The Department of Justice announced on September 6, 2012, that the government has intervened in a whistleblower lawsuit against Hospice of the Comforter Inc. (“HOTCI”) alleging false Medicare. HOTCI provides hospice services to patients residing in the vicinity of Orlando, Fla.
The lawsuit, filed by HOTCI’s former vice-president of finance,
New York Downtown Hospital, located in lower Manhattan near New York City’s financial district, will pay $13.4 million to settle two lawsuits pending in the United States District Court for the Eastern District of New York.
The lawsuits entitled United States and New York State ex rel.
Omnicare, Inc., based in Covington, Kentucky, agreed to settle a lawsuit alleging it submitted false claims for reimbursement to government health insurers and paid a “kickback” when it bought the pharmacy company, Total Pharmacy Services, LLC. Omnicare is a company that supplies drugs to nursing homes. The 2007 lawsuit was filed by whistleblower,
On July 27, 2012, it was announced that the McKesson Corporation agreed to pay $151 million to 29 states to settle allegations that the company artificially raised Medicaid drug prices, resulting in excess charging for prescription medications. More specifically, it was alleged that McKesson provided inflated prescription-drug information for a wide variety of brand-name drugs and the knowledge that the information would be given to First DataBank,
The District of Columbia Court of Appeals upheld a ban by the U.S. Department of Health & Human Services prohibiting three former executives from serving in the healthcare industry. This 12-year ban affected Perdue Pharma executives, CEO Michael Freedman, General Counsel Howard Udell, and Chief Scientific Officer Paul D. Goldenheim,
On August 2, 2012, the Mayo Clinic and three related Mayo entities agreed to settle the False Claims Act suit which was filed in the U.S. District Court for the District of Minnesota. The suit was brought under the Qui Tam provision of the False Claims Act and alleged that Mayo submitted false claims for payment to the government,
The U.S. Government Accountability Office issued a report stating that 7,000 Medicaid providers in three states had approximately $791 million in unpaid federal taxes from 2009 and earlier. Medicaid providers from Florida, New York, and Texas received approximately $6.6 billion in Medicaid reimbursements during 2009 as a result of the American Recovery and Reinvestment Act.
The Dartmouth Hitchcock Clinic, which serves northern New England residents, has paid over $500,000 to settle claims that six of its neurologists overbilled Medicare and Medicaid. The investigation started with Dartmouth-Hitchcock’s self-disclosure of billing improprieties related to one physician in 2009. The Vermont US Attorney commented that the claims, under the False Claims Act,
James Alderson, a former chief financial officer for a Montana hospital, received a $27 million benefit by blowing the whistle on his former employer’s accounting fraud.
A federal appeals court ruled that the reward, since filing the qui tam suit under the Federal False Claims Act, is taxed as ordinary income and not under the lower capital gains tax rate.
An Arizona-based company, NextCare Inc., has agreed to pay the United States $10 million to settle federal and state allegations that it submitted false claims. NextCare is an owner of a chain of urgent care facilities with locations in Arizona, Colorado, Texas, North Carolina, Ohio, and Virginia.
NextCare Inc.
If you are aware of any person, corporation or entity that you think may be violating the Federal False Claims Act or a State False Claims Act, contact us today.