The Deseret News reports on David Hailey’s deceptive “analysis” of the Killian memos, in which he claimed to have evidence the memos were created on a typewriter—but used Adobe Photoshop and a computer typeface to “prove” it; unsurprisingly, Hailey is whining about being “lynched:” E-mails fire away at USU professor.

Hailey, who teaches technical communications at USU, spent seven years in the Army, typing training manuals and various memos on typewriters. That’s where his interest in typography began. “This is the kind of stuff I’ve done since 1966,” he said.

Critics who have posted comments on Internet “blog” sites — the arena where doubt was first cast about the documents CBS obtained — are calling Hailey a “fraud,” alleging his findings are politically motivated and that other USU officials may have somehow guided his study.

Hailey did make a monetary donation to presidential candidate John Kerry’s campaign, according to one USU official.

Since posting his findings on the Web, Hailey has for the past week received hundreds of e-mails that he now simply forwards to a file he created called “hate mail.” The subject line of one e-mail reads, “In more ways than one, you are a fascist hack.”

Hailey’s plans are to read through the mail more thoroughly for another research project but not until he is “emotionally stable.” He said he couldn’t sleep Thursday night because people are attacking his credibility and credentials.

“In a virtual reality situation, they’re coming on campus and trying to lynch me,” Hailey said over the phone.

Utah State president Kermit Hall is backing Professor Hailey, and crying “intimidation! smear!”

Without a request for an interview, USU President Kermit Hall called the Deseret Morning News with his own take on the situation.

“Whoever it is,” Hall said of the e-mails, “is clearly trying to intimidate the university and trying to intimidate Professor Hailey.”

Hall called Hailey’s research “legitimate” and said the professor has every right to engage in and publicize the research.

“There’s been an effort to suggest that the administration put him up to this — the answer to that is, ‘wrong,’ ” Hall added. “There’s a suggestion that the purpose of his work is to join some kind of political action — that’s wrong.”

Hall called the blogging and e-mails the “worst kind of smear” against academic research and the opportunity for academics to share their research within academe and with the “wider” public.

When the story first broke, I wrote a very polite email to President Hall, asking for his comments on the allegations against Professor Hailey. He ignored it.