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False Claims Act Update & Alert |
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Taxpayers
Against Fraud Education Fund | Washington, D.C. |
WWW.TAF.ORG
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n TAF Home Page n Previous Newsletters n Email editor
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Taxpayers Against Fraud
Lawyer of the
Year Awards to Taxpayers Against Fraud is pleased to announce that Frederick M. Morgan, Jennifer M. Verkamp, Scott A. Powell, and Don McKenna are recipients of TAF's Lawyer of the Year Award for 2009 for their exemplary work in United States ex rel. Pogue v. Diabetes Treatment Centers of America, Inc. Said TAF President Jeb White, "We salute the tenacity of these four lawyers who spearheading litigation in a declined case which took 15 years, but which eventually eventually resulted in a $40 million settlement. "Beyond the financial victory for America's taxpayers, the Pogue case is important in that it resulted in 15 published opinions, several of which have been pivotal in establishing the now widely-accepted principle that violations of the Anti-Kickback Act can form the basis for a suit under the False Claims Act. >> To read more ____________ Whistleblower of the Year Award to Taxpayers Against Fraud is proud to name Thomas Cantor, President and founder of Scantibodies Laboratory, Inc., as our Whistleblower of the Year for 2009. In 2001, Mr. Cantor came to realize that a parathyroid hormone assay sold by Nichols Diagnostics (NID), a subsidiary of Quest Diagnostics, was giving faulty and abnormally high results, and as a result dialysis patients were being overdosed with expensive and harmful Vitamin D drugs, leading to preventable surgeries and earlier deaths. Assuming the faulty test kit being produced by Nichols Diagnostics was an honest calibration mistake, Tom brought his test results to the company’s attention, but was stiff-armed. The faulty test kits were a huge profit center for Nichols Diagnostics and for the doctors, clinics and hospitals which prescribed vitamin D therapies based on their faulty results. Over the course of six years, Tom beat the drum trying to get the attention of the U.S. Government, to no avail. It was only after he filed a False Claims Act lawsuit that his charges were actually investigated, and the totality of the problem was revealed. In the end Quest Diagnostics was forced to shut down their very profitable Nichols Diagnostics test subsidiary, and had to pay $302 million to the U.S. Government – the largest settlement ever paid by a medical lab company for a faulty product. >> To read more____________
Honest Abe Integrity in Government Award to Senator Patrick Leahy of Vermont and Congressman James Sensenbrenner of Wisconsin have been given Taxpayers Against Fraud's 2009 "Honest Abe Integrity in Government Award," for their bipartisan leadership in shepherding FERA -- the Fraud Enforcement and Recovery Act of 2009 -- into law.
Notes Jeb White, President of Taxpayers Against Fraud, "FERA is the first amendment to the False Claims Act in 23 years, and strengthens the ability of the Federal Government to go after fraudulent contractors at a time when U.S. Government is spending hundreds of billions of dollars to jump-start the economy, fight two wars overseas, and vastly expand the nation's health care system. FERA is a welcome step forward in reassuring America's taxpayers that there will continue to be bipartisan support in the war against fraud." >> To read more
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