By Ben Nuckols

BALTIMORE (AP) — A former university professor accused of working as a call girl hanged herself over the weekend, police said Monday.

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Brandy Britton, 43, was found dead at her home Saturday by a family member.

Britton, who was a sociology and anthropology professor at the University of Maryland, Baltimore County, was charged a year ago with four counts of prostitution and was scheduled to go on trial next Monday. The charges carried up to a year in jail each.

"On a first-time offense, I doubt if she would have served any time," said Wayne Kirwan, a spokesman for the Howard County State's Attorney's office.

Britton's attorney, Christopher Flohr, called her a "kind and generous soul."

"Her death underscores an important question: Was the public benefited at all by the resources spent on her arrest and prosecution?" Flohr said in a statement.

Britton earned her doctorate from the University of California at San Francisco and founded the Institute for Women and Girls Health Research Inc., which she ran out of the same Ellicott City home where she allegedly entertained johns for upwards of $300 an hour. The home was under foreclosure.

In 1999, she lost her job at the University of Maryland and filed a gender discrimination lawsuit against the university.

In dismissing the lawsuit, a federal judge cited complaints about Britton from students and colleagues about her teaching and about personality conflicts. The judge also noted an accusation by the National Institutes of Health that Britton falsified data on a research project.

Police began investigating Britton in 2005 after receiving numerous complaints and finding her rates and services posted on a Web site.