Vilified 'Climategate' Scientist Says He Considered Suicide

Phil Jones, the British scientist at the center of a worldwide scandal over e-mails appearing to show climate scientists manipulating global warming data, says he considered killing himself "several times" during the crisis, the Times of London reports.

"I am just a scientist," Jones said. "I have no training in PR or dealing with crises." As climate change deniers called for him to resign his post, and even making threats on his life, Jones lost weight and went on beta-blockers and sleeping pills. He continues to receive death threats, including two in the past week. "I was shocked," he said. "People said I should go and kill myself. They said that they knew where I lived. They were coming from all over the world."

In e-mails that global warming deniers seized on ahead of the Copenhagen climate summit late last year, Jones appeared to call on his colleagues to destroy evidence that would counter proof of climate change. Jones has vehemently stood by his work, saying that the e-mails written by him and other scientists were deliberately taken out of context and misconstrued to create the appearance of scandal. Several informal reviews have agreed that no scientific misconduct took place, and the incident is being reviewed by the U.N. climate change panel.