Certain faculty members at Duke University and the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill have started receiving checks as part of $19 million Duke agreed to pay to settle a class-action lawsuit alleging that the two schools conspired not to steal faculty from each other.
A federal judge approved the settlement agreement in late August, ending a long-running dispute that also included a $54 million settlement Duke paid two years ago to medical faculty at the two schools.
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The lawsuit alleges that Duke and UNC-Chapel Hill officials had a tacit understanding for decades not to try to hire faculty away from the other. When a Duke radiologist learned of the deal after being turned down for a job at UNC Health, she sued in 2015, leading to the first settlement in the case.
As part of that settlement, UNC-Chapel Hill and UNC Health signed a consent agreement in which they promised to no longer participate in any "no poaching" agreements. No monetary damages were part of UNC-Chapel Hill's settlement because it's a state government entity.
During that case, evidence turned up showing that the no-poaching agreement extended beyond the medical schools, so Lucia Binotti, a Spanish professor at UNC-Chapel Hill, filed another lawsuit that named Duke as the sole defendant but listed UNC-Chapel Hill as an "unnamed co-conspirator."
The latest settlement covers non-medical faculty at the two schools between Oct. 1, 2001, and Feb. 5, 2018. It was unclear Monday exactly how many faculty members agreed to be part of the settlement.
Attorneys said full-time faculty were expected to receive an average of $2,341, with adjunct and visiting faculty getting about $152 each. Individual awards were based on the faculty member's annual salary during the period.
Neither Duke nor UNC-Chapel Hill has admitted any wrongdoing in settling the lawsuits.