Former UA professor sentenced to year in prison

A photo provided by the Washington County jail shows Simon S. Ang, a former electrical engineering professor at the University of Arkansas, Fayetteville who was charged with multiple counts of wire fraud. (Washington County sheriff's office via AP)
A photo provided by the Washington County jail shows Simon S. Ang, a former electrical engineering professor at the University of Arkansas, Fayetteville who was charged with multiple counts of wire fraud. (Washington County sheriff's office via AP)

A former University of Arkansas professor was sentenced Thursday to one year and a day in prison after pleading guilty to one count of making a false statement to the FBI about the existence of patents for his inventions in the People’s Republic of China.

According to court documents, Simon Saw-Teong Ang, 65, of Fayetteville filed 24 patents in China that bear Ang’s name or Chinese birth name.

The University of Arkansas, where Ang worked as a professor, required employees to promptly furnish to the university “full and complete” disclosures of inventions, and university policy provided that it — not individual inventors — would own all inventions created by those subject to the policy, according to a news release from the U.S. Attorney's Office for the Western District of Arkansas.

Despite this requirement, Ang didn't disclose his Chinese patents to the university and, when interviewed by an FBI agent, lied about his involvement in the inventions, according to the news release. Specifically, when asked whether his name would be listed as “the inventor” of numerous patents in China, Ang denied being the inventor, despite knowing he was.

Also, Ang received numerous talent awards from the Chinese government that he didn't list on the university’s annual conflict-of-interest disclosure forms.

After his release from prison, Ang will be on supervised release for one year. He was also fined $5,500.

U.S. District Judge Timothy L. Brooks presided over Thursday's sentencing hearing in federal court in Fayetteville.

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