A ruling was released a few days ago by the US Department of Justice on the topic of genetic intellectual property laws, barring companies and individuals from claiming patents on isolated genetic sequences. For those of you unfamiliar with this incredibly controversial field, it essentially revolves around the question of whether or not any entity can “own” the rights to a particular sequence of the human genome.

Granted, this isn’t “own” as in “Hi, I’m Genencorp and I own your genes, now give them to me.” It’s a much more abstract and subtle sense of ownership, though it still has a strong impact on the world of biological research (and possibly on each of our lives).
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UC Berkeley graduates make the news frequently, but you won’t see the following story in your alumni magazine. In September of 1968, Dr. Pedro Leonardo Mascheroni received his graduate degree in Physics; in September 2010, he received an indictment from the US government for 22 counts of various flavors of conspiracy and fraud. His wife, Marjorie, is also a Cal alum (B.A. in Fine Art) and is included as a defendant in the case.

As with the best legal dramas, the two sides of this story are drastically different.

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