I remember seeing an interview with one of them and he claimed that he never wanted to do that announcement. Rather, he was pushed into it by the University and

I remember seeing an interview with one of them and he claimed that he never wanted to do that announcement. Rather, he was pushed into it by the University and was probably more responsible for ruining his career than the experiment not working. As for the experiment, as I recall it did produce neutrons, an expected byproduct of fusion. There was certainly an interesting reaction going on but it turned out that it wasn't fusion.