Document ID: s3://data.kl3m.ai/documents/govinfo/USCOURTS/USCOURTS-ca13-19-02291/USCOURTS-ca13-19-02291-0/pdf.json

Parties Involved:
Department of Veterans Affairs
Respondent
Negar Hessami
Petitioner
Merit Systems Protection Board
Respondent

Document Text:

United States Court of Appeals 

for the Federal Circuit ______________________

NEGAR HESSAMI,

Petitioner

v.

MERIT SYSTEMS PROTECTION BOARD,

Respondent

______________________

2019-2291

______________________

Petition for review of the Merit Systems Protection 

Board in No. PH-1221-17-0271-W-2.

______________________

Decided: November 9, 2020

______________________

KELLEE BOULAIS KRUSE, The Employment Law Group, 

Washington, DC, argued for petitioner. Also represented 

by ROBERT SCOTT OSWALD. 

 JEFFREY GAUGER, Office of General Counsel, United 

States Merit Systems Protection Board, Washington, DC, 

argued for respondent. Also represented by KATHERINE 

MICHELLE SMITH, TRISTAN LEAVITT. 

 ______________________

Before NEWMAN, REYNA, and STOLL, Circuit Judges.

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2 HESSAMI v. MSPB

REYNA, Circuit Judge.

The petitioner, Dr. Negar Hessami, a former Chief of 

Pharmacy for a Department of Veterans Affairs medical 

center, challenges the Merit Systems Protection Board’s 

dismissal of her whistleblower appeal for lack of jurisdiction. We hold that for purposes of the Board’s jurisdiction 

under the Whistleblower Protection Act (“WPA”), when determining whether an appellant has non-frivolously alleged that she disclosed information that she reasonably 

believed evidenced misconduct under the statute, the 

Board’s inquiry should be limited to evaluating whether 

the appellant has alleged sufficient factual matter, accepted as true, to state a claim that is plausible on its face. 

Because the Board erroneously relied on the testimony of 

agency witnesses in dismissing Dr. Hessami’s appeal for 

lack of jurisdiction, we vacate and remand for further proceedings. 

BACKGROUND

Between 2012 and 2016, Dr. Hessami served as the 

Chief of Pharmacy at the VA Medical Center in Martinsburg, West Virginia (“the Center”). During that time, the 

first curative therapies for Hepatitis C Virus infection

(“HCV”) entered the market, and the Center grappled with 

the challenge of providing patients with access to the enormously expensive but life-saving new therapies. The new 

medications were funded through a budget assigned by the 

Regional Veteran Integrated Service Network (“VISN”) 

specifically for HCV patients at the Center. Hessami Affidavit, J.A. 989–94 (“Aff.”), ¶ 4. Along with the budget, the

regional VISN provided treatment guidelines for administration of HCV therapies. Id. at ¶ 16. Dr. Hessami was 

responsible for overseeing the ordering and dispensing of 

the HCV medications at the Center. Id. at ¶ 19. As part of

her role, she became familiar with HCV treatment guidelines, monitored all purchases of HCV medications, and 

provided weekly reports of purchases and relevant 

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HESSAMI v. MSPB 3

treatment information to the VISN. Id. at ¶¶ 7–11. She 

also served as the pharmacy’s point of contact for the regional VISN, and worked with the Center’s Chief of Staff, 

Jonathan Fierer, and the Chief of Medicine, Deborah Bennett, to assemble a hepatitis interdisciplinary team (“HIT” 

or “IDT”) that met weekly to coordinate the treatment of 

HCV patients at the facility. Id. at ¶¶ 5–6.

The first of the curative HCV medications, simeprevir 

and sofosbuvir, were approved by the FDA in 2013. These 

drugs, which were often prescribed together in a regimen 

referred to as “S&S,” were priced at hundreds of dollars per 

pill. According to national guidelines and manufacturing 

prescribing information, the typical length of therapy was 

12 weeks, but patients could be treated for longer periods

under certain circumstances. Id. at ¶ 11. In the fall of 

2014, two new combination therapies for the treatment of 

HCV were approved under the brand names Viekira and 

Harvoni. Id. at ¶ 15. The newer drugs were available to 

the Center at a fraction of the cost of S&S. The regional 

VISN pharmacy benefits manager recommended that all 

new patients be started on the new products rather than 

S&S beginning in January 2015. Id. at ¶¶ 37, 40. 

A. Whistleblower Disclosures

Between November 2014 and February 2015, Dr. Hessami on multiple occasions raised concerns about the prescribing practices of Dr. Trent Nichols, M.D., one of the 

physicians at the Center who treated HCV patients. According to Dr. Hessami, Dr. Nichols did not have any experience prescribing HCV drugs to patients before he began 

working at the Center around September of 2014. Id. at 

¶¶ 17–18. Dr. Hessami raised concerns that Dr. Nichols 

was departing from the recommended treatment protocols

by continuing to prescribe S&S when the guidelines recommended using the newer therapies, and by prescribing S&S 

to patients for longer than the typical 12-week course. Id.

at ¶¶ 20–26, 28–30, 33–34, 38, 42–44. According to Dr. 

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Hessami, in multiple meetings, one-on-one discussions,

and emails, she informed senior members of the clinical 

and financial staff at the VISN and at the Center that Dr. 

Nichols’s treatment decisions were (1) unnecessarily exposing patients to increased risk of adverse drug reactions and 

side effects, and (2) overspending the Center’s HCV funds. 

Id. 

For example, Dr. Hessami alleges that during IDT 

meetings, she directly and publicly confronted Dr. Nichols 

and “asked that [he] at least justify why he was going beyond the length of treatment guidelines.” Id. at ¶¶ 23, 43. 

Following one such meeting, she sent an email, dated February 17, 2015, to Dr. Bennett and several others regarding 

Dr. Nichols’s decision to continue prescribing S&S to new 

patients. She explained that the VISN was “adamantly 

asking the facilities to start new patients on Harvoni or 

Viekira,” and was “not funding [the Center] for the patients 

newly started on S&S.” She further explained the financial 

consequences of Dr. Nichols’s decisions:

The cost of S&S drugs combined is ~$52,000.00 vs. 

for Viekira is ~$8,000.00 and Harvoni is 

~$14,000.00 per month/per patient. 

Since the beginning of February, Dr. Nichols has 

started 4 patients on the old two drugs (S&S) for 

total cost of almost $208,000.00 that the medical 

center has to absorb since VISN is not reimbursing 

Martinsburg for the old drugs. 

Last Thursday, in our weekly meetings, I brought 

this issue to Dr. Nichols[’s] attention again and yet 

he has started a new patient on S&S on Friday (02-

13-2015). This is $52,000.00 that we are not going 

to get reimbursed for. 

I would like to humbly ask you to monitor his ordering practices regarding Hep C medications, 

which will compromise the reimbursement funds 

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HESSAMI v. MSPB 5

and providing an excellent patient care that we all 

strive for.

J.A. 125. Dr. Bennett responded to the group that when 

Dr. Nichols had previously been asked not to start new patients on S&S, he had appeared to understand. She suggested that one option for addressing the problem was to 

ask Dr. Nichols to provide a written explanation for the 

new S&S prescriptions and another was to simply not fill 

the new prescriptions. She later informed the team that 

she had decided to block S&S prescriptions going forward 

and that any discussions regarding “necessity” would need 

to be discussed with her directly. J.A. 122–23.

In other emails and meetings, Dr. Hessami voiced more 

general concern that the Center was overspending on HCV 

medication, including that it had spent $9 million of its $13 

million annual budget for HCV medication by January 

2015. J.A. 9, 297–98. After one such meeting during which 

Dr. Hessami raised the issue, Dr. Fierer instructed her not 

to mention the $9 million publicly again. J.A. 10, 977. 

Dr. Hessami alleges that she continued to voice her 

concerns throughout 2015 and that her comments were at 

times met with hostile, derogatory statements by Dr. 

Fierer. Aff. ¶ 29. 

B. Suspension and Demotion

In late 2015, a pharmacy employee accused Dr. Hessami of misconduct, and Dr. Hessami was suspended and 

later demoted for charges of conduct unbecoming a supervisor. Following her demotion, Dr. Hessami filed a complaint with the Office of Special Counsel (“OSC”) under the 

WPA alleging that she had been accused of wrongdoing and

punished as reprisal for her protected disclosures regarding the agency’s spending on HCV drugs. When OSC declined to take action, she filed an individual-right-of-action 

(“IRA”) appeal to the Merit Systems Protection Board under 5 U.S.C. § 1221.

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The VA moved to dismiss her appeal for lack of jurisdiction, asserting that Dr. Hessami had failed to adequately establish that she had made protected 

whistleblower disclosures pursuant to the Whistleblower 

Protection Enhancement Act (“WPEA”).1 J.A. 39–42. Because the parties had already completed discovery, the 

Agency set forth a statement of facts as part of its motion 

that cited to affidavits and deposition testimony from both 

parties’ witnesses as well as documentary evidence. See 

J.A. 33–38.

The Board granted the VA’s motion to dismiss. In its

decision, the Board adopted many of the VA’s proposed 

statements of fact, relying heavily on statements from 

Agency witnesses. In particular, the opinion set forth the 

following representations from Dr. Bennett as “essentially 

undisputed”: 

• The appellant did not raise with [Dr. Bennett], nor 

was there ever a concern over, patient safety with 

Dr. Nichols’s prescribing practices.

• Dr. Nichols’s treatment plans were discussed with 

the HIT, wherein he would always present research 

and documentation to support his treatment approach; and the HIT always approved his treatment 

plans and medications chosen.

• With respect to length of treatment, only a small 

number of patients were extended beyond the typical course, but those cases presented complex 

1 The WPA, effective since 1989, provides the general framework of the whistleblower protection process. The WPEA of 2012 made certain amendments to the 

existing WPA framework regarding, as relevant to this 

case, the scope of protected disclosures and the definition 

of “personnel action.”

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HESSAMI v. MSPB 7

clinical issues and Dr. Nichols looked at their clinical needs based on his long history and experience.

• Dr. Nichols monitored the patients’ lab values, and 

all cases were presented, justified by research, and 

approved by the HIT.

• Dr. Nichols’s treatment choices were recognized as a 

standard of care and cited in current literature 

sources.

• There were clinical reasons to support the use of the 

older drugs over the newer, less expensive drugs. 

J.A. 6.

Based on the record evidence, the Board concluded that 

Dr. Hessami failed to make non-frivolous allegations of a 

violation of law, rule or regulation; or gross mismanagement, gross waste of funds, abuse of authority, or a substantial and specific danger to public health or safety. The 

Board found that Dr. Hessami’s disclosures constituted 

mere disagreement over “fairly debatable” “questions of 

policy” and were thus “not the type of communications protected by the WPEA.” J.A. 14–16. With respect to the 

waste of funds and danger to public health or safety factors, 

the Board found that Dr. Hessami had failed to explain 

why the expenditures she discussed were out of proportion 

to the expected benefits of the treatment and had further 

failed to identify any patients who were actually harmed 

by Dr. Nichols’s prescribing practices. J.A. 13–14. On 

these grounds, the Board dismissed Dr. Hessami’s appeal

for lack of jurisdiction. 

Dr. Hessami petitioned for review in this court. We 

have jurisdiction under 28 U.S.C. § 1295(a)(9). 

DISCUSSION

The Board has jurisdiction over an IRA appeal under 

the WPA, 5 U.S.C. § 1221, if the appellant has exhausted 

her administrative remedies before the OSC and makes 

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8 HESSAMI v. MSPB

“non-frivolous allegations” that (1) she engaged in whistleblowing activity by making a protected disclosure under

5 U.S.C. § 2302(b)(8), and (2) the disclosure was a contributing factor in the agency’s decision to take or fail to take 

a personnel action. 5 U.S.C. § 1221; Yunus v. Dep’t of Veterans Affairs, 242 F.3d 1367, 1371–72 (Fed. Cir. 2001). A 

protected disclosure under Section 2302(b)(8) is one which

the employee “reasonably believes evidences (i) any violation of any law, rule, or regulation, or (ii) gross mismanagement, a gross waste of funds, an abuse of authority, or a 

substantial and specific danger to public health or safety.”

5 U.S.C § 2302(b)(8).

Dr. Hessami contends that the Board erred in crediting 

the agency’s evidence against her in finding that she failed 

to make non-frivolous allegations of a protected disclosure. 

Whether the Board has jurisdiction over an appeal is a 

question of law we review de novo. Forest v. Merit Sys. 

Prot. Bd., 47 F.3d 409, 410 (Fed. Cir. 1995).

A. Non-Frivolous Allegation

We first clarify the appropriate scope of the Board’s inquiry when evaluating its jurisdiction over a whistleblower 

appeal. In Spruill v. Merit Sys. Prot. Bd., this court held 

that the threshold question of whether an appellant has invoked the Board’s jurisdiction should be assessed under a

“non-frivolous allegation” standard analogous to the “wellpleaded complaint rule” used to evaluate federal question 

jurisdiction in federal court. 978 F.2d 679, 687–89 (Fed. 

Cir. 1992). We explained that “under the ‘well-pleaded 

complaint rule,’ whether a district court has federal-question jurisdiction over a claim ‘must be determined from 

what necessarily appears in the plaintiff’s statement of his 

own claim in the bill or declaration.’” Id. at 688 (quoting

Christianson v. Colt Indus. Operating Corp., 486 U.S. 800, 

809 (1988)).

Our subsequent cases have evaluated jurisdiction in 

whistleblower cases based on whether allegations were 

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HESSAMI v. MSPB 9

facially sufficient. See Johnston v. Merit Sys. Prot. Bd.,

518 F.3d 905, 910 (Fed. Cir. 2008); Yunus, 242 F.3d at

1372. This court has consistently treated “a non-frivolous 

allegation” of an element as one that, “‘if proven, can establish the Board’s jurisdiction.’” Cahill v. Merit Sys. Prot.

Bd., 821 F.3d 1370, 1373 (Fed. Cir. 2016) (quoting Garcia 

v. Dep’t of Homeland Sec., 437 F.3d 1322, 1330 (Fed. Cir. 

2006) (en banc)). Most recently, in Piccolo v. Merit Sys.

Prot. Bd., we stated that “at the jurisdictional stage, a petitioner need only assert non-frivolous allegations—allegations that are not ‘vague, conclusory, or facially 

insufficient,’ and that the petitioner ‘reasonably believe[s]’ 

to be true—of a protected disclosure that was a contributing factor to a reprisal.” 869 F.3d 1369, 1371 (Fed. Cir. 

2017) (quoting Johnston, 518 F.3d at 910). We held there 

that evidence concerning “a petitioner’s credibility including . . . consideration of affidavits submitted by an allegedly 

retaliatory supervisor . . . ‘relates to the merits of the 

claim’” rather than jurisdiction. Piccolo, 869 F.3d at 1371

(quoting Johnston, 518 F.3d at 911).

In 2015, the Board codified the non-frivolous allegation 

standard in its regulations at 5 C.F.R. §§ 1201.57(b) and 

1201.4. See Practices and Procedures, 80 Fed. Reg. 4489

(Jan. 28, 2015). Section 1201.57(b) provides that an appellant who initiates a whistleblower appeal “must make nonfrivolous allegations . . . with regard to the substantive 

jurisdictional elements”2 of the appeal. 5 C.F.R. 

§ 1201.57(b). Section 1201.4 defines a “nonfrivolous allegation” as “an assertion that, if proven, could establish the 

matter at issue” and specifies that “[a]n allegation generally will be considered nonfrivolous when, under oath or 

penalty of perjury, an individual makes an allegation that: 

2 This excludes the non-merits elements of exhaustion and standing, which must be established by preponderance of the evidence. 

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10 HESSAMI v. MSPB

(1) Is more than conclusory; (2) Is plausible on its face; and 

(3) Is material to the legal issues in the appeal.” Id. at 

§ 1201.4(s).

We recognize that this court has, on at least one occasion, analogized the standard for establishing non-frivolous allegations to the standard for summary judgment. 

See Kahn v. Dep’t of Justice, 528 F.3d 1336, 1341 (Fed. Cir. 

2008) (“The standard for determining whether non-frivolous disclosures exist ‘is analogous to that for summary 

judgment.’” (quoting Dorrall v. Dep’t of the Army, 

301 F.3d 1375, 1380 (Fed. Cir. 2002))). We did not, however, actually apply the summary judgment standard to

authorize jurisdictional dismissal of a whistleblower appeal based on evidence submitted by the agency. To the 

extent the “summary judgment” analogy suggests that 

such a dismissal would be proper, it is plainly contrary to 

both the Board’s current regulations and our holding in 

Spruill.3 

3 The “summary judgment” analogy in Kahn was 

borrowed from Dorrall, 301 F.3d at 1380, which turned on 

the question of constructive discharge, a question that we 

have since held to be subject to a “preponderance of evidence” test for jurisdictional purposes rather than non-frivolous allegations. See Garcia, 437 F.3d at 1325. Although 

in certain pre-Spruill cases, we approved of the Board’s reliance on the agency’s evidence in finding no jurisdiction, 

those cases involved direct appeals under 5 U.S.C. 

§ 7513(d), where the threshold jurisdictional question was 

whether the employee suffered an appealable personnel action, a determination that is subject to the preponderance 

of the evidence standard. See Manning v. Merit Sys. Prot.

Bd., 742 F.2d 1424, 1428 (Fed. Cir. 1984) (relying on agency 

evidence in concluding that employee was not suspended 

for more than 14 days); Wilson v. Merit Sys. Prot. Bd., 

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HESSAMI v. MSPB 11

Permitting jurisdictional dismissal of an appeal based 

on a summary review of the evidence on the core merits 

issues would undermine Congress’s express intent that the 

merits of employee appeals be resolved through a hearing

rather than summary judgment. As we explained in Crispin v. Dep’t of Commerce, Section 7701 expressly provides 

that in any appeal to the Board, “[a]n appellant shall have 

the right to a hearing for which a transcript will be kept,”

and the legislative history made clear that the provision 

was meant to bar summary judgment. 732 F.2d 919, 922 

(Fed. Cir. 1984) (citing 5 U.S.C. § 7701(a)(1); H.R. REP.

NO. 95–1717, at 137 (1978), as reprinted in 1978 

U.S.C.C.A.N. 2860, 2871). Thus, this court held in Crispin

that even when the documentary record clearly supports

judgment for the agency, the appellant is nonetheless entitled to a hearing on the merits as a matter of statutory 

right.4 Crispin, 732 F.2d at 922. A summary judgment 

standard for “non-frivolous allegations” would allow the 

agency to circumvent that rule and obtain the equivalent 

of summary judgment on the merits by merely framing its 

motion as one for jurisdictional dismissal. 

We thus clarify and hold that when evaluating the 

Board’s jurisdiction over a whistleblower action, the question of whether the appellant has non-frivolously alleged 

protected disclosures that contributed to a personnel action

807 F.2d 1577, 1583 (Fed. Cir. 1986) (relying on agency evidence in concluding that employee had not been reduced 

in grade). 

4 The Board, in recognition of our holdings, declined 

to promulgate a process for summary judgment. Practices 

and Procedures, 77 Fed. Reg. 62350, 62352 (Oct. 12, 2012)

(rejecting suggestion to create summary judgment proceedings because “[t]he Court of Appeals for the Federal Circuit 

has found that the MSPB lacks authority to order summary judgment.”). 

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12 HESSAMI v. MSPB

must be determined based on whether the employee alleged sufficient factual matter, accepted as true, to state a 

claim that is plausible on its face.5 The Board may not 

deny jurisdiction by crediting the agency’s interpretation of 

the evidence as to whether the alleged disclosures fell 

within the protected categories or whether the disclosures 

were a contributing factor to an adverse personnel action. 

With these principles in mind, we turn to the allegations in this case. 

B. Protected Disclosures

Fairly construed, the crux of Dr. Hessami’s allegations 

is that a VA physician, Dr. Nichols, was prescribing the 

more expensive S&S regimen to patients rather than the 

substantially less expensive alternatives, Harvoni and Viekiri, and he was prescribing S&S to patients for substantially longer courses of treatment than necessary or 

recommended. She alleges that she was knowledgeable 

about the local and national HCV treatment guidelines, 

and that Dr. Nichols’s prescription practices were contrary 

to those guidelines. She alleges that the extended treatment exposed patients to substantially increased exposure 

5 It does not follow from this, however, that the 

Board is restricted to considering these allegations in a vacuum. As the Supreme Court has explained regarding the 

analogous well-pleaded complaint rule, “[d]etermining 

whether a complaint states a plausible claim for relief 

will . . . be a context-specific task that requires the reviewing court to draw on its judicial experience and common 

sense.” Ashcroft v. Iqbal, 556 U.S. 662, 679 (2009). And, 

consistent with that analogous rule, the Board may also 

consider sources such as “matters incorporated by reference or integral to the claim, items subject to judicial notice, [and] matters of public record.” See A & D Auto Sales, 

Inc. v. United States, 748 F.3d 1142, 1147 (Fed. Cir. 2014). 

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HESSAMI v. MSPB 13

to adverse drug reactions and side effects for patients and 

that Dr. Nichols’s choice of drugs and duration of therapy 

resulted in hundreds of thousands of dollars in excess costs

for the Center. We can infer from her allegations that at 

the time Dr. Hessami made her disclosures, she believed, 

as she suggested to others, that Dr. Nichols’s decisions to 

depart from treatment guidelines were not otherwise justified. This is supported by her allegations that she confronted Dr. Nichols during meetings to ask him to justify 

his prescribing practices, and that afterwards, Dr. Bennett 

felt it was appropriate to block all prescriptions of S&S and 

to require Dr. Nichols to justify his prescription decisions 

in writing. See Cahill, 821 F.3d at 1373–74 (reading allegations “with an eye on likely inferences appropriate to the 

context” in assessing whether they were non-frivolous and 

plausible). 

These allegations are “non-frivolous” within the meaning of 5 C.F.R. § 1201.4. They were made “under oath” in 

Dr. Hessami’s affidavit. They describe a “facially plausible” series of events. They are not merely “conclusory” because they set forth specific facts supporting Dr. Hessami’s

beliefs of wrongdoing. 

The allegations are also “material” because, if accepted 

as true, they are sufficient to support a reasonable belief of 

gross waste, gross mismanagement, and danger to public 

health. Specifically, assuming that Dr. Hessami’s allegations reflect the facts reasonably known to her at the time 

she made her disclosures, a person in her position could 

reasonably believe that the additional cost of the therapy 

prescribed by Dr. Nichols constituted gross waste because 

it was significantly out of proportion to the additional “benefit reasonably expected to accrue to the government.” See,

e.g., Chambers v. Dep’t of Interior, 515 F.3d 1362, 1366 

(Fed. Cir. 2008). We assume, as we must at this stage, that 

Dr. Hessami reasonably believed that Dr. Nichols failed to 

provide clinical justification for his prescribing decisions. 

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A reasonable person could also conclude that the same 

prescribing practice constituted gross mismanagement because the unjustified higher cost of the therapies was likely 

to have a substantial detrimental impact on the Center’s 

ability to complete its mission of providing care to HCV patients because the prescriptions were rapidly depleting the 

Center’s HCV budget. See Wen Chiann Yeh v. Merit Sys. 

Prot. Bd., 527 F. App’x 896, 900 (Fed. Cir. 2013). This belief could be reasonable even if it was eventually confirmed 

that the Center would be able to secure additional funding. 

Similarly, if we accept as true Dr. Hessami’s allegation 

that Dr. Nichols was prescribing S&S to patients for longer 

than their recommended durations without clinical justification for doing so, a reasonable person in Dr. Hessami’s 

position could conclude that those prescriptions created a 

substantial and significant danger to public health. The 

mere fact that the prescription policy for HCV treatments 

was heavily debated does not strip whistleblower protection from disclosures about specific prescription decisions 

that the whistleblower reasonably believes endangered patients. See Chambers, 515 F.3d at 1368 (“[G]eneral criticism by an employee of the Environmental Protection 

Agency that the Agency is not doing enough to protect the 

environment would not be protected under this subsection. 

However, an allegation by a Nuclear Regulatory Commission engineer that the cooling system of a nuclear reactor 

is inadequate would fall within the whistle blower protections.” (quoting S. REP. NO. 95–969, at 21 (1978), as reprinted in 1978 U.S.C.C.A.N. 2723, 2744)). Here, Dr. 

Hessami’s allegations amount to more than a general assertion that the VA is neglecting the health of its HCV patients. Even if she is unable to identify specific patients 

who were harmed, the allegation that a specific government physician is directing patients to take medications 

with known risks and side effects for an unnecessarily long 

period of time, paired with her reasonable belief that there 

was no clinical justification for doing so, does not represent

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HESSAMI v. MSPB 15

a “negligible, remote, or ill-defined peril that does not involve any particular person, place, or thing, is not protected.” Chambers, 515 F.3d at 1368–69 (citation omitted). 

At the jurisdictional stage, the allegations have sufficient 

specificity and substantiality to support a reasonable belief 

that Dr. Nichols’s prescribing practices constituted a substantial and specific danger to public health. 

In concluding that Dr. Hessami’s disclosures were not 

entitled to protection, the Board found that the substance 

of the disclosures constituted “disagreement over questions 

of policy” and “evidence of robust debate on how effectiveness of the Hep[atitis] C care should be measured and how 

disputes concerning such treatment should be managed.” 

J.A. 14. However, in enacting the WPEA in 2012, Congress 

made clear that policy decisions and disclosable misconduct under the WPA are not mutually exclusive. See

S. REP. NO. 112–155, at 7–8 (2012), as reprinted in 2012 

U.S.C.C.A.N. 589, 595–96. The fact that there was an ongoing debate about the most effective and efficient means 

for providing HCV care to patients does not exclude allegations of misconduct about such care from whistleblower 

protection. 

In finding that the substance of Dr. Hessami’s allegations could not amount to misconduct, the Board assumed, 

based on the testimony of agency witnesses as cited in the 

opinion, that Dr. Nichols’s prescribing choices were clinically justified, and that this should have been known to Dr. 

Hessami. That assumption was impermissible at the stage 

of the proceedings, where the question is the sufficiency of 

Dr. Hessami’s allegations to invoke the Board’s jurisdiction. Regardless of whether the agency may ultimately 

prove on the merits that Dr. Nichols’s prescribing decisions 

were discernibly reasonable, Dr. Hessami has adequately 

alleged a reasonable belief that they were not. The issue 

should therefore be resolved at a hearing. 

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16 HESSAMI v. MSPB

For these reasons, the Board erred in dismissing Dr. 

Hessami’s appeal for failure to allege protected disclosures 

as to gross mismanagement, a gross waste of funds, and a 

substantial and specific danger to public health.6 We 

therefore vacate the Board’s dismissal and remand for further proceedings. 

C. Contributing Factor in Personnel Action

To establish jurisdiction, an appellant must establish 

not only that she exhausted her administrative remedies 

and made protected disclosures, but also that the disclosures were a contributing factor in a “personnel action” 

within the scope of the WPEA. Because the Board dismissed Dr. Hessami’s appeal based on failure to allege protected disclosures, the Board did not reach whether she 

had sufficiently alleged contribution to a personnel action. 

Because neither the Board nor the VA provided any reasoning for why Dr. Hessami’s allegations are inadequate to 

show that her disclosures contributed to her demotion or 

that her demotion constituted a personnel action, we are 

unable to make that determination in the first instance

based on the record before us. Thus, on remand, the Board 

should evaluate the remaining substantive element for 

WPA jurisdiction before proceeding with a hearing on the 

merits. 

6 We agree with the Board that Dr. Hessami made 

no specific allegation for why she reasonably believed that 

her disclosures evidenced a violation of law, rule, or regulation. Even on appeal, she fails to raise any colorable argument for why Dr. Nichols’s departure from treatment 

guidelines would constitute a violation of law, and she 

points to no other sources of law that were violated by the 

conduct she disclosed. 

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HESSAMI v. MSPB 17

CONCLUSION

For the reasons discussed, we conclude that Dr. Hessami made non-frivolous allegations that she made disclosures she reasonably believed evidenced gross 

mismanagement, a gross waste of funds, and a substantial 

and specific danger to public health. We thus vacate the 

Board’s dismissal of Dr. Hessami’s appeal and remand for 

the Board to assess in the first instance whether she nonfrivolously alleged that her disclosures were a contributing 

factor to a personnel action against her, so as to invoke the 

Board’s jurisdiction. If her allegations are adequate in this 

regard, then the Board must provide her with a hearing on 

the merits of her claim. 

VACATED AND REMANDED

COSTS

Costs to petitioner. 

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