One-time Mars InSight Lander engineer scores $1.5m redress over whistleblower sacking

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Click For Photo: https://regmedia.co.uk/2015/05/28/insight_mars_lander.jpg

An American jury has awarded $1.5m to a former NASA engineer who was fired by his contractor ManTech in retaliation for his blowing the whistle over documents from Lockheed Martin.

David Lillie was able to "prove, by a preponderance of the evidence, that he had a good faith belief that ManTech was committing a fraud or falsehood" against the American government "to obtain the payment of money", according to a US jury verdict (PDF, 15 pages).

ManTech - ManTech - International - Corporation - Contractor

ManTech, properly known as ManTech International Corporation, was a contractor on the Mars InSight Lander in late 2014 when Lillie was helping design the spacecraft's High Efficiency Power Supply.

According to Lillie's original complaint (PDF, 22 pages), he needed access to a set of Lockheed Martin-owned Mathcad files, and, the US District Court for the Central District of California was told, there were "unusually strict" controls around these files.

Files - Someone - ManTech - NASA - Jet

After he asked about accessing the files legitimately, someone hired by ManTech from NASA's famous Jet Propulsion Lab, the JPL, told him they had acquired the files...

(Excerpt) Read more at: www.theregister.co.uk

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