False Claims Act Update & Alert
Taxpayers Against Fraud Education Fund | Washington, D.C. | WWW.TAF.ORG September 19, 2007
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			FCA Amendments Introduced Senators Charles Grassley (R-IA), Richard Durbin D-IL), Patrick Leahy (D-VT), and Arlen Specter (R-PA) have introduced the FCA Corrections Act of 2007 (PDF) which is designed to clarify certain provisions of the False Claims Act and close loopholes not envisioned when the Act was amended in 1986. Specific corrections and  clarifications included in the bill: Clarification of the scope of FCA liability; Clarification of the conditions under which a federal employee can file a qui tam action; Clarification of the public disclosure bar to prevent truly parasitic lawsuits. >> To read more
			Aventis to Pay $190 Million Aventis has agreed to pay over $190 million to settle a Medicaid Average Wholesale Price case involving the anti-nausea drug Anzemet.  Aventis is now known as sanofi-aventis.  To read more
			TAF Conference & Awards TAF held it's annual conference last week, and it was a sellout (as in previous years), with speakers ranging from former Attorney General John Ashcroft to (now) Acting Attorney General Peter Keisler.  TAF Award winners for 2007: 4TAF Whistleblower of the Year awards went to Jim Holzrichter and Janet Chandler for their proactive efforts to create a whistleblower mentoring program, and for their perseverance in bringing (and winning) two of the most arduous FCA legal battles to date;   4TAF Lawyer of Year awards went to David Chizewer and Fred Cohen for their terrific win in the Amerigroup case, with special commendations to the U.S. Attorney's Office for the Northern District of Illinois, and to the Illinois Attorney General's Office for their work on this same case;  4TAF's Honest Abe Integrity in Government awards went to Patrick O'Connell, Chief, National Investigations, of Texas’ Medicaid Fraud Control Units, and James Sheehan, former U.S. Attorney for Philadelphia (and now New York's first Medicaid Inspector General); 4TAF's Lifetime Achievement award went to Jim Moorman for his work leading the False Claims Act bar over the course of the last seven years, which has resulted in a strengthening of the Federal Act, and an expansion of the law to the state level.  >> To read more
			First New York FCA Case New York state filed its first state False Claims Act case against Merck, the maker of Vioxx, for misrepresenting the dangers the drug posed to its users. Between 1999, when Vioxx was introduced, and 2004 when it was pulled from the market, New York state spent over $100 million on Vioxx prescriptions.  >> To read more
			Massive Medicare Theft A new audit by the U.S. Government Accountability Office has found that private health plans contracting with Medicare are keeping money they're supposed to be return to the government or passing along to beneficiaries. >> To read more
			NY Focuses on Home Heath New York Attorney General Andrew Cuomo is proposing a statewide registry of certified home health aides as a way of culling fraud out of the state's Medicaid system.  The New York Post has endorsed the idea. >> To read more
			Tenet Lawyer Sued Under FCA DoJ is going after a former general counsel of Tenet under the FCA. The charge: the lawyer knowingly lied when she certified fraudulent  practices at Tenet had ended. >>  To read more