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Andrew F. Pierce (State Bar No. 101889) 

Gretchen Birkheimer (State Bar No. 222184) 

PIERCE & SHEARER LLP 

2055 Woodside Road, Suite 110 

Redwood City, CA 94061 

Phone: (650) 843-1900 

Fax: (650) 843-1999 

Email: apierce@pierceshearer.com 

gbirkheimer@pierceshearer.com 

Attorneys for Plaintiff 

BALAKANAP ATHY RAJARATNAM 

UNITED STATES DISTRICT COURT 

NORTHERN DISTRICT OF CALIFORNIA 

BALAKANAPATHY RAJARATNAM, Case No. 

Plaintiff, COMPLAINT 

v. JURY TRIAL REQUESTED 

THE BOARD OF TRUSTEES OF THE 

LELAND STANFORD JUNIOR 

UNIVERSITY, 

Defendants. 

PlaintiffBALAKANPATHY RAJARATNAM hereby alleges as follows: 

JURISDICTION AND VENUE 

1. The jurisdiction of this Court is invoked pursuant to 28 U.S.C. § 1331 because 

the subject matter of Plaintiffs claim is premised on the American Reinvestment and 

Recovery Act of 2009, Public Law 111-5, 123 Stat. 115 (Feb. 17, 2009) (hereafter "ARRA"), 

as hereinafter more fully appears. Supplemental jurisdiction of Plaintiffs state law claims set 

forth herein are premised on 28 U.S.C. §1367. 

2. Venue as to all claims for relief asserted by this Complaint is proper in this 

District pursuant to 28 U.S.C. § 1391(b) because a substantial part of the events or omissions 

giving rise to the claim occurred in this judicial district. 

Ill 

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PARTIES 

3. PlaintiffBALAKANPATHY RAJARATNAM ("Plaintiff') is, and at all times 

relevant hereto has been, a resident of the State of California, County of Santa Clara. From 

March 28, 2008 through the date of the filing of this complaint, Plaintiff has been employed 

as an Assistant Professor of Statistics and Assistant Professor of Earth System Science at 

Leland Stanford Junior University in the County of Santa Clara, State of California. 

4. Defendant The Board of Trustees of the Leland Stanford Junior University 

(hereafter "Stanford") is a corporate trust organized under the laws of the State of California, 

doing business in the County of Santa Clara, California. 

PROCEDURAL BACKGROUND 

5. In or about April, 2015, Plaintiff filed a complaint with the Office of the 

Inspector General of the National Science Foundation, alleging that Stanford had improperly 

sanctioned and effectively discharged Plaintiff in reprisal for Plaintiffs report of the misuse 

of federal funds in an ARRA-funded research paper (hereafter "Reprisal Complaint"). 

6. The OIG and Plaintiff agreed to a six-month extension of time for the OIG to 

issue its report the Reprisal Complaint to the head of the National Science Foundation. 

7. On or about September 28, 2016, the OIG issued its report on the Reprisal 

Complaint. 

8. On or about November 3, 2016, the National Science Foundation issued its 

final decision on Plaintiffs reprisal complaint in accordance with section 15 5 3 of ARRA. 

9. All conditions precedent to filing a suit have been performed or have occurred. 

ALLEGATIONS COMMON TO ALL COUNTS 

10. In or about March, 2010, Plaintiff and a co-author submitted a paper funded by 

an NSF grant under ARRA to the journal Annals of Statistics. Tony Cai, a co-editor of the 

journal, acknowledged receipt of the article and requested some revisions, which Plaintiff 

considered. In November, 2010, Cai notified Plaintiff that the journal was rejecting the 

article. 

11. Plaintiff subsequently learned that in June, 2010, Cai co-authored a paper 

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addressing the same problem as Plaintiffs paper and containing the same results as Plaintiffs 

paper, and submitted Cai's paper to the Annals of Statistics for publication. 

12. In January, 2011, Plaintiff and his co-author submitted the paper to a second 

journal, which accepted it without substantial revisions. Unbeknownst to Plaintiff, Tiefeng 

Jiang, one of the reviewers of Plaintiffs article at the second journal, had co-authored the 

June 2010 paper with Cai. 

13. In February, 2011, Cai and Jiang published a supplement to their June 2010 

article addressing the same problem as Plaintiffs paper and containing the same results as 

Plaintiffs paper. The Cai-Jiang paper acknowledged that it had been funded by ARRA 

grants. 

14. Plaintiff reported Cai and Jiang's actions to the Institute of Mathematical 

Statistics ("IMS"), which undertook an investigation in August 2011 concerning whether Cai 

had a conflict of interest or at least an appearance of conflict of interest when he reviewed and 

suggested revisions to Plaintiffs paper without disclosing to Plaintiff that he was working on 

a paper concerning the identical problem and submitting his own paper for publication while 

rejecting Plairttiff s paper. IMS appointed Stanford Professor Iain Johnstone to conduct the 

investigation. 

15. In or about October, 2011, Johnstone issued a report finding no conflict of 

interest or appearance of conflict of interest. However, the report contained redactions from 

correspondence between Johnstone and Plaintiff in which Johnstone had conceded that Cai 

should not have reviewed Plaintiffs paper. As a result of Johnstone's report, IMS closed the 

investigation, and Cai and Jiang are generally considered in the field to have been the first to 

publish the results. 

16. In direct conversation with Plaintiff, Johnstone warned Plaintiff to keep the 

plagiarism allegations quiet if Plaintiff wanted to stay at Stanford "in the long run" and that if 

Plaintiff pursued the allegations he would "win the battle but lose the war." 

17. In or about March, 2012, Plaintiff reported his plagiarism allegations against 

Cai and Jiang, and the ensuing cover-up by Johnstone, to the then-Chair of the Statistics 

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Department at Stanford. In January, 2013, Plaintiff met with Stanford Dean Pamela Matson 

about the plagiarism and cover-up allegations. Dean Matson referred Plaintiff to the 

University's Research Compliance Officer, Kathy McClelland, who declined to investigate 

the allegations against Cai and Jiang because they were not Stanford faculty. In May, 2013, 

Plaintiff spoke with Stanford Associate Dean of Earth Sciences Sue Crutcher, reporting that 

Johnstone had threatened Plaintiff to stay quiet about the plagiarism allegations. 

18. Stanford did not investigate or take any action against Johnstone, who is and at 

all relevant times herein was a Stanford faculty member, as a result of Plaintiffs reports. 

19. On September 27, 2013, one of Plaintiffs graduate student advisees, who had 

previously made romantic and sexual overtures toward Plaintiff and been rebuffed, 

complained to Stanford officials that Plaintiff had sexually harassed him. Stanford 

commenced an investigation of the student's complaint in or about October, 2013. 

20. The individual charged with conducting the investigation was Dean Richard 

Saller, a close personal friend of Johnstone. Johnstone had served as the Vice-Dean of the 

School of Humanities alongside Dean Saller for some time. The investigation of the student's 

complaint was not conducted in accordance with the procedures set forth in Stanford's 

Statement on Faculty Discipline, as was required for any complaint of sexual harassment 

against a faculty member. Under Saller's direction, the investigation ranged far afield of the 

student's initial complaint, including pointed questioning regarding Plaintiffs plagiarism 

allegations against Cai and Jiang. On January 22, 2014, Saller and Dean Matson issued a 

letter of findings from the investigation. The letter contained numerous personal slurs against 

Plaintiff and purported to impose disciplinary sanctions against Plaintiff prohibiting him from 

mentoring graduate students. 

21. Without graduate student advisees to mentor and collaborate with, Plaintiff is 

unable to conduct significant research activity. Plaintiff was up for tenure 

22. Plaintiff appealed Saller and Matson's decision to then-Stanford Provost John 

Etchemendy, alleging that Saller was biased against Plaintiff based on Plaintiffs reports of 

Johnstone's cover-up of the plagiarism by Cai and Jiang, and that Saller had used an 

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unfounded and uncorroborated student complaint as a pretext for retaliating against Plaintiff 

for Plaintiff's allegations against Johnstone. Etchemendy considered Plaintiff's allegations 

for several months, and in or about January 2015, issued a letter of findings upholding Saller's 

sanction prohibiting Plaintiff from working with any new graduate students. 

23. In March, 2015, Plaintiff appealed Etchemendy's decision to then-Stanford 

President John Hennessey. 

24. On March 4, 2015, the Chair of the Statistics Department notified Plaintiff that 

his tenure review process was beginning. 

25. In or about April, 2015, Plaintiff filed an online Whistleblower report against 

Stanford with the Office of the Inspector General of the National Science Foundation, 

contending that Stanford's actions constituted unlawful reprisal against Plaintiff in violation 

of the ARRA Whistleblower provisions. 

26. In or about March, 2016, Hennessey denied Plaintiff's appeal and ordered the 

January 2014 Saller and Matson letter and the January 2015 Etchemendy letter to be placed in 

Plaintiffs tenure file. 

27. In or about October, 2016, with uncomplimentary letters from Hennessy, 

Etchemendy, and Saller and Matson appearing in Plaintiff's tenure file, and with knowledge 

that Plaintiff had been prohibited from working with graduate students pursuant to directives 

in those letters, faculty members in the Department of Statistics and Department of Earth and 

System Sciences voted to deny Plaintiff's tenure application. 

FIRST CAUSE OF ACTION 

Violation of ARRA, §1553 

(Against Stanford) 

28. Plaintiff hereby incorporates by reference all preceding paragraphs as if fully 

set forth herein. 

29. The ARRA makes unlawful for any non-Federal employer receiving covered 

funds under ARRA to discharge, demote, or otherwise discriminate against an employee as a 

reprisal for disclosing information to a person with supervisory authority over the employee 

(or such other person working for the employer who has the authority to investigate, discover, 

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or terminate misconduct) that the employee reasonably believes is evidence of an abuse of 

authority or violation of a regulation relating to covered funds. 

30. When Plaintiff reported his plagiarism and cover-up allegations to senior 

Stanford officials in 2011 and 2012, Plaintiff had a reasonable belief that Cai and Jiang had 

engaged in a misuse of ARRA funds by plagiarizing Plaintiffs and his co-author's March 

2010 paper, and that Johnstone had aided and abetted this misuse by covering up evidence of 

the plagiarism. 

31. Stanford is and at all relevant times herein has been a non-Federal employer 

and a recipient of federal research grants under ARRA. 

32. Stanford unlawfully discriminated against Plaintiff in reprisal for Plaintiffs 

report of Cai, Jiang and Johnstone's misuse of ARRA funds by, inter alia, subjecting Plaintiff 

to extraordinary sanctions purporting to have been based on an uncorroborated and 

thoroughly refuted complaint from a troubled graduate student, in violation of Stanford's own 

faculty discipline policies. Such sanctions include, without limitation, prohibiting Plaintiff 

from taking on any new graduate students as advisees and mentees or recruiting new graduate 

students to join Plaintiffs research group, publishing highly colored and personally malicious 

letters regarding the student complaint to Plaintiffs tenure file, with the fully foreseeable 

result that Plaintiffs tenure application was denied and Plaintiff has been forced to seek less 

prestigious employment elsewhere. 

3 3. As a result of Stanford's actions set forth hereinabove, Plaintiff has suffered 

harm to his reputation; lost wages and employment benefits; and emotional stress, anxiety and 

humiliation, all to Plaintiffs detriment. 

WHEREFORE, Plaintiff prays for judgment as set forth below: 

1) For compensatory (special) damages, including without limitation, lost wages 

(including back pay and front pay and employment benefits) according to 

proof; 

2) For general damages, including without limitation, for mental and emotional 

distress according to proof; 

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3) For reasonable attorneys' fees pursuant to, without limitation, those provided 

by Public Law 111-5, 123 Stat. 115 (Feb. 17, 2009) §1553(c)(3); 

4) For costs of suit incurred herein; 

5) For an award of interest, including prejudgment interest, at the legal rate; and 

6) For such other and further relief as the Court deems proper. 

JURY DEMAND 

Plaintiff Balakanapathy Rajaratnam hereby demands a trial by jury of all issues 

pursuant to Rule 38 of the Federal Rules of Civil Procedure and Public Law 111-5, 123 Stat. 

115 (Feb. 17, 2009) §1553(c)(3). 

Dated: December 30, 2016 

7 

COMPLAINT 

An rewF. P 

Gretchen E. Birkheimer 

Attorneys for Plaintiff 

BALAKANPATHY 

RAJARATNAM 

Case No.· 

/. 

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