On March 19, 2018, the Securities and Exchange Commission (“SEC”) announced its highest ever Dodd-Frank Act (“DFA”) bounty awards to three whistleblowers. These SEC awards represent a new milestone in the SEC’s ongoing efforts to incentivize would-be whistleblowers to report unlawful conduct directly to the Commission. Two whistleblowers will divide a nearly $50 million award […]
Two former occupational therapists at a Columbia nursing home were whistleblowers in a Medicare fraud case that was settled this month for $30 million. Kristi Emerson and LeeAnn Holt collected evidence against Signature Healthcare, when they worked at its old Trotwood Avenue location in Columbia. The local facility was sold to a New Jersey company […]
June 14, 2018 – Humana and Roche Diagnostics will face a $45 million federal kickback lawsuit after a whistleblower filed a False Claims Act violation, which alleges Roche tried to entice Humana financially to secure access to the payer’s business operations. A federal judge in the Northern District of Illinois has dismissed two motions to appeal a 2014 whistleblower […]
A nursing home chain with more than two dozen facilities in Tennessee has settled a $230 million Medicare fraud case. The government’s investigation launched in 2014 when two whistleblowers started collecting evidence on their own. LeeAnn Holt and Kristi Emerson, both of whom are occupational therapists from Columbia, collected reams of anecdotes — in part, because […]
Eight years ago, Salina Savage took on government contractors who had used a shell company to prevent legitimate businesses from receiving lucrative jobs at the Hanford Nuclear Reservation. The Richland-based whistleblower’s case finally settled this week, generating more than $5.5 million in fines against the company and a total of $690,000 paid to Savage for […]
MORRISTOWN, NJ — A jury has awarded a Morristown police officer $1.7 million in damages after they found the department retaliated against him after he whistleblew on the police chief. Officer Keith Hudson filed a complaint in 2014 alleging that Chief Peter Demnitz worked for various local companies while clocked in for work at the […]
MAY 29, 2018 — Inchcape Shipping Services Holdings Limited and certain of its subsidiaries have agreed to pay $20,000,000 to resolve allegations that they violated the False Claims Act by knowingly overbilling the U.S. Navy under contracts for ship husbanding services, the Department of Justice announced today. The lawsuit was brought under the qui tam, […]
CHARLESTON, S.C., May 24, 2018 /PRNewswire/ — A federal judge in South Carolina issued an order of judgment on Wednesday that imposes civil damages and penalties totaling more than $114 million on the former CEO of a medical testing lab and to two owners of the lab’s marketing partner for violations of the False Claims Act. The defendants were found guilty of […]
The SEC Whistleblower Program has awarded more than $250 million to whistleblowers since 2011. Under the rules of the program, the SEC is required to pay awards to eligible whistleblowers who voluntarily provide the Commission with original information about violations of the federal securities laws that lead to successful enforcement actions that result in monetary sanctions of more than $1 million. Importantly, […]
Signals from the U.S. Securities and Exchange Commission over how seriously it takes cybersecurity, combined with a Supreme Court ruling on whistleblower protections, are putting pressure on companies to be more careful about how they deal with potential tipsters, lawyers say. The securities regulator issued guidance in February on how companies should handle cybersecurity issues. […]
