Potential Laboratory Sabotage

[ssfgrad]

I got into the new lab!  This lab is even more tailor made for me than the last lab.  If anything I am annoyingly tenacious, so that definitely helped me through the application process. I wanted to post this update because so many people in this thread helped me through one of the darkest times in my career.  Thank you from the bottom of my heart! Also, to those that private messaged me expressing that they were having similar experiences, please trust your gut.  If your gut says "run", run. There will always be other opportunities out there.  If I had stayed in that lab my work would have been subpar and the stress would have taken years off of my life.  Now, I am onto better and brighter things.   

[fuzzylogician]

That is an awesome update, I am so glad that things are finally working out for you!! Thank you for coming back to share your good news  

[Concordia]

I don't know if this has come up before, but @fuzzylogician 's avatar always makes me think of a horse's head until I look at it more closely.zzfuzzylogicianylogician

[fuzzylogician]

9 hours ago, Concordia said:

I don't know if this has come up before, but @fuzzylogician 's avatar always makes me think of a horse's head until I look at it more closely.zzfuzzylogicianylogician

That's a first... 

[Concordia]

Make sure to cite it properly-- it's not often I am first to an important new discovery.

[steve660]

I know it’s a bit late, but I just came across this thread and it brought back memories of the nightmare I suffered when doing my PhD (chemistry) at a prestigious UK university.  To cut a long story very short, simple preparations of my starting material kept going wrong, I was ridiculed and humiliated by my supervisor’s assistant, and driven to despair and the verge of nervous breakdown.  It took me months to realise that somebody might be sabotaging them, months more to realise it was the assistant who was doing it.  My supervisor was dismissive, even blaming me for causing him “trouble”, and reminded me I had no evidence.  I went to the departmental head of security, told him I thought my work was being sabotaged, whereupon he promptly named the assistant!  Apparently he had been after the creep for years, suspecting him of other acts of sabotage, and theft, but was stymied by lack of proof.  I eventually got my PhD (no thanks to the assistant) and was glad to get out of that place.  Years later I came across the Hare psychopathy checklist and was disturbed, but not surprised, to find that the assistant ticked more than half the boxes.

In my case the creep got away with it, but I note that in two other cases (victims were Magdalena Koziol at Yale, and Heather Ames at Michigan) hidden cameras were used successfully to catch the culprits.  Also in each case, the supervisors did not handle the situations well.  Koziol ended up suing hers’, Ames’ one accused her of sabotaging her own work!

I guess the moral is, don’t trust even your closest colleagues, go to whoever is in charge of security not your supervisor, and insist on hidden cameras.

[ssfgrad]

Hello all!  It has been a whirlwind of year for me completing all of my PhD coursework over again at a new university (no the credits did not transfer).  There is now an end in sight and I wanted to give you an update on this crazy story.  First off, I am doing wonderfully in my new lab.  In fact, all of those hours of needlessly troubleshooting my work in my old lab has made me a very proficient bench scientist.  My new project is really killer and is gaining some traction/winning some tiny university based awards. Each little win I get solidifies my decision on leaving my old lab. Right now I am at a scientific conference and my old lab is in attendance.  My old PI and Sarah are here! It’s very awkward and this is the first time I have seen them since I quit.  Unfortunately, this is going to be something I deal with because we are still very much in the same field.  I have just held my head up and moved on each time I’ve seen them. I have been a little nervous that Sarah would try to fabricate a story about me, which is why I have made sure to always have someone around me while walking around.  Here is what I can gather based on their presentations/behavior. Veronica graduated after seven years in the lab. It looks like she never received a first authored publication and that all of her pubs were authored by Sarah. The PI gave a talk on Veronica’s dissertation work and she isn’t listed as a coauthor on it. An undergrad gave a poster closely borrowing from the project that I designed while in the lab. All in all, it seems that it is still as toxic as ever. This is my first time at this specific conference and the old lab knows a lot of people, so it has been pretty intimidating but I am pushing through. This afternoon there is an awards ceremony and they are announcing grant awardees for a grant that I applied for.  Fingers crossed!  I wanted to update here since this post has chronicled all of the ins and outs of my situation.  Cheers! 

Edited January 6, 2019 by ssfgrad

[higaisha]

this thread is more interesting than any movie tbh. Glad you're doing better now!

[ssfgrad]

I know, right!  My friends think I should write a book ?.  

I received the grant btw, I walked right past the old lab to accept it. Sweet, sweet victory. Now, onto bigger and better things!  

[CanadianHopeful]

On 1/7/2019 at 6:31 AM, ssfgrad said:

I know, right!  My friends think I should write a book ?.  

I received the grant btw, I walked right past the old lab to accept it. Sweet, sweet victory. Now, onto bigger and better things!  

 

I would read it. This thread is intense.