The United States Department of Justice (“DOJ”) recently announced that PharMerica Corp. will pay $31.5 million, including more than $4 million to a whistleblower, to settle alleged violations of the Controlled Substances Act (“CSA”) and False Claims Act (“FCA”) related to the company’s improper dispensing of narcotics and submission of false claims to Medicare Part D.
Bills signed by Governor Larry Hogan, Speaker of the House Michael Busch and Senate President Mike Miller include, expanding the Maryland False Claims Act protecting whistleblowers.
On April 1, 2015, the SEC announced its first whistleblower protection case involving restrictive confidentiality language. The agency charged the Houston-based engineering and technology firm KBR, Inc., with using overly restrictive language in confidentiality agreements that allegedly obstructed the whistleblowing process.
Speaking at a Fordham University School of Law event on Friday, March 6, U.S. Attorney for the Southern District of New York, Preet Bharara said that whistleblower bounties and leniency agreements could be useful tools for uncovering public corruption. Bharara is the latest law enforcer to endorse the benefits of rewarding tipsters who come forward with information about misconduct.
The official founding of a Senate Whistleblower Protection Caucus was announced on February 25, 2015 by Senator Charles Grassley (R-IA).
In 2014, the total whistleblower recoveries amounted to just shy of $3 billion, $2.2 billion (73 percent) of which were in the health care arena.
The official founding of a Senate Whistleblower Protection Caucus was announced on February 25, 2015 by Senator Charles Grassley (R-IA).
Medicare, Part D began in 2006 as a program to get much needed medication to more than 36 million senior citizens and people with disabilities. Billions of needless expense has been added to the program due to lack of oversight and doctors prescribing name brand medications instead of generics.
The Justice Department announced that it has reached a $1.25 million settlement with ev3, a medical device manufacturer base in in Minnesota. Ev3 formerly was known as Fox Hollow Technologies. A lawsuit filed under the whistleblower provision of the False Claims Act alleges that between 2006-2007, Fox Hollow induced 12 hospitals in 9 states to admit patients who were undergoing elective atherectomy procedures.
United States ex rel. Carroll v. Adventist Health Systems, et al., Case No. CV-10-4925 DMR
A settlement in the amount of $2,250,000, payable by St. Helena Hospital, to the United States, stems from allegations that it submitted false claims to Medicare for certain cardiac procedures and related inpatient submissions.
