Pan Boss Data Charges Dropped

April 20, 2007: Charges against Jim Selim have been cleared after a jury found the Pan Pharmaceuticals founder not guilty of procuring another person to destroy data containing drug testing results.

The data in question was relevant to Pan’s travel sickness drug Travacalm, the travel sickness drug which in 2003 sparked the company’s collapse after the largest drug recall in Australia’s history.

Prosecutors alleged that in early 2003, Selim ordered his IT manager Karl Brooks to destroy the company data. Last month Brooks told the NSW Supreme Court he had taken a particular computer home to destroy the data before returning it to the office the next morning.

The alleged data deletion incident occurred in January 2003, three months before the Therapeutic Goods Administration ordered the Travacalm drug recall after receiving a number of complaints from users.

Justice Fullerton ordered the jury to find Selim not guilty because the prosecution failed to prove the ‘legal ingredients’ of the charges.

“The Crown must prove that the accused knew that the data may be required in federal judicial proceedings,” she tole the Court.

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