In its continuing effort to safeguard expenditures of taxpayer dollars, the United States Justice Department has reported a 2013 recovery of $3.8 billion in settlements and judgments resolving a myriad of whistleblower lawsuits and False Claims Act cases.*  Cases involving health care fraud comprised more than one-half of the total reported recovery, or $2.6 million. The bulk of health care whistleblower and False Claims Act lawsuits involved Medicare and Medicaid fraud.  Especially evident within this group of cases were fraud and... Read More

The United States Department of Justice has announced its intent to make itself a party in a qui tam whistleblower lawsuit against the pharmaceutical manufacturer Novartis.* A qui tam lawsuit is filed by a whistleblower acting on behalf of the government against an organization allegedly engaged in fraudulent conduct. In certain cases, rather than allowing a whistleblower to proceed on its behalf, the Department of Justice will intervene in the case itself. Put another way, the government will engage in the... Read More