Source: Pixabay and jessica45
Chief United States Magistrate Judge Page Kelley in the United States District Court for the District of Massachusetts has affirmed a motion to dismiss in a whistleblower action filed by two UK orthopedic surgeons—Antoni Nargol, FRCS and David Langton, MRCS.
The lawsuit has been ongoing for nearly a decade. In 2012, Dr. Nargol and Dr. Langton brought an action under the False Claims Act. The action was filed against DePuy Orthopaedics, Inc., DePuy, Inc., and Johnson & Johnson Services, Inc. (collectively “DePuy”).
The surgeons claimed that, per the memorandum and order, “over a five-year period, DePuy illegally promoted and sold a significant number of Pinnacle devices that fell outside FDA-approved manufacturing specifications.” This caused “false claims to be submitted to Medicare and Medicaid.”
One of the main issues in the current matter arose from Dr. Nargol’s and Dr. Langton’s involvement in other litigation. Both previously served as experts and consultants in litigation that involved the Pinnacle device at issue.
As experts and consultants in the other litigation, Dr. Nargol and Dr. Langton had access to confidential information. The confidential information was “subject to protective orders.” During the course of the whistleblower litigation, issues arose regarding the surgeons’ “past disclosure of confidential information.”
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