An empty courtroom is seen at the New York State Supreme Court in Manhattan, New York City, U.S., August 21, 2020. REUTERS/Andrew Kelly
(Reuters) - The full 4th U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals will hear argument Thursday in a case alleging that a company now owned by Allergan defrauded the federal government out of $680 million by deliberately reporting inaccurate drug-pricing data to Medicaid.
The court granted en banc review after a divided panel said it didn’t matter whether Forest Laboratories actually intended to defraud the government, since the drug-pricing rules are ambiguous and Forest’s interpretation of them was objectively reasonable.
Attorneys for Deborah Sheldon, the widow of former Forest sales manager Troy Sheldon, said the panel’s 2-1 decision in January “tips the scale toward fraudsters” and would have a “far-reaching and negative impact” on whistleblowers and the government’s ability to recover under the False Claims Act.
The government agrees, warning of “enormous practical consequences” if the panel’s decision stands.
Under the majority’s standard, “a defendant can actually understand a requirement correctly, choose to violate it but avoid all liability if its attorney can conjure up a post-hoc alternative interpretation of the requirement that is at least objectively reasonable,” Justice Department lawyer Joshua Dos Santos wrote in the government’s amicus brief.
That’s “a standard ‘only the dimmest of fraudsters could fail to take advantage of’,” Dos...
The prosecution said the videos, published on Instagram, contained unsubstantiated allegations against a faculty member at the law school of an unnamed private university and were considered capab...