Advocates for Justice

Procurement fraud—overcharging the government on some of the millions of products and services that government agencies purchase from private companies every year—is one of the most common schemes giving rise to whistleblower cases under the False Claims Act. On the federal side, an agency called the General Services Administration, or GSA, oversees the procurement of many goods and services on behalf of the federal government. Companies that want to sell their goods to federal agencies go through an application process to get their products listed on the federal GSA “schedule.” Many successful cases have been brought under the False Claims Act based on fraud committed on the GSA. For example, in one of the biggest recoveries, the software company Oracle paid $199.5 million to settle claims that it overcharged the government on the purchase of software products listed on the GSA schedule.

Save Our Juries launched in July 2014, becoming ABOTA's first public awareness campaign. Its mission is to "uphold the jury system provided by the Seventh Amendment to the U.S. Constitution by educating the American public about the current issues, the history and the value of the right to trial by jury." In 1958, my father, ABOTA's first National President, built ABOTA on this one mission - to preserve our civil justice system. It's vital that we always use his founding purpose as the anchor of this organization. 

In a complaint filed this week, California Attorney General Kamala Harris added detailed allegations to a whistleblower case filed by Cotchett, Pitre & McCarthy against BP (formerly British Petroleum) that accuses the oil company of massive overcharging of California cities, counties, universities, and government agencies on purchases of natural gas over the course of the past decade.

Continuing Care Retirement Communities (“CCRCs”) are gaining in popularity as an option for senior retirement living. Many CCRCs offer gorgeous surroundings akin to a 5-star hotel. Often they tout ties to prestigious universities in the hopes of attracting alumni and faculty. However, for all the attractions of CCRC living, there are serious legal consequences to be considered before a senior should make the move to a CCRC.

Another area of healthcare that is rife with fraud is hospice care. Hospices aim to provide palliative care, as opposed to curative care, to patients in the last six months of their lives. Palliative care is aimed at relieving the pain, symptoms, and/or stress of terminal illness and includes a comprehensive set of medical, social, psychological, emotional, and spiritual services provided to a terminally ill individual. Medicare recipients of palliative care agree to forego curative treatment of their terminal illness.

Congratulations to Niall McCarthy for being named to the Irish Legal 100 for 2014.  The Irish Legal is published in the Irish Voice, which is a national legal newspaper.

After an hour long hearing on Thursday, December 11, 2014, Judge Elihu M. Berle of the Los Angeles Superior Court rejected defense challenges to a CPM whistleblower complaint alleging that they engaged in a vast fraudulent scheme involving spinal surgeries in Southern California. The plaintiffs assert that the defendants have defrauded the government and various California workers compensation insurance carriers by systematically arranging and performing spinal surgeries that: (1) were medically unnecessary; (2) used non-FDA-approved, counterfeit surgical hardware, including rods and screws that were implanted in patients’ back; (3) result from a vast array of kickbacks; and (4) were billed to insurance carriers and government payers at illegally inflated rates. 

Mixed news this week for Dodd-Frank whistleblowers and attorneys working in that space: As we already know from the Securities and Exchange Commission’s annual report to Congress (released last month), foreign-based whistleblowers are coming forward in ever-growing force to report Dodd-Frank violators to the Commission.

The owner of the property adjacent to Martin’s Beach has been ordered to immediately reopen public access to the beach. Judge Barbara Mallach of the San Mateo County Superior Court issued a final order today directing Vinod Khosla to open the gate blocking access to the way it was when he purchased the property.

The U.S. Court of Appeals for the Sixth Circuit held last week that the FCA does not bar prospective employers from discriminating against job applicants for having served as whistleblowers against different companies in the past.