Identical twins are handed $1.5M in damages after being falsely accused of cheating in medical exam

A pair of identical twins have been handed $1.5million in damages by a college in South Carolina after it wrongly accused them of cheating in a medical exam through signaling, as a court ruled their answers were identical because their minds were connected. 

Kayla and Kellie Bingham, 30, were initially enrolled at the Medical University of South Carolina (MUSC) in 2016 to fulfill their dreams of one day becoming doctors.

Now, six years later, after suing the medical school for defamation, the two sisters were compensated for having their reputations damaged after a jury ruled in their favor. 

It all started when both siblings, who were 24 when the scandal was first revealed, were assigned to sit at the same table during a medical exam, according to Kellie.

She told Insider that it was virtually impossible for her and Kayla to see each other’s computer screens despite the fact that there was only a distance of four-or-five feet between them. 

Kayla and Kellie Bingham, 30, were awarded $1.5million in damages by the Medical University of South Carolina (MUSC) after suing the college for defamation regarding accusations that both former medical school students had cheated on an exam in 2016

The Medical University of South Carolina refused to see the twins’ history of scoring similarly on quizzes, tests, and exams as evidence proving that they had not cheated. Instead, faculty though the two sisters had communicated through signaling and social cues

It also wasn’t the first time that the daughters of South Carolina Republican state Representative Kenny Bingham had tested together and scored similarly. 

The twins had received the same SAT scores despite testing on different days and locations and were also graded within a fraction of a point of each another in high school. Both of them had been registering similar answers to test questions since the first grade.

A professor, who taught both siblings in college before their enrollments in medical school, noticed these striking similarities and wrote about them in a letter defending the twins. He said they had both submitted the exact same answers – right or wrong – on an exam that he oversaw in 2012, despite making them sit at opposite ends of the classroom.

Professor Nancy Segal, a psychologist and behavior geneticist, specializing in the study of twins at California State University, Fullerton, also came to the Kayla and Kellie’s defense and even testified in court for them. 

She claimed that she would’ve been stunned if the two sisters had not reached the same conclusion that consistently followed them through the time both spent in school: scoring similarly on an exam.

She also said that cheating complaints filed against twins are ‘common’ in higher education.

‘They are genetically predisposed to behave the same way,’ Prof. Segal said. ‘They’ve been raised the same and are natural partners in the same environment.’

While some research shows instances of telepathic phenomena, there isn’t enough conclusive, evidence-based proof to support the idea of ESP or that twin telepathy exists. Prof. Segal claims in her book, Twin Mythconceptions, that stories about twin telepathy are only a reflection of the tight, affectionate bond between siblings.

In instances where identical twins were raised apart but then found out that they had similar tastes when they did meet, the similarities consider the genetic component of personality and interests, according to Prof. Segal.

‘Identical twins just have this kind of understanding that goes beyond what we typically think of as a close relationship,’ she told the jury. Prof. Segal also took note that MUSC hadn’t considered ‘the impact of the corresponding genetic profiles’ when they initially accused the twins of cheating.

Kayla (left) and Kellie (right) received the same SAT scores despite testing on different days and locations and were also graded within a fraction of a point of one another in high school

All of that, however, wasn’t taken into consideration by MUSC faculty when it initially summoned Kayla and Kellie two weeks after taking the medical exam to be informed that they were formally accused of cheating by the college.

‘My mind was racing,’ Kayla told Insider, recalling the way she felt when she first addressed the medical school’s honor board. ‘I was sobbing and incredulous that this was happening to us.’ 

‘There’s no way to process your emotions when you’re accused of something you didn’t do,’ she added.

Kellie had thought MUSC would’ve removed its cheating accusations after she had informed the school’s board of her and her sister’s similar testing patterns in the past.

That wasn’t to be the case. Furthermore, both former medical students had found out that a professor had ‘raised the alarm after monitoring the results of the whole class remotely,’ Insider reported, which led him to think that both sisters had been cooperating for answers. 

The proctor of the exam was then asked to attentively watch the twins and had noticed that both were constantly nodding their heads as if they were sending signals to one another. She also saw one of the two women ‘flipping’ a sheet of paper on the table ‘so the other could see it.’

Kayla and Kellie were eventually to get MUSC to drop its cheating accusations a week after they were made but damage had already been done to the students’ reputation and credibility

‘We were just nodding at a question at our own computer screens,’ Kayla told Insider, adding that her and Kallie had ‘incredibly similar’ sets of manners and didn’t think it’d be potentially held against them one day. 

Describing the cheating claims as ‘ridiculous’ to MUSC’s honor board, Kayla insisted that she and Kallie had no ‘twin telepathy’ or ‘secret language.’ 

‘We don’t feel each others’ pain or anything like that,’ she further said, adding that ‘there was no signaling’ or any questionable looks between her and her sister. 

In spite of coming up with a staunch defense, the twins were not able to prove their innocence and appealed to the college’s dean, Raymond DuBois, who cleared them of any wrongdoing a week later. 

Nonetheless, the two sisters’ credibility and reputation had already been damaged by then. They became unpopular on campus and had been labelled ‘academically dishonest’ by their peers. 

Their names also ran in local and state media outlets, which prompted them to be isolated from friends and to be ‘disinvited’ to two weddings, Insider reported. 

Kayla and Kellie dropped out of medical school to turn into lawyers fighting defamation cases! Pictured: The twins graduating from college before enrolling in medical school

By September 2016, Kallie and Kayla had left MUSC ‘at the recommendation of the dean, because of how hostile it had become’ before filing a lawsuit against the college in 2017. 

Kayla recalled the moment the jury had read its findings as ‘the biggest moment of our lives’ and that finally being proven innocent saw ‘everything restored to us’. 

Since dropping out of medical school, both sisters have moved on to become lawyers and scored similarly on the LSAT before eventually graduating in 2021. 

They’re now co-workers at the same law firm, where they take on defamation cases similar to the one that they first experienced six years ago.