Alicia Mundy, a longtime reporter in Washington DC, covering politics, policy issues, and the occasional courtroom battle, is the author of Dispensing With the Truth: The Victims, the Drug Companies, and the Dramatic Story behind the Battle over Fen-Phen, and, coming in September, Crystal Mesh: How Addiction to Money turned Medical Device Makers and Doctors into Street Dealers.

Prior to her career in journalism, Alicia was a Beltway Bandit consultant to the Defense Department and State Department on Western Europe’s policy toward the Soviet Union. Things were simpler then.