A Superior Court jury in Santa Clara County has imposed $38million fine on drugmaker Pfizer which would be paid to Bay Area research group.

It was established that Pfizer stole trade secrets from the San Bruno-based Ischemia Research and Education Foundation to develop a pain relief drug.

According to the lawsuit, Pfizer wanted to use the foundation's database for clinical trials on Bextra, a drug to treat acute pain chiefly caused by arthritis in the year 2002.

But since the New York-based drugmaker and the foundation could come to a conclusion on terms for use of the database, Pfizer arranged a side deal with Ping Hsu, a lead statistician at the foundation. Hsu arranged to provide the data to Pfizer without approval of the foundation, according to the suit. That is to say that Pfizer stole the data from the foundation. The foundation has alleged in a lawsuit that Pfizer improperly gained access to its data by using one of its employees.

Pfizer and Hsu could also face punitive damages that could increase the verdict to more than $120 million. The lawsuit also claims that Pfizer and Hsu destroyed evidence when confronted about the data theft.