Collaborator hoarding data (that they did not generate)
I am a postdoc working on a large, interdisciplinary project analyzing archaeological material using a range of complementary biomolecular approaches. I work for the museum (it's affiliated with a university) and have conducted the analyses that I am an expert in, and we have also sent off (and my PI paid for) a complementary set of analyses from a lab at another university.
We have another collaborator at a third university, who is relatively peripheral to the project, but she has positioned herself as the team expert on this topic and seems to have somehow convinced the lab we sent the material to (and paid for these analyses to be performed) to give her the data, instead of my PI. When my PI wrote to the head of the lab, plus this collaborator, and asked to have the data delivered, she replied, "Results just came in - yes absolutely, once we have a coherent text, we'll share it with you."
This was 6 months ago, we have not seen the data, but she is presenting at an upcoming workshop. It doesn't seem fair that she would present the data publicly when we still haven't seen them. And from her message, it sort of sounds like they have plans to write up the results, and just show us a nearly-complete draft. But we specifically ordered & purchased these analyses to complement the data I have generated, with the plan of having a single interdisciplinary paper.
I have started to hear some details from other colleagues and collaborators. One mentioned that she's been working really hard on the project recently (he clearly thought we were in the loop about what she's been up to, but we're not), and another colleague wrote me to express concern because she noticed we were being excluded.
I have a meeting with my PI about this, who is also concerned, but I am worried that he might feel hesitant to confront her about it, and might actually allow the data to be split into two papers. In theory, I would be okay with that too, but not if it's a decision that they are trying to force by withholding data from us.