

David Lewis, an adjunct professor in the university department of ecology, conducted EPA-funded research in the 1990s on the harmful effects of sewage sludge, and in 1996 wrote a commentary in Nature deriding the agency for the lack of science supporting its regulations. He claims those allegations cost him his job with the EPA, as we reported in 2005.

Beginning in 1998 Lewis began researching human illness and death associated with the use of EPA-regulated sewage sludge. Meanwhile, another team of UGA-EPA researchers -- in a study called the "Risse project" -- also began studying Augusta sewage in 1998, and later reported that the sludge was well within environmental compliance. They vocally opposed Lewis' work, and one member of the Risse project filed allegations of misconduct against him in 2000. The university investigator found the allegations to be groundless.

Lewis and two families whose farms had been affected by the toxic sludge filed suit against members of the Risse project and university bodies in 2006. The case has been sealed until now.

In court documents obtained by Red and Black (a UGA newspaper), the plaintiffs claim that Risse project members intentionally distorted toxic substance amounts in the sludge by collecting samples only during droughts, when levels would be "misleadingly low." The files say that the Risse project garnered more than $1.5 million in federal grants.

Lewis and his co-plaintiffs also claim that the university Board of Regents and the research foundation, which supervised the projects, knew they were fraudulent but supported the work in order to obtain further federal grants.

UGA is one of five finalists vying to become a national center for agro-bioterrorism research. In a letter Lewis' lawyer wrote to UGA president Michael Adams, obtained by the Baltimore Examiner, he said: "I can fully appreciate the ramifications it would have on the University of Georgia's bid to become a national center for agro-bioterrorism research if President Adams were to truthfully acknowledge the role his office has played in the fabrication of scientific data."