{"id":858741,"date":"2026-08-15T07:06:14","date_gmt":"2026-08-15T07:06:14","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/858741\/"},"modified":"2026-08-15T07:06:14","modified_gmt":"2026-08-15T07:06:14","slug":"jason-arday-former-cambridge-professor-accused-of-plagiarism-found-dead-education-news","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/858741\/","title":{"rendered":"Jason Arday, former Cambridge professor accused of plagiarism, found dead | Education News"},"content":{"rendered":"

Police are treating sociology professor Jason Arday\u2019s death as unexpected but not suspicious.<\/p>\n

<\/a><\/p>\n

Published On 14 Aug 202614 Aug 2026<\/p>\n

A British academic and former University of Cambridge professor has been found dead just over a week after resigning his prestigious post amid a high-profile plagiarism scandal.<\/p>\n

Jason Arday, 41, was found unresponsive at a south London address on Friday, according to British media reports citing authorities.<\/p>\n

London\u2019s Met Police said in a statement, \u201cAt this time his death is being treated as unexpected, but is not believed to be suspicious.\u201d<\/p>\n

Cambridge University vice-chancellor Professor Deborah Prentice said she was \u201cdesperately saddened\u201d to hear news of Arday\u2019s death.<\/p>\n

The news comes just nine days after Arday resigned as a professor and fellow of Jesus College at the University of Cambridge, having been the youngest Black professor in the school\u2019s history when he was appointed in 2023.<\/p>\n

The sociology professor\u2019s resignation followed several investigative articles into his academic work and personal life, as well as allegations that he plagiarised parts of his doctoral thesis.<\/p>\n

In a statement released after his death, Arday\u2019s family criticised a \u201ccampaign of harassment\u201d that had targeted\u00a0the academic.<\/p>\n

\u201cThe campaign of misinformation was too much for Jason, who was a gentle man and who always wanted to see the best in everyone. We are in shock to have lost this amazing father, partner, brother, uncle and son,\u201d said the statement, released via his publisher Simon & Schuster late on Friday.<\/p>\n

\u2018Personal cost\u2019 of scrutiny<\/p>\n

On July 24, British newspaper The Times of London published an analysis of Arday\u2019s 2015 PhD thesis highlighting what it said were multiple examples of passages that were \u201cidentical or near-identical\u201d to an earlier paper written by another researcher.<\/p>\n

The British media also raised questions about Arday\u2019s claims that he had raised 5.5 million pounds ($7.4m) for charity through feats such as running 30 marathons in 35 days and 965 kilometres (600 miles) in six days.<\/p>\n

Arday had admitted to making mistakes, but he said he was being wrongly \u201cportrayed to be a liar and a fantasist and an academic fraud\u201d.<\/p>\n

Announcing his resignation<\/a> last week, he said the \u201cpersonal cost\u201d of the scrutiny of him had become \u201ctoo great\u201d.<\/p>\n

\u201cWhile criticism is an inevitable part of academic life, what I have experienced has gone far beyond scholarly disagreement,\u201d he said.<\/p>\n

Cambridge University initially dismissed claims of plagiarism made against Arday by a former colleague because they had already been investigated by Liverpool John Moores University. However, last week Cambridge said it would carry out an independent investigation into Arday\u2019s appointment.<\/p>\n

Glasgow University also announced a review into Arday\u2019s previous academic work.<\/p>\n

Arday\u2019s new memoir, Great and Unfortunate Things, was recently released in the United States and is set to be published in the United Kingdom later this month. The book, which details Arday\u2019s childhood difficulties with autism and his later success, has also attracted scrutiny, but publisher Simon & Schuster has insisted that \u201cno allegations of plagiarism have been made with respect\u201d to it.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"Police are treating sociology professor Jason Arday\u2019s death as unexpected but not suspicious. Published On 14 Aug 202614…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":858742,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[2],"tags":[549,3456,43,44,5522,41,39,42,40,127],"class_list":["post-858741","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-headlines","tag-education","tag-europe","tag-headlines","tag-news","tag-racism","tag-top-news","tag-top-stories","tag-topnews","tag-topstories","tag-united-kingdom"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/858741","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=858741"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/858741\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/858742"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=858741"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=858741"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=858741"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}