Earlier this year, we previewed two significant False Claims Act (FCA) cases before the U.S. Supreme Court, United States ex. rel. Schutte v. SuperValu, Inc., No. 21-1326 ("SuperValu"), and United States ex. Rel. Proctor v. Safeway, Inc., No. 22-111 ("Safeway"). The FCA provides that "any person who knowingly presents, or causes to be presented, a false or fraudulent claim" to the United States, or who engages in other related activity as set forth in the statute, is liable to the United States for substantial civil penalties plus treble damages. 31 U.S.C. § 3729 (emphasis added.) The SuperValu and Safeway cases involved a situation where the defendants were alleged to have subjectively believed their claims were false, but because of ambiguity in the underlying regulations (which limited reimbursement for prescription drugs based on a pharmacy's "usual and customary" drug prices), it would have been objectively reasonable to have believed the claims were proper. The question for the Supreme Court was whether in such a situation the defendants could be said to have "known" their claims were false. After all, so the defendants argued, even if they subjectively believed their claims were false, it was objectively reasonable for them to have believed they were not.
The answer, according to a unanimous ruling handed down last week in favor of the government and relators and against the defendant pharmacies: "[w]hat matters for an FCA case is whether the defendant knew the...
Police are investigating Park Chulmin, 36, a former member of the Seongnam International Mafia Group, who raised allegations about President Lee Jae Myung’s alleged ties to organized crime during ...