The way you handled this does not speak well of your character. You should have: 1. Preserved the articles in a safe place. 2. Resigned. 3. Given the articles to another publication and state what happened. What I see here is that you were concerned first about your own finances. That is what makes you look bad. Ethics first, finances second.
Giving the articles to another publication would constitute unethical behavior as well though, considering he didn’t own the content and could not claim any authorship over it, though perhaps alerting authors or editorial staff could have spurred that result. And obviously a question about the most unethical thing a person in this field has done isn’t going to be something that speaks well of their character. I don’t think it speaks well of a person’s character to judge someone for the single most unethical thing they’ve done in their career.
