UNC professor asks for raise from Argentina jail cell

(CBS) CHAPEL HILL, N.C. - A University of North Carolina professor is demanding a huge pay raise - even though he's currently awaiting trial on a drug smuggling charge in a Buenos Aires prison.

Don't cry for him, Argentina.

According to the Charlotte Observer, 68-year-old physics professor Paul Frampton was arrested Jan. 23 at a Buenos Aires airport, after being accused of trying to fly back to the United States with 2 kilograms of cocaine.

Frampton maintains his innocence, saying he flew to Argentina to meet a woman he met online only to be met instead by a man who told him to carry a suitcase filled with cocaine.

Frampton wrote a letter to Provost Bruce Carney this month, the newspaper reports, saying that his salary should be twice that of the $107,000 he was previously making.

The professor admits it's a little nervy.

"[I]t is definitely chutzpah," Frampton told the Observer. "But the facts show that I deserve it."

Math professor Mark Williams, who represented Frampton at a grievance hearing, said it was bad timing on the physics professor's part to ask for a raise.

"I do think it's reasonable to say that it's obvious that his salary is far too low," Williams told the Observer. "But no, of course I don't think it's a good idea at all for Paul to be asking for a raise while he's in prison."

Perhaps the physics professor fails to grasp the gravity of the situation?

The newspaper reports that Frampton was placed on personal leave so the university didn't have to pay him...at all.