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by Joe Bergantino
(CBS4) For years, Doctor Leonard Laster was one of the highest paid state employees in Massachusetts.

His total compensation was $2.6 million, an average of about $162,000 a year.

Laster began his state career as Chancellor at the UMass Medical School, with faculty tenure. But after three stormy years, with a few notable successes, he resigned under pressure in 1990.

This story is about what happened next.

A joint investigation by the I-Team and the Worcester Telegram & Gazette uncovered a deal at the UMass Medical School that has cost millions.

Starting in 1990, until Leonard Laster retired in 2002, the people who run the UMass Medical School allowed Laster to collect about $2 million, for doing very little.

His current pension is almost $60,000 a year, one of the more generous in state government.

"This is appalling, disgraceful and it is an insult," says Susan Campbell of the UMass Nurses Union.

The I-Team and the Telegram obtained a document that spells out Dr. Laster's role at the medical school after he resigned as chancellor.

It shows that Laster got a fancy title, "Distinguished University Professor of Medicine and Health Policy."

His responsibilities? The document says teaching and research.

Medical school officials say Laster did not teach any courses. In a statement, Laster says he developed one course but the school declined to offer it.

As for research, there are no records indicating Laster did any medical research.

Other responsibilities laid out in the document include organizing "programs related to health policy" and "developing new ventures" with business and industry.

Laster says he planned a series called the UMass Health Policy Forum. The school did not implement it. There is no record of Laster developing new ventures with business and industry.

The document says Laster was supposed to submit reports twice a year, detailing his plans and activities. Medical school officials say they cannot find any reports.

Those reports were supposed to go to Dr. Aaron Lazare, who succeeded Laster as Medical School Chancellor. He was Laster's boss for 12 years and is still in charge.

Why did the medical school pay Laster for doing so little?

"I don't have the details. He was working but I don't have the details to offer you," Dr Lazare told us.

Laster did write a book compiling interviews with doctors. It is entitled "Life After Medical School."

Laster says the early days of research at The National Institutes of Health was a topic for a possible second book, not yet published. Laster says he researched and wrote a draft over six years.

Laster wrote at least 37 articles over 12 years. Not scholarly research or writing. All of them were opinion pieces in publications including the Washington Post, Boston Globe and Worcester Telegram & Gazette.

Dr. Laster refused our requests for an on-camera interview, so we tried to speak with him outside of his Cape Cod house one recent morning. He did not respond.

After a recent UMass trustees meeting, students protesting fee hikes told us they believe the university should be held accountable.

"It doesn't surprise me, but it disgusts me," said UMass student Jaimie Corliss.

A spokesman for Medical School Chancellor Dr. Lazare says that Dr. Lazare cannot discuss an employee's performance.

The I-Team and the Telegram confronted Lazare at a meeting of the UMass Board of Trustees last month. "Two million dollars of taxpayer money. Why did you waste that money?" Bergantino asked.

Lazare did not answer that question, but a spokesman insists Dr Laster fulfilled the terms of his deal with the medical school.

Dr. Laster told us the same thing.

So how did Laster get paid so much for apparently doing so little?

Why didn't his boss, the medical school chancellor, require him to do more?

What happened in this case raises questions about accountability and management at the UMass Medical School, a school that will receive millions of your tax dollars this year.

In response to our joint investigation with the Worcester Telegram & Gazette, the UMass president has asked a senior university official to investigate exactly what Laster did after he resigned as chancellor. That official will report to the Univeristy's trustees next month.

We will stay on top of this story and let you know what happens.

For the past two months, the I-Team's Joe Bergantino worked on this story with Telegram & Gazette reporter Shaun Sutner.

Read Sutner's Stories:

Easy Money: Ex-UMass Med School Chancellor Parlayed Resignation Into Fat Paycheck
Tenure Can Be A Treasure Trove In Academia
Collaboration Between Media Outlets Yielded Story

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