The study, by Dr. Kwang Cha, Dr. Rogerio Lobo, and Daniel Wirth, was published in 2001 in the Journal of Reproductive Medicine. Dr. Cha, first author of the prayer study, has now been charged with plagiarism involving a more recent study. According to a Feb. 18 Los Angeles Times article, Dr. Alan DeCherney, editor-in-chief of Fertility and Sterility, concluded that a 2005 article by Dr. Cha and associates. was a word-for-word, chart-for-chart copy of a paper previously published by a different author in a Korean medical journal. “I'm sure that it's plagiarism,” Dr. DeCherney told the L.A. Times....
In October 2002, coauthor Daniel Wirth, a mysterious man with no medical or scientific training, was indicted by a federal grand jury on multiple felony charges. An FBI investigation found that Mr. Wirth and an accomplice had been using the identities of dead boys to orchestrate criminal schemes. Inexplicably, editors at the JRM still refused to respond to questions about the paper.
In May 2004, Mr. Wirth pled guilty to felony charges and was taken into custody by federal marshals. He admitted that he was the man who designed the prayer study and supposedly set up and managed prayer groups in three nations. ...
After Mr. Wirth's revelation, Columbia University announced that Dr. Lobo had only provided editorial assistance, actually had nothing to do with the alleged research, and could not even verify that the study had ever been conducted.
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In summary, the man who designed and supposedly conducted the prayer study resides in federal prison, and the man originally listed as lead author admits he knows nothing about the alleged research. The only remaining author has now been charged with plagiarism.
This may be the first time in history that all three authors of a randomized, controlled study have been found guilty of fraud, deception, and/or plagiarism. Even more remarkable is the fact that the JRM has steadfastly refused to retract its physics-defying paper. Dr. Devoe at the JRM did not respond to numerous calls and e-mail requests to state his position on this matter