Mathew Herper from Forbes and Dr. Scher's rep say: No way Jose!

In a Forbes article released today Dr. Howard Scher "rep" alleges that he does not know of any family members that would benefit financially if Provenge was not approved.

A Memorial Sloan-Kettering spokeswoman says that Scher had nothing to do with his letter leaking, and that he knew of no family members who would benefit financially either way if Provenge were approved.

In my previous brainstorming I gathered enough information to believe that there was enough evidence to conclude that Barry S. Lafer is a member of Howard Scher's family in law.

Barry S. Lafer owns Lafer Equities which is an offshore arbitrage hedge fund in the Cayman Islands. They are worth around 200 million. Alot of the stock they own is in companies that have in one way or another something related to cancer and chemotherapy.

Now how are you so sure Barry and Alan Lafer are related to Deborah Lafer ( Howard Scher’s wife) you might ask me.

Where's your proof?

Ok point well taken, so put your thinking caps on and let me show you step by step how I came to this conclusion based on facts I found. Just keep in mind I am not 100 percent sure. Just 99 percent sure they are all in the same big happy family.
First off Howard Scher wed Deborah Lafer who worked for Warburg Pincus at the time of their wedding. Click here to read the article.

Now in the New York Times there is a death notice for a Louis Lafer.

Click on this link and you can read it yourself.

Louis was the father to Barry and Alan Lafer. One of the surviving brothers was Fred Lafer.

According to this New York times article Fred Lafer is Deborah Lafer’s father.

Click again here to see proof.

According the the New York Times death notice Barry Laffer’s father was Louis Lafer. Deborah’s father Fred is Barry Lafer’s uncle. In other words Deborah and Barry are first cousins.

Louis Lafer ( brothers) Fred Lafer
Father of Father of
Barry Lafer Deborah Lafer

I find it odd , given the fact that his wife used to work in one of the world's largest hedge funds, that Dr. Howard Scher is oblivious and does not know that his wife's family has over 200 million dollars in an offshore hedge fund in the Cayman Islands. And they invest in one of his favorite subjects - cancer! How can that subject not come up around the dinner table?

Just in case you’re still a doubting Thomas let’s look at some more connections between Deborah Lafer-Scher and Barry Lafer.

They have both made campaign donations from the same Wayne New Jersey location .
Click here to see Barry S Lafer’s donation
Click here to read Howard Scher's mother in law's donation location.

Now back to Matthew Herper's article. He goes on to scoff at the idea of a connection stating,

In response to a previous Forbes story, readers wrote in alleging that Scher's wife works for a hedge fund that might be short Dendreon stock (betting against its rise). This is not true. She works in human resources for a nursing home company that could not conceivably benefit materially from any news about Dendreon..."

On this blog I mentioned that Dr. Scher's wife used to work at a company that runs UBS and has one of the worlds largest hedge funds. Never did I say that she works for a hedge fund. Her family does though. Lafer Equities.Howard Scher's family's hedge fund according to this SEC document was heavily invested in Cancer/Chemo stocks last quarter.

Murphy Blinded Journalist?

Why a journalist for such a respected publication as Forbes would not look a little deeper before completely ruling out any connection is tantamount to shoddy, and sloppy one sided reporting.

Making dogmatic conclusions and printing them as fact in Forbes ( of all publications) without further investigating them makes me think this particular writer is not the brightest bulb in the closet. Either that or he just wants people to see things how he wants them to.