On April 18, the United States Supreme Court heard oral arguments in the consolidated cases of U.S. ex rel. Schutte v. SuperValu Inc. and U.S. ex rel. Proctor v. Safeway (SuperValu). Both cases dealt directly with the qui tam provisions of the False Claims Act. The Supreme Court’s ruling in SuperValu could fundamentally alter the government’s ability to pursue False Claims Act cases in the future.
Qui tam claims enable private citizens, or whistleblowers, to file lawsuits on behalf of the government if they know of an individual or company defrauding the government. Qui tam whistleblowers are eligible to receive between 15 and 30% of the government’s recovery. Whistleblowers acting through the qui tam provisions of the False Claims Act have recovered more than $70 billion since the law was strengthened in 1986. The law is regularly cited as one of the most important fraud-fighting statutes in existence.
In these cases, whistleblowers brought their suit forward on behalf of the government against SuperValu and Safeway, alleging that their pharmacies knowingly overbilled Medicare, Medicaid, and the Federal Employee Health Benefits Program for prescription drugs. The federally funded programs require that companies do not collect more than is “usual and customary” for the price that they charge for a given drug. The whistleblowers produced extensive documentation that for years SuperValu and Safeway offered customers a “price-matching” discount that they did not account for...
Washington, April 27 Prominent television hosts and journalists have pushed back against online claims that the White House ... Washington, April 27 Prominent television hosts and journalists have ...