Brown Lawyer Says UCI Knew of Ties to Firm

An attorney for Christopher S. Brown, the fired director of UC Irvine’s Willed Body Program, said Saturday that university officials were aware of his connections to a special effects company that later received work from the program.

University records released Friday show that the Willed Body Program paid Mysteriously Magical Effects $2,380 between 1996 and 1998. Brown’s resume lists him as an executive director of the company, although the company’s president has disputed that. The university says the company helped maintain medical school skeletons.

Brown was fired last month amid suspicions that he or associates profited from the program, an allegation now being investigated by the district attorney’s office. Brown has not been charged with a crime.

But one of his attorneys, Stephen Warren Solomon, maintained Saturday that Brown discussed his ties to Mysteriously Magical Effects during his 1996 job interviews with UCI.

When Brown became director of the cadaver program in 1996, he suggested the job of repairing skeletons be given to Mysteriously Magical Effects after determining that a lab technician couldn’t handle the work. By that time, Brown was no longer working for the special effects company, his lawyer said.