False Claims Act Update & Alert
Taxpayers Against Fraud Education Fund | Washington, D.C. | WWW.TAF.ORG February  21, 2007
		Sign Up for this FREE Newsletter n Previous Newsletters n TAF Home Page n About TAF-EF n The False Claims Act n Email editor n To unsubscribe send email with "unsubscribe" in subject line.   Please take a moment to forward this FREE electronic newsletter to others that might be interested!   Do You Have a Case? If you think you might have a False Claims Act case, take the quiz to see if you have the basic elements of a case. If you pass the quiz, fill out our intake form for a lawyer referral.	More Rope for Texas When Texas Attorney General Greg Abbott appeared before the Texas Senate Finance Committee, Chairman Steve Ogden wanted to know why Abbott hadn't requested additional lawyers to work on backlogged False Claims Act cases.  The answer:  It was an oversight.  Abbott himself has noted that Texas now has more than 140 backlogged Medicaid fraud cases, and that the top 20 of those cases could recover $700 million back to the state. >> To read more
			Bribing Dementia Patients to Steal from Medicare Nine doctors, six healthcare administrators and three associates have been indicted in a scam in which elderly and mentally ill patients were bribed with doughnuts, candy and gifts to sign up for unnecessary respiratory treatments, resulting in more than $12 million being stolen from Medicare.  >> To read more
			Building a Business on Fraud? Companies that use fraud schemes to soar like rockets on Wall Street can crash like rocks when those schemes come under investigation.  A few examples: St. Barnabas Health Care Systems (subscription required) recently fired its business-office team, including its Vice President and Chief Financial Officer, and is reported to be trying to mortgage its hospitals to obtain cash. These actions follow the company settling a $265 million False Claims Act case last year. Amerigroup faces $524.7 million in fines after being found guilty in a whistleblower lawsuit --about five times more money than the company has cash in hand. Universal Health Services has been downgraded by Bear Stearns following the announcement that the company has received a search warrant in a criminal investigation of its South Texas affiliates. The University of Medicine and Dentistry of New Jersey (UMDNJ) is projecting a $5.5 million loss due to a dramatic decline in cardiac patients following news stories about kickbacks paid to doctors referring patients to UMDNJ.
			9-11 Fraudsters The Department of Justice has filed a civil False Claims Act lawsuit against two men who obtained loans and grants from several federal agencies after the September 11, 2001 terrorist attacks in NYC.  The men claimed their executive search firm had leased property and maintained equipment at 2 World Trade Center when, in fact, neither they nor their company had operated at that location.  >> To read more